title: Home sign

text: Studies of home signing children and adults show consistent pairing between the form of a gesture token and its meaning. These signs are also combined in compound gestures to create new words. The lack of bidirectionality in creation of home sign systems between the parent and child restricts the invention of signs with arbitrary meanings. The emergence of a conventionalized lexicon proceeds slower in a home sign system than in natural languages with a richer social network. Study of adult home signers in Nicaragua show that home signers use gesture to communicate about number, with cardinal numeral and non-cardinal numeral markings.


title: Home sign

text: Home sign systems have simple morphology. Gestures are composed of parts with a limited set of handshape forms. Hand shapes can be used in two ways: to represent a hand as it manipulates an object, or to represent the object itself. Morphophonological patterns in handshape production are more similar to conventionalized sign language handshapes than hearing individuals’ gestures. These handshapes are high in finger complexity for object handshapes and low in finger complexity for handling handshapes. Home signers also use handshape as a productive morphological marker in predicates, displaying a distinction between nominals and predicates. Study of adolescent home signers show ability to express motion events, though this strategy differs from conventional sign language. The motions of signs used in home sign systems can vary in length of path and directionality. Most of the hand shape morphemes could be found in combination with more than one motion morpheme, and vice versa.


title: Home sign

text: Within an individual system, home signers show consistency in a particular word order that distinguishes the subject of the utterance. Across home sign systems there is preference for action to be utterance-final. Structural dependency, words grouped based on a hierarchical structure or pattern, has been studied in Brazilian home signers who consistently produce modifiers with the noun modified. Gestural markers for negation (side to side head shake) and "wh"-form questions (manual flip) show consistent meaning, use, and position. Home signers mark grammatical subjects in sentences and are able to distinguish the subject from the topic of the sentence. These systems show some evidence of a prosodic system for marking phrase and utterance boundaries.


title: Home sign

text: Home signing children vary greatly in how often they display narrative skills; however, their narratives show similar structural patterns. This includes elaborating on basic narrative by including setting, actions, a complication, and temporal order. Hearing mothers produce co-narration with deaf children less frequently (than hearing mothers do with hearing children), and these contributions are spoken and rarely gestural.


title: Home sign

text: The context of home sign system creation includes limited or no exposure to a spoken or signed language model, isolation from deaf children and adults, and parental choices regarding communication with the deaf child. Home sign creation is a common experience of deaf children in hearing families, as approximately 75% of hearing parents do not sign and communicate with their deaf children using a small set of gestures, speaking, and lipreading. In a home with parents who are deaf or know sign language, a child can pick up the sign language in the same way a hearing child can pick up spoken language.


title: Home sign

text: Home signs are a starting point for many sign languages. When a group of deaf people come together without a common sign language, they may share features of their individual home sign systems creating a village sign language that may establish itself as a complete language over time. However, home signs are rarely passed on to more than one generation, because they generally fade when the deaf child is exposed to language outside of the home.


title: Home sign

text: Deaf children who use home sign are distinguished from feral children who are deprived of meaningful social and linguistic interaction. Home signing children are socially integrated to an extent with lack of conventional linguistic interaction. Home sign systems have some elements of language, and children who use these systems are able to acquire a natural sign language later in school.


title: Home sign

text: The deaf child is the creator of a home sign system. Mothers of adult home signers in Nicaragua were evaluated to determine their role in the development of their child's home sign system. The results of this study concluded that mothers comprehended spoken Spanish descriptions of events better than home sign descriptions, and native ASL signers performed better than mothers at understanding home sign productions. This suggests that mothers do not directly transmit home sign systems to their deaf children. Though caregivers' co-speech gestures may serve as an initial foundation for their child's home sign system, children surpass this input. Hearing caregivers typically do not share the same gestural communication system with the deaf child, using fewer gestures with less consistency and displaying different sentence-level patterns. A deaf child's gestural system is more likely to overlap with that of another home signer, including cross culturally.


title: Home sign

text: Social network structure influences the development of a home sign system, impacting the conventionalization of referring expressions among members. Richly connected networks, where all participants interact with one another using the communication system, show greater and faster conventionalization. Home sign systems are typically sparsely connected networks, where the home signer communicates with each member of the network but the members do not use home sign to communicate with each other.


title: Home sign

text: Studies by Deanna Gagne and Marie Coppola of perspective-taking abilities in adult home signers reveal that home signers do not pass experimental false-belief tasks, despite having visual observation of social interaction. False-belief understanding, integral to the development of theory of mind, requires language experience and linguistic input. Further study of these adult home signers indicates that home signers show precursor abilities for theory of mind, such as visual perspective taking.


title: Home sign

text: Lack of conventional language for numbers has been shown to affect numerical ability. In comparison to unschooled hearing and signing deaf individuals, adult home signers do not consistently produce gestures that accurately represent cardinal values of larger sets and do not exhibit effective use of finger counting strategies. Further study indicates home signers are able to recall gestures used as nouns, verbs, and adjectives, but they show poor number recall, which worsens as numbers increase.


title: Home sign

text: Syntactic structure is similar between groups of home signers in different cultures and geographical regions, including word order preferences and complex sentence usage. For example, home sign systems of children in Turkey and the United States exhibit similar patterns in sentence-level structure.<ref name=":


title: Home sign

text: Certain gestures, such as pointing, head shaking, and shrugging, share similar meanings throughout cultures. Young children shake their heads to indicate negation before they express negative meanings through language. However, most young children use the head shake as an initial marker of negation, and replace it with speech or manual signs once language is acquired. Children using a home sign system do not have exposure to a structured language, and therefore do not replace the head shake with manual signs until language is acquired.<ref name="Franklin et al 2011"


title: Home sign

text: Home sign systems differ across cultures in terms of gesture use by hearing caregivers. Compared to American mothers, Chinese mothers show more similarity in gesture form (handshape and motion) and syntax with systems used by their deaf children. In comparing narratives from Chinese and American deaf children, home signing children produce culturally appropriate narratives. Variability between home signers are group internal, with different individual home signers having their own set of gestures for the same type of objename=


title: String-searching algorithm

text: In computer science, string-searching algorithms, sometimes called string-matching algorithms, are an important class of string algorithms that try to find a place where one or several strings (also called patterns) are found within a larger string or text.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: A basic example of string searching is when the pattern and the searched text are arrays of elements of an alphabet (finite set) Σ. Σ may be a human language alphabet, for example, the letters "A" through "Z" and other applications may use a "binary alphabet" (Σ = {0,1}) or a "DNA alphabet" (Σ = {A,C,G,T}) in bioinformatics.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: In practice, the method of feasible string-search algorithm may be affected by the string encoding. In particular, if a variable-width encoding is in use, then it may be slower to find the "N"th character, perhaps requiring time proportional to "N". This may significantly slow some search algorithms. One of many possible solutions is to search for the sequence of code units instead, but doing so may produce false matches unless the encoding is specifically designed to avoid it.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: The most basic case of string searching involves one (often very long) string, sometimes called the "haystack", and one (often very short) string, sometimes called the "needle". The goal is to find one or more occurrences of the needle within the haystack. For example, one might search for "to" within:


title: String-searching algorithm

text: One might request the first occurrence of "to", which is the fourth word; or all occurrences, of which there are 3; or the last, which is the fifth word from the end.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Very commonly, however, various constraints are added. For example, one might want to match the "needle" only where it consists of one (or more) complete words—perhaps defined as "not" having other letters immediately adjacent on either side. In that case a search for "hew" or "low" should fail for the example sentence above, even though those literal strings do occur.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Another common example involves "normalization". For many purposes, a search for a phrase such as "to be" should succeed even in places where there is something else intervening between the "to" and the "be":


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Finally, for strings that represent natural language, aspects of the language itself become involved. For example, one might wish to find all occurrences of a "word" despite it having alternate spellings, prefixes or suffixes, etc.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Another more complex type of search is regular expression searching, where the user constructs a pattern of characters or other symbols, and any match to the pattern should fulfill the search. For example, to catch both the American English word "color" and the British equivalent "colour", instead of searching for two different literal strings, one might use a regular expression such as:


title: String-searching algorithm

text: A similar problem introduced in the field of bioinformatics and genomics is the maximal exact matching (MEM). Given two strings, MEMs are common substrings that cannot be extended left or right without causing a mismatch.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: A simple and inefficient way to see where one string occurs inside another is to check at each index, one by one. First, we see if there's a copy of the needle starting at the first character of the haystack; if not, we look to see if there's a copy of the needle starting at the second character of the haystack, and so forth. In the normal case, we only have to look at one or two characters for each wrong position to see that it is a wrong position, so in the average case, this takes O("n" + "m") steps, where "n" is the length of the haystack and "m" is the length of the needle; but in the worst case, searching for a string like "aaaab" in a string like "aaaaaaaaab", it takes O("nm")


title: String-searching algorithm

text: In this approach, backtracking is avoided by constructing a deterministic finite automaton (DFA) that recognizes stored search string. These are expensive to construct—they are usually created using the powerset construction—but are very quick to use. For example, the DFA shown to the right recognizes the word "MOMMY". This approach is frequently generalized in practice to search for arbitrary regular expressions.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Knuth–Morris–Pratt computes a DFA that recognizes inputs with the string to search for as a suffix, Boyer–Moore starts searching from the end of the needle, so it can usually jump ahead a whole needle-length at each step. Baeza–Yates keeps track of whether the previous "j" characters were a prefix of the search string, and is therefore adaptable to fuzzy string searching. The bitap algorithm is an application of Baeza–Yates' approach.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Faster search algorithms preprocess the text. After building a substring index, for example a suffix tree or suffix array, the occurrences of a pattern can be found quickly. As an example, a suffix tree can be built in formula_1 time, and all formula_2 occurrences of a pattern can be found in formula_3 time under the assumption that the alphabet has a constant size and all inner nodes in the suffix tree know what leaves are underneath them. The latter can be accomplished by running a DFS algorithm from the root of the suffix tree.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Some search methods, for instance trigram search, are intended to find a "closeness" score between the search string and the text rather than a "match/non-match". These are sometimes called "fuzzy" searches.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: In the following compilation, "m" is the length of the pattern, "n" the length of the searchable text, and "k" = |Σ| is the size of the alphabet.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: The Boyer–Moore string-search algorithm has been the standard benchmark for the practical string-search literature.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: In the following compilation, "M" is the length of the longest pattern, "m" their total length, "n" the length of the searchable text, "o" the number of occurrences.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Naturally, the patterns can not be enumerated finitely in this case. They are represented usually by a regular grammar or regular expression.


title: String-searching algorithm

text: Other classification approaches are possible. One of the most common uses preprocessing as main criteria.


title: 2015 Labour Party leadership election (UK)

text: The 2015 Labour Party leadership election was an internal Labour Party poll which was triggered by the resignation of Ed Miliband as Leader of the Labour Party on 8 May 2015, following the party's defeat at the 2015 general election. Harriet Harman, the Deputy Leader, became Acting Leader but announced that she would stand down after the leadership election. It was won by Jeremy Corbyn in the first round.


text: Four candidates were successfully nominated to stand in the election: Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper, Jeremy Corbyn, and Liz Kendall. The voting process began on Friday 14 August 2015 and closed on Thursday 10 September 2015, and the results were announced on Saturday 12 September 2015. Voting was by Labour Party members and registered and affiliated supporters, using the alternative vote system.


text: Support for Corbyn, who entered the race as a dark horse candidate, and the release of opinion polls which showed him leading the race, led to high-profile interventions by a number of prominent Labour figures including Gordon Brown, Tony Blair, Jack Straw, David Miliband, and Alastair Campbell, among others, many of whom argued that Corbyn's election as leader would leave the party unelectable.


text: Despite these interventions, Corbyn was elected in the first round receiving 59.5% of the votes, winning in all three sections of the ballot. Less than a year later, a leadership challenge saw another leadership election, where Corbyn again won, with an increased share of the vote.


text: The leadership election, triggered by Ed Miliband's resignation, took place under the reformed rules adopted from the proposals of the February 2014 Collins Report, which was led by Ray Collins, Baron Collins of Highbury, and was itself partly the result of calls for inquiry and reform relating to the 2013 Falkirk Selection Scandal. The plan entailed a shorter election than the one that took place in 2010, with a new leader being in place before Labour's party conference in September 2015.


text: The review changed the way in which Labour elects leaders. Under the former system, a three-way electoral college chose the leader, with one-third weight given to the votes of the Parliamentary Labour Party (i.e., Labour members of the House of Commons and Labour members of the European Parliament), one-third to individual Labour Party members, and one third to the trade union and affiliated societies sections. Following the Collins review, the electoral college was replaced by a pure "one member, one vote" (OMOV) system. Candidates are elected by members and registered and affiliated supporters, who all receive a maximum of one vote and all votes are weighted equally. This meant that, for example, members of Labour-affiliated trade unions needed to register as Labour supporters to vote.


text: To stand, candidates now needed to be nominated by at least 15% of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP), i.e. 35 MPs, at that time. The vote, as in previous elections, was held under the alternative vote (instant-runoff) system. The deputy leadership election was held under the same rules.


text: In late August, the Labour Party reported that about 552,000 members and supporters were eligible to vote; about 292,000 full members, 148,000 affiliated supporters (members of trade unions and socialist societies who opted to affiliate), plus 112,000 registered supporters.


text: A meeting of Labour's National Executive Committee took place on 13 May 2015 to set a timetable and procedure for the two elections.


text: The deadline on 12 August 2015 to join as a member or supporter was extended by 3 hours due to heavy demand making the party website difficult to use.


text: To be placed on the ballot, candidates for leader had to obtain the nominations of 35 MPs. An MP who nominates a candidate does not have to subsequently support, or vote for, that candidate. Some MPs have stated that they nominated only to ensure that candidate got onto the ballot paper.


text: The number of MPs next to the candidate's name below includes the candidate, who can count as one of the 35 MPs needed. Public nominations for candidates by MPs were as follows:


text: Before dropping out of the race on 12 June, Mary Creagh had 10 nominations: Sarah Champion, Jo Cox, Neil Coyle, Thangam Debbonaire, Helen Hayes, Susan Jones, Mike Kane, Stephen Kinnock, Tulip Siddiq


text: A total of 26 Labour MPs did not nominate any candidate: Graham Allen, Ben Bradshaw, Alan Campbell, Rosie Cooper, Mary Creagh, Stella Creasy, John Cryer, Angela Eagle, Natascha Engel, Caroline Flint, Barry Gardiner, Roger Godsiff, Harriet Harman, Meg Hillier, Lindsay Hoyle, Alan Johnson, Sir Gerald Kaufman, Ed Miliband, Rob Marris, Ian Murray, Graham Stringer, Mark Tami, Keith Vaz, Tom Watson, David Winnick, Rosie Winterton


text: Burnham was praised for having both "a radical left-wing vision" and being credible enough "to unite the party and win back power", as well as for being someone who "actually listens to party members and the public".


text: Burnham attracted press criticism for claiming £17,000 a year from the taxpayer to rent a London flat, despite owning another within walking distance of the House of Commons. A spokesman for Burnham said that renting out the original flat was necessary to "cover his costs" as parliamentary rule changes meant he was no longer able to claim for mortgage interest expenses. Burnham was criticised for saying that Labour should have a woman leader "when the time is right", with the "New Statesman" saying that he had "tripped over his mouth again".


text: Cooper was praised by the "Huffington Post" for her hard work in local constituencies during the leadership contest and for her preparation for the Local Government Association hustings.


text: She has been criticised both for thanking David Miliband for putting her as his second choice (after Liz Kendall) and for her "broken, downbeat delivery".


text: Corbyn's leadership bid was the subject of fierce discussion within the media. Janan Ganesh in the "Financial Times" argued that the election of Corbyn "spells disaster" for the Labour Party. Owen Jones argued in "The Guardian" that the reason Corbyn was so popular was because he "offers a coherent, inspiring and, crucially, a hopeful vision" addressing social injustice and economic inequality, comparing the surge of support for Corbyn to the popularity of both UKIP in England and the Scottish National Party (SNP) in Scotland.


text: In June 2015, Kendall's leadership bid received praise from "The Sun", who said that she is the "only prayer they [the Labour Party] have". "The Sun" also praised her for saying 'the country comes first' in response to Andy Burnham who said 'the [Labour] Party always comes first' in the "Newsnight" Labour leadership hustings. Commentators from across the political spectrum have said that Kendall is the leadership candidate that the Conservatives "fear the most".


text: However, the Huffington Post criticised her, saying "Liz Kendall just doesn't seem to have it, she seems to be always on the verge of tripping over her own words, as if she is perpetually being caught off guard."


text: One of the most notable features of the election was the large increase in Labour Party membership, and the registration of significant numbers of the new affiliated and registered classes of voting supporters, during the period of the campaign. Concern was expressed that the new rules were unfairly benefiting Corbyn, and there might be a legal challenge, but in the event the result was so decisive these concerns were not pursued after the election.


text: In June 2015, the Conservative-identifying political commentator Toby Young wrote in the "Telegraph" encouraging Conservatives to join Labour to vote for Jeremy Corbyn, his reason being "to consign Labour to electoral oblivion". This trended on Twitter as #ToriesforCorbyn and the attempt, as well as Labour's response, were subject to criticism. Two days later the Communist Party of Great Britain (Provisional Central Committee) wrote also in support of Corbyn. Following this, Labour MP John Mann called for the election to be halted. Acting leader of the party Harriet Harman responded by calling on constituency parties to check new members, but stated that Labour has "a robust system to prevent fraudulent or malicious applications." Labour MP Fabian Hamilton stated there was "no evidence" that groups were trying to infiltrate the election. Leadership candidates Andy Burnham and Liz Kendall also responded by saying there was no evidence of infiltration, and while not dismissing the claims, Corbyn stated he only wanted "genuine Labour supporters" to vote for him.


text: It emerged in early August 2015 that 260 former candidates from the Green Party, Left Unity and the Trade Union and Socialist Coalition had attempted to become registered supporters but would now be blocked from voting. Shortly before this it was revealed that Conservative MP and former junior minister Tim Loughton had been caught applying to become a registered Labour supporter, subsequently claiming that his intention was to "blow the gaff on what a complete farce the whole thing is". Veteran Labour MP Barry Sheerman also joined calls for the election to be "paused" over the fears of infiltration by other parties. The Labour Party told representatives of the four candidates at a meeting on 11 August that 1,200 members and supporters of other parties had been excluded and a further 800 were under investigation. Harriet Harman at the time admitted that as many as 100,000 people may be blocked from voting.


text: The number of those rejected would eventually reach 56,000, around 9.1% of the 610,753 considered eligible to vote at the start of the contest. According to the party, 45,000 of those were rejected for not being on the electoral register.


text: Labour also confirmed that it would cancel supporters' votes after they had been cast if it was found that they were members of other parties. A number of high-profile individuals were blocked from voting, including Marcus Chown, Jeremy Hardy, Douglas Henshall, Ken Loach, Francesca Martinez, Mark Serwotka, Pete Sinclair, Mark Steel, Luke Wright and Toby Young.


text: Andrew MacKinlay, a former Labour MP, further alleged that Labour was attempting to rig its own leadership election against Corbyn; a view shared by comedian Jeremy Hardy. Such allegations became known to the media – and particularly Corbyn supporters – as the "Labour Purge", with #LabourPurge trending on Twitter. Claims of such a "purge" of Corbyn supporters were rejected by Harman who insisted that the exclusion processes were impartial to candidates. Scottish newspaper "The National" printed a page-long satirical cartoon speculating further vote-rigging by Labour's leadership.


text: With less than 24 hours to go before the voting deadline, the party closed their telephone helpline. The move came during widespread complaints from "thousands" of voters who were missing emailed or physical ballot papers. "The Guardian" reported that one of their sources in the leadership camps stated that "the party has basically decided to stop taking calls and if you don't have a vote, you're now basically not getting one." The party refused to confirm how many ballot papers had actually been sent. Andy Burnham publicly criticised the number of missing ballots and the closure of the phone line.


text: Labour MP David Lammy called for a full inquiry into the missing ballot papers. Of the 200 people his team phone called in London on the eve of the deadline, one in five were missing their ballots.


text: The polls in this section have been undertaken by media pollsters known to use industry standard polling methods.


text: Where there is more than one line for a poll, this is for when a candidate has been eliminated and their second or third preference votes passed onto another candidate.


text: The polls below asked Labour supporters across the country how they would vote in the leadership election if they were eligible.


text: The polls below asked voters across the country how they would vote in the leadership election if they were eligible.


text: The polls below asked voters in London how they would vote in the leadership election if they were eligible.


text: The polls below were conducted before nominations for the leadership closed and therefore include Labour politicians who were not in the final four candidates who were nominated.


text: Turnout for the vote was 422,871 (76.3%) of the 554,272 eligible voters, with 207 spoilt ballots. 343,995 votes (81.3%) were cast online, the UK's largest online ballot.


text: Ed Miliband, former party leader, offered his support to Corbyn and urged other Labour MPs to do so, though he ruled himself out of taking on a position in Corbyn's shadow cabinet, to focus on representing his constituency. Kezia Dugdale, then leader of Scottish Labour, declared that "politics has changed" and people desired a "radical change", with Corbyn's election to the leadership showing that Labour had "listened to that call". Carwyn Jones, then leader of Welsh Labour and First Minister of Wales, congratulated Corbyn and urged the party to embrace the fact that the campaign had "energised a huge number of people who were previously disengaged from party politics" and unite around their new leader.


text: David Cameron, then leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister, stated that Corbyn's win would make the Labour Party a threat "to our national security, to our economic security and to the security of your family". This echoed the same warning from other Cabinet ministers, including Michael Fallon, then Secretary of State for Defence, and from an email sent by Conservative Campaign Headquarters to party members. However Nick Hurd, former Minister for Civil Society, and Daniel Hannan, then MEP for South East England, both warned their party against "complacency". Ruth Davidson, then leader of the Scottish Conservative Party, said that the result demonstrated that Labour had given up on being in government, and that many Labour MPs would show "despair at his appointment".


text: Nigel Farage, then leader of the UK Independence Party, congratulated Corbyn but added his concerns about the new Labour leader's immigration policies. Before Corbyn's win, Farage stated that Corbyn's "sweeping emergence on the Left of British politics, where he has helped re-engage many who had given up on politics, is a good thing for our democracy".


text: Tim Farron, then leader of the Liberal Democrats, commented on the "massive space in the centre ground of British politics" that had been opened up, due to the perceived shift leftwards by Labour, and suggested that the Liberal Democrats would be able to appeal more directly to "sensible, moderate, progressives who are opposed to what the Conservatives are doing, but cannot bring themselves to support a party of the hard left". The President of the Liberal Democrats, Sal Brinton, accused Labour of abdicating "its responsibilities" as a party of effective opposition. Willie Rennie, leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, said that Corbyn's success meant a "return to the damaging see saw politics of the past". Kirsty Williams, leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, attacked Corbyn as the "opposite of what this country needs", accusing Labour of returning to its 1970s policies.


text: Natalie Bennett, then leader of the Green Party of England and Wales released a statement saying that her party would be "delighted" to work with Corbyn on a range of issues where they share common ground.


text: Nicola Sturgeon, leader of the Scottish National Party and First Minister of Scotland, praised Corbyn on winning the leadership contest but claimed that Labour's failure to defeat the Conservatives at the next general election would further the cause for Scottish independence and leave the SNP as the only real opposition.


text: Leanne Wood, then leader of Plaid Cymru congratulated Corbyn and urged the Labour Party to join with her party's MPs in opposing "Tory policies that are causing great harm to people in Wales and beyond".


text: Alasdair McDonnell, then leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party commended Corbyn on an "incredible election campaign" and urged him to work towards returning Labour to an electable position, as well as opposing Conservative policies.


text: Mike Nesbitt, then leader of the Ulster Unionist Party called on Corbyn to maintain Labour's policy towards Northern Ireland and "support agreements brought forward by the local parties".


text: Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Krugman said that it was not surprising that Jeremy Corbyn won the leadership contest, as all the candidates except for Corbyn essentially supported the Conservative government's austerity policies. As Krugman noted, not only the candidates but also the Labour moderates implicitly agreed with their opponents' idea that the government budget should always be balanced by the austerity policies. Krugman argued that it was a false claim that the Labour party, in power during 1997–2010, spent far beyond their means and caused a debt crisis.


text: Economist Joseph Stiglitz, also a Nobel prize winner, argued that the Labour party platform was different from what a leftist party must do, saying that Labour had not opposed austerity programmes. He added that Corbyn's camp offered a left-wing agenda and therefore Stiglitz was not surprised at all that Corbyn became the contender for the leadership contest.


title: Dormancy

text: Dormancy is a period in an organism's life cycle when growth, development, and (in animals) physical activity are temporarily stopped. This minimizes metabolic activity and therefore helps an organism to conserve energy. Dormancy tends to be closely associated with environmental conditions. Organisms can synchronize entry to a dormant phase with their environment through predictive or consequential means. Predictive dormancy occurs when an organism enters a dormant phase "before" the onset of adverse conditions. For example, photoperiod and decreasing temperature are used by many plants to predict the onset of winter. Consequential dormancy occurs when organisms enter a dormant phase "after" adverse conditions have arisen. This is commonly found in areas with an unpredictable climate. While very sudden changes in conditions may lead to a high mortality rate among animals relying on consequential dormancy, its use can be advantageous, as organisms remain active longer and are therefore able to make greater use of available resources.


title: Dormancy

text: Hibernation is a mechanism used by many mammals to reduce energy expenditure and survive food shortages over the winter. Hibernation may be predictive or consequential. An animal prepares for hibernation by building up a thick layer of body fat during late summer and autumn that will provide it with energy during the dormant period. During hibernation, the animal undergoes many physiological changes, including decreased heart rate (by as much as 95%) and decreased body temperature. In addition to shivering, some hibernating animals also produce body heat by non-shivering thermogenesis to avoid freezing. Non-shivering thermogenesis is a regulated process in which the proton gradient generated by electron transport in mitochondria is used to produce heat instead of ATP in brown adipose tissue. Animals that hibernate include bats, ground squirrels and other rodents, mouse lemurs, the European hedgehog and other insectivores, monotremes and marsupials. Although hibernation is almost exclusively seen in mammals, some birds, such as the common poorwill, may hibernate.


title: Dormancy

text: Diapause is a predictive strategy that is predetermined by an animal's genotype. Diapause is common in insects, allowing them to suspend development between autumn and spring, and in mammals such as the roe deer ("Capreolus capreolus", the only ungulate with embryonic diapause), in which a delay in attachment of the embryo to the uterine lining ensures that offspring are born in spring, when conditions are most favorable.


title: Dormancy

text: Aestivation, also spelled "estivation", is an example of consequential dormancy in response to very hot or dry conditions. It is common in invertebrates such as the garden snail and worm but also occurs in other animals such as lungfish, salamanders, desert tortoises, and crocodiles.


title: Dormancy

text: While endotherms and other heterotherms are described scientifically as hibernating, the way ectotherms such as lizards become dormant in cold is very different, and a separate name was invented for it in the 1920s: brumation. It differs from hibernation in the metabolic processes involved.


title: Dormancy

text: Reptiles generally begin brumation in late autumn (more specific times depend on the species). They often wake up to drink water and return to "sleep". They can go for months without food. Reptiles may eat more than usual before the brumation time but eat less or refuse food as the temperature drops. However, they do need to drink water. The brumation period is anywhere from one to eight months depending on the air temperature and the size, age, and health of the reptile. During the first year of life, many small reptiles do not fully brumate, but rather slow down and eat less often. Brumation is triggered by a lack of heat and a decrease in the hours of daylight in winter, similar to hibernation.


title: Dormancy

text: In plant physiology, dormancy is a period of arrested plant growth. It is a survival strategy exhibited by many plant species, which enables them to survive in climates where part of the year is unsuitable for growth, such as winter or dry seasons.


title: Dormancy

text: Many plant species that exhibit dormancy have a biological clock that tells them when to slow activity and to prepare soft tissues for a period of freezing temperatures or water shortage. On the other hand, dormancy can be triggered after a normal growing season by decreasing temperatures, shortened day length, and/or a reduction in rainfall. Chemical treatment on dormant plants has been proven to be an effective method to break dormancy, particularly in woody plants such as grapes, berries, apples, peaches, and kiwis. Specifically, hydrogen cyanamide stimulates cell division and growth in dormant plants, causing buds to break when the plant is on the edge of breaking dormancy. Slight injury of cells may play a role in the mechanism of action. The injury is thought to result in increased permeability of cellular membranes. The injury is associated with the inhibition of catalase, which in turn stimulates the pentose phosphate cycle. Hydrogen cyanamide interacts with the cytokinin metabolic cycle, which results in triggering a new growth cycle. The images below show two particularly widespread dormancy patterns amongst sympodially growing orchids:


title: Dormancy

text: When a mature and viable seed under a favorable condition fails to germinate, it is said to be dormant. Seed dormancy is referred to as embryo dormancy or internal dormancy and is caused by endogenous characteristics of the embryo that prevent germination (Black M, Butler J, Hughes M. 1987). Dormancy should not be confused with seed coat dormancy, external dormancy, or hardheadedness, which is caused by the presence of a hard seed covering or seed coat that prevents water and oxygen from reaching and activating the embryo. It is a physical barrier to germination, not a true form of dormancy (Quinliven, 1971; Quinliven and Nichol, 1971).


title: Dormancy

text: Seed dormancy is desired in nature, but the opposite in the agriculture field. This is because agricultural practice desires rapid germination and growth for food whereas in nature, most plants are only capable of germinating once every year, making it favorable for plants to pick a specific time to reproduce. For many plants, it is preferable to reproduce in spring as opposed to fall even when there are similar conditions in terms of light and temperature due to the ensuing winter that follows fall. Many plants and seeds recognize this and enter a dormant period in the fall to stop growing. The grain is a popular example in this aspect, where they would die above ground during the winter, so dormancy is favorable to its seedlings but extensive domestication and crossbreeding has removed most dormancy mechanisms that their ancestors had.


title: Dormancy

text: While seed dormancy is linked to many genes, abscisic acid (ABA), a plant hormone, has been linked as a major influencer to seed dormancy. In a study on rice and tobacco plants, plants defective in zeaxanthin epoxidase gene, which are linked to ABA-synthesis pathway. Seeds with higher ABA content, from over-expressing zeaxanthin epoxidase, led to an increased dormancy period while plants with lower numbers of zeaxanthin epoxidase were shown to have a shorter period of dormancy. A simple diagram can be drawn of ABA inhibits seed germination, while gibberellin (GA, also plant hormone) inhibits ABA production and promotes seed germination.


title: Dormancy

text: Typically, temperate woody perennial plants require chilling temperatures to overcome winter dormancy (rest). The effect of chilling temperatures depends on species and growth stage (Fuchigami et al. 1987). In some species, rest can be broken within hours at any stage of dormancy, with either chemicals, heat, or freezing temperatures, effective dosages of which would seem to be a function of sublethal stress, which results in stimulation of ethylene production and increased cell membrane permeability.


title: Dormancy

text: "Dormancy" is a general term applicable to any instance in which a tissue predisposed to elongate or grow in some other manner does not do so (Nienstaedt 1966). "Quiescence" is dormancy imposed by the external environment. "Correlated inhibition" is a kind of physiological dormancy maintained by agents or conditions originating within the plant, but not within the dormant tissue itself. "Rest" (winter dormancy) is a kind of physiological dormancy maintained by agents or conditions within the organ itself. However, physiological subdivisions of dormancy do not coincide with the morphological dormancy found in white spruce ("Picea glauca") and other conifers (Owens et al. 1977). Physiological dormancy often includes early stages of bud-scale initiation before measurable shoot elongation or before flushing. It may also include late leaf initiation after shoot elongation has been completed. In either of those cases, buds that appear to be dormant are nevertheless very active morphologically and physiologically.


title: Dormancy

text: Dormancy of various kinds is expressed in white spruce (Romberger 1963). White spruce, like many woody plants in temperate and cooler regions, requires exposure to low temperature for a period of weeks before it can resume normal growth and development. This "chilling requirement" for white spruce is satisfied by uninterrupted exposure to temperatures below 7 °C for 4 to 8 weeks, depending on physiological condition (Nienstaedt 1966, 1967).


title: Dormancy

text: Tree species that have well-developed dormancy needs may be tricked to some degree, but not completely. For instance, if a Japanese maple ("Acer palmatum") is given an "eternal summer" through exposure to additional daylight, it grows continuously for as long as two years. Eventually, however, a temperate-climate plant automatically goes dormant, no matter what environmental conditions it experiences. Deciduous plants lose their leaves; evergreens curtail all new growth. Going through an "eternal summer" and the resultant automatic dormancy is stressful to the plant and usually fatal. The fatality rate increases to 100% if the plant does not receive the necessary period of cold temperatures required to break the dormancy. Most plants require a certain number of hours of "chilling" at temperatures between about 0 °C and 10 °C to be able to break dormancy (Bewley, Black, K.D 1994).


title: Dormancy

text: Short photoperiods induce dormancy and permit the formation of needle primordia. Primordia formation requires 8 to 10 weeks and must be followed by 6 weeks of chilling at 2 °C. Bud break occurs promptly if seedlings are then exposed to 16-hour photoperiods at the 25 °C/20 °C temperature regime. The free growth mode, a juvenile characteristic that is lost after 5 years or so, ceases in seedlings experiencing environmental stress (Logan and Pollard 1976, Logan 1977).


title: Dormancy

text: Many bacteria can survive adverse conditions such as temperature, desiccation, and antibiotics by forming endospores, cysts, or states of reduced metabolic activity lacking specialized cellular structures. Up to 80% of the bacteria in samples from the wild appear to be metabolically inactive—many of which can be resuscitated. Such dormancy is responsible for the high diversity levels of most natural ecosystems.


title: Dormancy

text: Recent research has characterized the bacterial cytoplasm as a glass forming fluid approaching the liquid-glass transition, such that large cytoplasmic components require the aid of metabolic activity to fluidize the surrounding cytoplasm, allowing them to move through a viscous, glass-like cytoplasm. During dormancy, when such metabolic activities are put on hold, the cytoplasm behaves like a solid glass, 'freezing' subcellular structures in place and perhaps protecting them, while allowing small molecules like metabolites to move freely through the cell, which may be helpful in cells transitioning out of dormancy.


title: Dormancy

text: Dormancy, in its rigid definition, does not apply to viruses, as they are not metabolically active. However, some viruses such as poxviruses and picornaviruses, after entering the host, can become latent for long periods of time, or even indefinitely until they are externally activated. Herpesviruses, for example, can become latent after infecting the host, and after years they can activate again if the host is under stress or exposed to ultraviolet radiation.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Akita is the capital and largest city of Akita Prefecture. Other major cities include Yokote, Daisen, and Yurihonjō. Akita Prefecture is located on the coast of the Sea of Japan and extends east to the Ōu Mountains, the longest mountain range in Japan, at the border with Iwate Prefecture. Akita Prefecture formed the northern half of the historic Dewa Province with Yamagata Prefecture.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Separated from the principal Japanese centres of commerce, politics, and population by several hundred kilometres and by the Ōu and Dewa mountain ranges to the east, Akita remained largely isolated from Japanese society until after the year 600. Akita was a region of hunter-gatherers and principally nomadic tribes.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: The first historical record of what is now Akita Prefecture dates to 658, when Abe no Hirafu conquered the native Ezo tribes at what are now the cities of Akita and Noshiro. Abe, then governor of Koshi Province (the northwestern part of Honshū bordering the Sea of Japan), established a fort on the Mogami River, and thus began the Japanese settlement of the region.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: In 733, a new military settlement (later renamed Akita Castle) was built in what is now the Takashimizu area of Akita, and more permanent roads and structures were developed. The region was used as a base of operations for the Japanese empire as it drove the native Ezo people from northern Honshū.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Governance of the region shifted hands several times. During the Tokugawa shogunate it was appropriated to the Satake clan, who ruled the region for 260 years and developed the agriculture and mining industries that are still predominant today. Throughout this period, it was classified as part of Dewa Province. In 1871, during the Meiji Restoration, Dewa Province was reshaped and the old daimyō domains were abolished and administratively reconstructed, resulting in the modern-day borders of Akita.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: The famous Heian period waka poet, Ono no Komachi, is said to have been born in Yuzawa City, Ogachi Town, located in the southeast of the prefecture.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Located on the north-western side of Honshu, Akita Prefecture is adjacent to the Sea of Japan to the west and borders four other prefectures: Aomori in the north, Iwate in the east, Miyagi in the southeast, and Yamagata in the south.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: The borders of Akita Prefecture roughly form a rectangle that is 169 kilometres (105 miles) from north to south and 86 kilometres (54 miles) from west to east. The Oga Peninsula is a prominent feature of the western edge, while the Ōu Mountains mark the eastern border and the higher Dewa Mountains run parallel through the center. Like much of northern Japan, the prefecture has cold winters, particularly in areas farther from the sea.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: As of 31 March 2019, 11% of the total land area of the prefecture is designated as Natural Parks, namely the Towada-Hachimantai National Park; Chōkai, Kurikoma, and Oga Quasi-National Parks; and Akita Shirakami, Hachimori Iwadate, Kimimachizaka, Magi Mahiru, Moriyoshizan, Taiheizan, Tashirodake, and Tazawako Dakigaeri Prefectural Natural Parks.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Like much of the Tōhoku Region, Akita's economy remains dominated by traditional industries such as agriculture, fishing, and forestry. This has led many young people to migrate to Tokyo and other large cities. Akita Prefecture has seen some of the most severe population decline in Japan: it is one of four prefectures in Japan registering declines in population since 1955. Its population also has the lowest percentage of children, at 11.2%. As of October 1, 2019, it has a population of approximately 966,000 people.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: The high rate of depopulation in Akita Prefecture has led smaller communities to merge with each other, which has affected the smallest of these merged communities. As depopulation in these communities continues, educational and health facilities have closed in some areas, encouraging families to migrate to larger cities for better access to health and educational opportunities and perpetuating the decline in population. This decline, combined with an aging population, has been concerning for rural communities.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Akita, 秋田, meaning autumn rice paddy, is famous for rice farming and its sake breweries. It is well known for having the highest consumption of sake in Japan and is thought to be the origin of the Akita breed of dog which carries the prefecture's name. The women of the region, referred to as , have also gained widespread renown for their white skin, rounded faces and high voices, all of which are considered highly desirable. Ono no Komachi is a famous example of an "Akita bijin".


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Recently there have been efforts to revitalize rural communities facing depopulation with different forms of green tourism and agritourism. These efforts are primarily aimed at attracting urbanites and foreign tourists to Akita Prefecture, advertising its pristine forests, sprawling rice fields, and range of cultures. There has been a push for home stays, farmers markets for locally produced foods, and the integration of outsiders into local cultural practices. The Namahage ritual in Oga on New Year's Eve draws a large number of tourists to Akita Prefecture every year.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Near Lake Tazawa, there are a number of hot springs resorts ("onsen"). These are popular with tourists from all over Japan. In addition, numerous seasonal festivals ("matsuri") offer a glimpse of rural or traditional Japan. Some famous examples are the Akita Kantō, the Omagari Fireworks, Namahage Festival, and the Yokote Kamakura Festivals.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Kakunodate, known as the little Kyoto, features many preserved samurai houses. The Aoyagi house is the former residence of Odano Naotake, who illustrated Japan's first modern guide to human anatomy. The house is now a museum and gallery of medical illustrations and traditional crafts.


title: Akita Prefecture

text: Starting in 2009, Akita began experiencing a huge surge in Korean tourism after the airing of the popular drama "Iris", which featured several scenes shot in Akita, most notably at Lake Tazawa and Oga's GAO Aquarium.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The American Film Institute Awards (also known as the AFI Awards) are awards presented by the American Film Institute to recognize the top 10 films and television programs of the year. Unlike other accolades about the art form, the AFI Awards acknowledge the film and television productions deemed culturally and artistically representative of the year's most significant achievements in the art of the moving image in American cinema.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: Media that does not fit the AFI's conventional eligibility criteria for the main categories, such as non-American productions as well as other types of media, are given recognition through the AFI Special Award.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The 2001 AFI Awards honored the best in film and television of the year. The nominations were announced on December 17, 2001, and the ceremony was broadcast on January 5, 2002, on CBS. It did not do well in the ratings (getting only 5.5 million viewers), so it would not be held in this format again. The AFI would go back to just listing the Top 10 Films and Top 10 Television Programs of the year, and not have any technical nor acting categories.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The AFI Special Award was given to "Mad Men", which for "its contributions to America's cultural legacy". The show has been listed in AFI's awards list seven times.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The 2019 AFI Awards honored the Top 10 Films and Top 10 Television Programs of the year. The winners were announced on December 4, 2019, while the ceremony was held on January 3, 2020.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: "Game of Thrones" earned its eighth mention, setting a new record. It also became the first and only continuing series to be awarded for all of its eligible seasons.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The 2020 AFI Awards were announced on January 25, 2021, and the selections were honored in a virtual event on February 26, 2021. The juries were led by Jeanine Basinger and Richard Frank.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The 2021 AFI Awards were announced on December 8, 2021. The ceremony was scheduled to be held on January 7, 2022, but was postponed to March 11, 2022, due to COVID-19.


title: American Film Institute Awards

text: The 2022 AFI Awards were announced on December 9, 2022. The juries were led by Jeanine Basinger and Richard Frank.


title: KevJumba

text: Kevin Wu (born June 12, 1990) is an American former YouTuber best known under the username KevJumba. The "San Francisco Chronicle"<nowiki>'</nowiki>s Jeff Yang has noted that Wu is not a comedian in the conventional sense but that by "just talking [he] is, well, pretty hilarious" due to his deadpan vocal delivery, animated facial expressions and tendency toward unexpected digressions.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu previously appeared on The CW Television Network's short-lived "Online Nation" and co-starred with Jessica Lee Rose and Philip DeFranco in "Hooking Up" from HBOLabs (the online arm of HBO) in 2008. In 2010, Wu and his father, Michael, competed as a team on the 17th season of "The Amazing Race", placing seventh out of eleven teams. In 2014, Wu starred in crime drama film "Revenge of the Green Dragons" (executive produced by Martin Scorsese). In 2013, Wu ceased production of YouTube content. In 2016, Wu returned for a brief period of time on social media. In November 2020, Wu created an account on Twitch, originally titled cybermuse.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu was born on June 12, 1990, in Houston, Texas. His father, Michael Wu, a Taiwanese immigrant, is a computer engineer. Wu graduated from Clements High School in Sugar Land, Texas in 2008 and attended the University of California, Davis for two years before dropping out. He was living in downtown Los Angeles while in the entertainment business but later relocated back to Houston.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu was severely injured in a car crash in June 2015. In May 2019, Wu completed his bachelor's degree in psychology at the University of Houston.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu was known for posting humorous videos on YouTube. When Wu's "I Have to Deal With Stereotypes" video was featured on YouTube's home page, his number of viewers began to increase. In this video, Wu talks about stereotypes he has to deal with as an Asian-American. He tries to disprove his cheapness by bragging about the recent purchase of a "brand new, top-of-the-line, TI-84 calculator". He acknowledges that this might make him nerdy but dismisses this stereotype too as he does not "make all A's...in school today [he] made a B+." He is then greeted by a voice that was supposed to be his mother calling him a loser and accusing him of dishonoring their family. Wu goes on to say he can prove his predominant social life with the constant ringing of his cell phone. At this point, his phone indeed rings, he answers it, and the voice on the other end to Wu's disappointment says, "Hey, why did you tell me to call you?" Wu has collaborated with fellow YouTube comedian Christine Gambito (HappySlip), making five videos with her.


title: KevJumba

text: Following his video, "Butthash Hero", Wu introduced his father, PapaJumba, onto his YouTube channel, and his father made several appearances in candid video clips taken by his son. Responding to Wu's father's growing popularity among viewers, his father made a debut in "I Love My Dad", and has been featured alongside his son many times since.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu began uploading videos onto Youtube during his junior year of high school. On February 26, 2008, the "Los Angeles Times" compared the web series "Quarterlife"'s viewership to Wu's. At the time Wu was a "semi-well known YouTube blogger" and had received 450,000 views for a video describing how he broke his shin. Quarterlife, which had been picked up by NBC, had received only 100,000 views on MySpace and 50,000 views on YouTube. By May 29, 2008, Wu had become one of three East Asians under the age of 21 to be in the top five of YouTube's all-time most subscribed users with 187,000 subscribers and more than 5.9 million views. By June 5, 2008, he had become the number one subscribed comedian on YouTube, and third most subscribed uploader overall. Wu's videos have received replies from Ella Koon, Jessica Alba, and Baron Davis.


title: KevJumba

text: In 2008, Davis created a "longest stare" contest for ibeatyou.com, a site that he and Alba's husband Cash Warren co-founded. The contest began with Davis challenging Wu, who then challenged Alba, who responded to the challenge. In 2011, Wu began performing with Yesterday, Today, Forever (YTF) along with other YouTube personalities. The group performed their first concert on October 9, 2011 in Honolulu, Hawaii. In June 2012, Wu began starring in YouTube videos on a new channel called YOMYOMF. He stars in his own series titled "KevJumba Takes All".


title: KevJumba

text: As of August 2014, Wu had more than 3,000,000 subscribers and more than 350 million combined views on the videos in his main channel. His combined video views total over 343.9 million. In early 2016, Wu privatized his videos on the KevJumba account, disabling all content to the public. However, the 35 videos on Wu's JumbaFund channel are still public. The privatized videos were later released again back to the public. He eventually uploaded two new videos titled "Hope." and "YOUTH REPRESENT" LIVE (Internet Power!)" in March 2017.


title: KevJumba

text: The web series "Funemployed", launched in the summer of 2010, stars Wu and Philip Wang of Wong Fu Productions and includes other notable YouTube stars such as Nigahiga, David Choi, Kina Grannis, and Chester See. With the large number of fans, this series quickly took off and became a hit, reaching 500,000 viewers in only a few weeks. The series focuses on two good friends named Kyle (Wu) and Jason (Philip Wang), and how they are dealing with unemployment after Jason is laid off at work. Kyle is characterized as the typical laid back guy, who comes off as somewhat of a slacker, while Jason is characterized as the more studious hard worker of the two. The two eventually come up with an idea of how to make money, believing that YouTube is the key, an allusion to Wu's and Wang's real life success with YouTube videos. "Funemployed" eventually came to an end on July 27, 2010, with their last episode entitled, "Gave it a Shot". There were a total of eleven episodes.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu launched the JumbaFund Youtube channel in 2009 with the mission of donating all of its earnings to a charity that viewers suggested. Wu mentions this in his video and always records himself donating all the profits to the charity in order to show the viewers that his JumbaFund charity is not used for anything but to donate to the needy.


title: KevJumba

text: In 2011, Wu was invited by the nonprofit The Supply to teach English in Nairobi, Kenya. Wu uploaded the videos from his trip onto the Jumbafund channel upon his return to the US and donated over $5,000 in ad revenue to The Supply. The nonprofit in turn used the funds to finance the construction of the then titled "Jumba Lenana Academy" secondary school in the Lenana neighborhood where Wu volunteered. Jumbafund, up until this point, donated to various charities, such as the Red Cross and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. However, in February 2012, Wu has stated that he will dedicate the channel's annual revenue entirely to completing the Jumba Lenana Academy. The school was finished in 2013 and renamed "KevJumba High School". Jumbafund ended up donating more than $50,000 to the construction of the school and Wu has expressed his intent to continue covering the facility's operational costs.


title: KevJumba

text: On April 21, 2016, Wu resurfaced on social media after an almost three-year absence as he made a blog titled "Monk.College". Wu said on his blog that he left YouTube so he could meditate (having taken an interest in transcendental meditation) and go to college. According to his blog, Wu currently resides in Houston, Texas. In August 2016, Wu privatized "Monk.College" for unspecified reasons. In March 2017, Wu made his first public appearance at Youth Represent the World Concert in Stafford, Texas, and opened up about his car accident to the public for the first time. After another three-year hiatus, Wu started streaming on Twitch. Wu hosted the Twitch livestream portion of the annual music festival Head in the Clouds in 2021 and 2022.


title: KevJumba

text: In 2007, Wu appeared on The CW's short-lived "Online Nation". "Online Nation" compiled an hour of web clips, broadcast them during primetime, lasting four episodes. Wu, along with other popular YouTube personalities, is also paid to broadcast a streaming show on BlogTV. He has been a member of BlogTV since March 29, 2008, and as of November 2, 2008, he had produced 70 live and 23 recorded shows with over 300,000 viewers of the live show and 100,000 viewers of the recorded shows.


title: KevJumba

text: As of October 2008, Wu starred with Jessica Rose and Phillip DeFranco in "Hooking Up" from HBOLabs (the online arm of HBO), a scripted 10-episode web-based series. "Hooking Up" is set at a fictional university where the students spend most of their time emailing and twittering, but still manage to miscommunicate. It is his first work on a scripted production. Guest appearances on "Hooking Up" will be made by Kevin Nalty, Michael Buckley, and other internet celebrities. The entire cast of "Hooking Up" is composed of YouTube video bloggers in the hope of attracting a young, internet knowledgeable audience. By the show's second day on YouTube, it had received more than 450,000 views. According to NewTeeVee.com, an evolving consensus is that for an online video to be a hit, somewhere between 100,000 and one million views are needed, giving "Hooking Up" a strong start. Maria Russo of the "Los Angeles Times" felt that Wu was better looking than star DeFranco and wondered why Wu plays the "tired role of the East Asian friend who helps the white guy get the chicks," while Bobbie Johnson of "The Guardian" said that many web surfers had "scoffed at what they see as a cynical attempt to cash in." On October 2, 2011, Wu hosted "Flicks" on Cartoon Network during an airing of "Around the World in 80 Days". Wu has also announced he would be starring in the independent film "Rock Jocks" with Justin Chon, Felicia Day, and Gerry Bedknob, which was released in 2012.


title: KevJumba

text: In 2011, Wu sponsored Brian Wong in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West, who raced a car with Wu's paint scheme in the Casino Arizona 125 at Phoenix International Raceway.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu was honored by East West Players, the oldest Asian Pacific American (APA) theatre company in the United States, for helping to increase the presence of APA's in the arts and entertainment at their 47th Visionary Award in 2013. Tim Dang, the Producing Artistic Director of East West Players at the time, called Wu "a great example of the 'next generation' taking the lead to raise the visibility of Asian Americans through new media and the art of comedy."


title: KevJumba

text: In May and June 2010, Wu participated with his father in filming for the 17th season of "The Amazing Race", an American reality television game show. Upon this announcement, it was also the first time his dad's name, Michael, was revealed, which was kept anonymous since his debut. Wu officially announced his participation on Facebook on September 1, and on YouTube a week later. The season premiered on September 26, 2010. Michael and Kevin's best placement was a third-place finish in Leg 2 and Leg 6. Their worst placement was a last place finish (9th) in Leg 3, a non-elimination leg. They ended up in seventh place and were eliminated in Leg 7 after being issued two 30-minute penalties for using a cab to travel between tasks on the leg when they were instructed to walk; another team had also issued a similar penalty and checked in after them, but only had one half-hour penalty, resulting in Kevin and Michael's elimination.


title: KevJumba

text: Wu began working on a film with Dante Basco and Kinetic Films LLC in late 2011. In December 2012, Wu released his first full-length feature film, "Hang Loose".


title: KevJumba

text: "Hang Loose" is a comedy in which Wu, who stars as himself, goes to Hawaii for his sister's wedding but finds himself on a misadventure with his future brother-in-law (played by Dante Basco) that changes his life. Other notable actors in the film include frequent collaborator Justin Chon as the main antagonist, BJ.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: The arms race between Great Britain and Germany that occurred from the last decade of the nineteenth century until the advent of World War I in 1914 was one of the intertwined causes of that conflict. While based in a bilateral relationship that had worsened over many decades, the arms race began with a plan by German Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz in 1897 to create a fleet in being to force Britain to make diplomatic concessions; Tirpitz did not expect the Imperial German Navy to defeat the Royal Navy.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: With the support of Kaiser Wilhelm II, Tirpitz began passing a series of laws to construct an increasing number of large surface warships. The construction of in 1906 prompted Tirpitz to further increase the rate of naval construction. While some British observers were uneasy at German naval expansion, alarm was not general until Germany's naval bill of 1908. The British public and political opposition demanded that the Liberal government meet the German challenge, resulting in the funding of additional dreadnoughts in 1910 and escalating the arms race.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: Maintaining Europe's largest army and second-largest navy took an enormous toll on Germany's finances. Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg, German chancellor from 1909, undertook a policy of détente with Britain to alleviate the fiscal strain and focus on the rivalry with France. Under Bethmann-Hollweg, and particularly from 1912 onwards, Germany abandoned the dreadnought arms race and focused on a commerce raiding naval strategy to be conducted with submarines.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: One of the ironies of the arms race and subsequent conflict was that while the German battle fleet fought only one major surface engagement, the inconclusive Battle of Jutland, and never seriously threatened British naval supremacy, the commerce raiding strategy that had been the historic focus of German naval doctrine would consistently endanger British merchant shipping and imports throughout the war. The success of German submarine warfare during the World War One had great influence on German Naval policy in the lead up to the Second World War, with the utilisation of both U-boats and fast, well armoured battlecruisers for commerce raiding being the primary task of the Kriegsmarine.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: Britain had the largest navy in the world and its policy was to ensure the Royal Navy was at least the size of the next two largest navies combined, known as the two-power standard. Britain's economy was dependent on the ability to ship in raw materials and export out a finished product. By 1900, 58% of calories consumed by Britain's population came from overseas, meaning that an inability to guarantee free movement on the seas would result in food shortages. Even before the German naval challenge, British political and military leaders mused about catastrophic economic, social, and political consequences if the Royal Navy could not guarantee British freedom of action. Worry about Britain's ability to defend itself became the focus of the invasion literature genre, which began in 1871, remained popular to World War I, and was highly influential on public opinion.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: The first Chancellor of united Germany Otto von Bismarck had skillfully guided Germany's foreign relations so it was not firmly attached to any other European power. After his departure in 1890, Germany's foreign policy drifted into deeper commitment with the Triple Alliance of Austria-Hungary and Italy. Friedrich von Holstein of the German Foreign Office convinced the new Chancellor, Leo von Caprivi, to not renew the Reinsurance Treaty with the Russian Empire in 1890. Bismarck had designed the Reinsurance Treaty to keep Russia from an alliance with France; the Russian search for allies who could finance their enormous debts resulted in the Franco-Russian Alliance several years later. Holstein had hoped that the lapsing of the Reinsurance Treaty would result in a closer relationship with Britain, which was competing with both Russia and France, which did not occur. From 1890 to 1897, Germany wavered between pro-British and pro-Russian policies, reflecting the incoherence of German leadership.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In 1890, Alfred Thayer Mahan, an American naval officer and historian, published "The Influence of Sea Power upon History", widely considered the most important work in modern naval strategy. Mahan argued that sea power was the deciding factor that allowed strong nations to thrive and impose their will on weaker nations, and that the proper way to achieve naval supremacy was large-scale battle between fleets. At the time, the Imperial German Navy subscribed to the commerce raiding theory of navy strategy, but Mahan's arguments had enormous influence over subsequent German and British thinking.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: Translated into German by Admiral Ludwig Borckenhagen, who supported Mahan's ideas, a copy of the book was placed in every German naval vessel. Kaiser Wilhelm II immediately subscribed to Mahan's ideas after reading his book in 1894 and sought Reichstag funding to implement them.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: The Reichstag funded four of the thirty-six cruisers that Wilhelm requested in 1895, and none at all the following two years. Frustrated at being rebuffed, Wilhelm recalled Alfred von Tirpitz from his duties in the Far East to be the Secretary of State of the German Imperial Naval Office in 1897. Tirpitz was a follower of anti-British nationalist Heinrich von Treitschke as well as Alfred Thayer Mahan's ideas on the primacy of battle fleets. In 1894, he wrote a famous memorandum section titled, "The Natural Purpose of a Fleet is the Strategic Offensive," dismissing commerce raiding and coastal defense, and arguing that Germany must prepare for offensive sea battle to ensure its place in the world.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In his first meeting with Wilhelm in June 1897, Tirpitz stated his case that Germany must confront Britain to ensure its place as a European power. He also outlined a strategy that he would follow for many years: build a German navy strong enough that the effort to destroy it would open Britain to attack from Britain's French and Russian rivals, which is a form of Mahan's "fleet in being". Tirpitz calculated that since the British navy was scattered to protect its possessions around the globe, "it comes to a battleship war between Heligoland and the Thames." Both Tirpitz and Bernhard von Bülow, who was Secretary of State of Foreign Affairs from 1897 to 1900 and then Chancellor until 1909, calculated that once Germany possessed a navy that Britain could not destroy without imperiling itself, Britain would be forced to negotiate with Germany as an equal and perhaps even give up its "splendid isolation" to join the Triple Alliance.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In accord with Wilhelm II's enthusiasm for an expanded German navy and the strategic vision of Tirpitz, five Fleet Acts in 1898, 1900, 1906, 1908, and 1912 greatly expanded the German High Seas Fleet. The German aim was to build a fleet that would be two thirds the size of the British navy.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: The First Naval Act passed in March 1898 after an extensive lobbying and public relations campaign led by Wilhelm, Tirpitz, and Bülow. The act funded the building of eleven battleships in the next seven years. Britain had little concern about the First Naval Act as it did not increase Germany's navy to a size relevant to the two-power standard. However, by November 1898, Tirpitz had begun work on a plan to double the fleet to include forty-five battleships and armored cruisers, which he presented to the Kaiser in September 1899. The timing was fortunate, as the eruption of the Second Boer War and British seizure of a German steamer off southern Africa enraged the German public against Britain; the Reichstag passed the Second Navy Law in June 1900.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: The passage of the Second Naval Act in Germany increased worry among British policymakers. In 1902, First Lord of the Admiralty Selborne, Tirpitz's British counterpart, told his fellow Cabinet members that the German navy was being built with an eye for war with Britain. Admiral Jacky Fisher was appointed First Sea Lord (professional head of the Royal Navy) in 1904, and massively reorganized the Royal Navy by bringing most of Britain's navy force close to the home isles. He also set up a committee to design a new super battleship, which especially in the wake of the May 1905 Battle of Tsushima seemed to be the future of naval warfare. was launched in February 1906, just 14 months after being approved. "Jane's Fighting Ships", an annual reference book on naval warships, noted that HMS "Dreadnought" was equivalent to two or three normal battleships.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In the beginning of 1905, the German naval attache in Britain reported to Tirpitz that the British were planning a new class of battleship. That summer, Tirpitz consulted with his advisers; by autumn, he had decided that Germany would match the British naval building plan. Scholars highlight that Imperial German decision-making was so incoherent that Tirpitz could make this decision without consulting the Chancellor, foreign ministry, treasury, the naval strategic planning offices, or the two other naval offices: the Naval High Command and Naval Cabinet. He presented his new supplementary naval bill to the Reichstag, envisioning a 35% increase in spending over the Second Naval Act to build two dreadnoughts and one armored cruiser per year. The bill encountered fierce opposition from across the political spectrum because of the growing government budget balance and resistance by the Reichstag to raising taxes. Fortunately for the bill, the Algeciras Conference that concluded in April 1906 after the First Moroccan Crisis inflamed German nationalist sentiment against Britain and France and the third naval law passed easily in May 1906.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: Wilhelm and Tirpitz, among other German leaders, viewed British actions as working in concert with France and Russia to encircle Germany. Tirpitz believed that the British knew that they had made a mistake in building the expensive dreadnoughts and armored cruisers, and that they would realize their folly if Germany did not flinch in following them. German leaders had also become increasingly nervous about a 'Kopenhagen,' a British strike to disable their fleet like that conducted in the 1807 Battle of Copenhagen. In December 1904, during the heightened tensions of the Russo-Japanese War, rumors spread that Japan's ally Britain would attack and the German ambassador to Britain, who was in Berlin, had to reassure Wilhelm and other senior officials that Britain did not intend to start a war. As fears rose, so did nationalist sentiment, including right-wing criticism of the leftist Social Democratic Party, who resisted higher defense spending and encouraged peaceful foreign relations.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: From 1905 onward, Admiral John Fisher developed war plans for blockading the German coast; it became a central British strategy and was implemented in 1914. In 1906, Fisher declared that Germany was the "only probable enemy" and that the Royal Navy should keep a force twice as powerful as Germany's navy within a few hours of Germany's shores. Eyre Crowe of the British Foreign Office wrote a memorandum on 1 January 1907 to Foreign Secretary Edward Grey that became policy. In it, Crowe urged stalwart resistance to what he viewed as Germany's attempts at hegemony in Europe. He argued that German actions might be the result of a confused strategy, but that the intent was irrelevant to British national security.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In March 1908, Tirpitz got a fourth naval bill – the second supplementary bill – passed by the Reichstag. It increased the rate of new battleships from three to four per year for the next four years, before stabilizing at three per year. If implemented, Germany would have had 21 dreadnoughts in 1914. Tirpitz continued to assume that Britain would not be alarmed by the German naval buildup and assured Kaiser Wilhelm of the supplementary bill that "internationally and domestically it looks as small and harmless as possible."


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: The heightened tensions around the Bosnian crisis led Chancellor Bülow, who was responsible for finding the money to fund the military, to question the value of Tirpitz's strategy, which was costly and appeared to increase Germany's diplomatic isolation. Germany's national debt had doubled between 1900 and 1908 and most of the national budget went to the military. Bülow was coming to the conclusion that Germany could not afford both the largest army and second-largest navy in Europe. Though the German ambassador in London, Paul Metternich, reported that the naval buildup was alienating Britain from Germany, Tirpitz stated that the conflict with Germany was based in economic rivalry, not competing navies. Tirpitz also argued that Germany had invested too much money into the naval program to halt it and that the domestic political coalition that had been created to support the naval buildup would react unpredictably if the government left the arms race. Facing an ever-expanding budget deficit, but lacking the confidence of the Kaiser and unable to raise taxes in the face of Reichstag opposition, Bülow resigned in July 1909.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: Up to Germany's 1908 naval bill, Britain in general had largely ignored the buildup, though some individuals in the military and government were already keenly aware of the potential threat. In December 1907, the Admiralty had in fact proposed reducing the rate of battleship construction to one dreadnought and one armored cruiser the following year, which was in line with the Liberal government's priorities to increase spending on social programs and reduce overall government spending, under the new leadership of Prime Minister H. H. Asquith in May 1908. However, in the summer following the 1908 bill, alarm among the public and in the government rose.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In August 1908, King Edward VII visited his nephew Wilhelm in Kronberg. He had been provided with a paper outlining British concerns but decided not to raise the issue of naval spending, as it might spoil the congenial mood. Wilhelm cheerfully commented to Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Charles Hardinge that he thought relations between Germany and Britain were quite good. Hardinge politely disagreed, stating that British concern at the German naval buildup would likely result in the Liberal government asking Parliament to expand British naval shipbuilding, resulting in a naval rivalry that would greatly increase tensions between the two countries. Wilhelm sharply replied that there was no reason for British concern and, that the German naval bill did not threaten the relative strengths of the two navies. No resolution was reached, and Wilhelm left the Kronberg meeting believing that he had convinced the British of the justness of Germany's position.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: A series of incidents escalated British tension. In autumn 1908, the British naval attache in Berlin reported that Germany was building an extra battleship; in reality, ship builder Schichau-Werke had asked the government for an early contract to build a ship scheduled for 1909 to avoid laying off workers in Danzig (now: Gdańsk, Poland). Then on 28 October, "The Daily Telegraph" published what was described as an interview with the Kaiser. The "Telegraph" sent the piece to Wilhelm for approval, who in turn passed it to Chancellor Bülow, who passed it on to the Foreign Ministry for their review, which apparently did not take place. In the published piece, Wilhelm appeared, in the words of historian Margaret MacMillan, both "self-pitying and accusatory", stating that the British "are mad, mad, mad as March hares" because they did not, as he opined, realize that Germany is their good friend and that the naval buildup was not directed against them, but Japan. The "Daily Telegraph" Affair was variously seen in Britain as evidence that Wilhelm was mentally unbalanced or that it was part of a sinister plan to sway British public opinion. German leaders were appalled that their leader would make such a public fool of himself, nationalists and conservatives were infuriated by Wilhelm's declarations of friendship with Britain, and leftists were convinced that the Reichstag needed more control over the Kaiser. Wilhelm and the throne were severely weakened, and the Kaiser fell into a dark depression. Wilhelm never forgave Bülow for allowing the publication, which was a contributing factor in the Chancellor's departure in July 1909.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: After the German bill, the Admiralty abandoned its plan for reduced construction and, in December 1908, proposed building at least six more dreadnoughts. Opposition in the Cabinet revolved around the cost, led by Chancellor of the Exchequer David Lloyd George and President of the Board of Trade Winston Churchill, who both saw the military expenditures as threats to the welfare reforms promised by the Liberal Party. Lloyd George warned Prime Minister Asquith that Liberal MPs would revolt at a proposal adding an estimated £38 million in naval expenditures to the budget. However, the Conservative opposition, the Navy League, and British arms industry advocated for the spending. In popular sentiment, they were joined by King Edward VII, who supported eight more dreadnoughts. A Conservative MP coined what would become a popular slogan: "We want eight and we won't wait!"


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In response to the broad support for increased naval strength, Asquith arranged a compromise in February 1909 to start four dreadnoughts in the next financial year, with an additional four more by spring 1910 if they were needed. With the Liberals in support, the government defeated a motion of no confidence brought by the Conservatives. Lloyd George included the additional dreadnoughts in his proposed "People's Budget" at the end of April 1909, which was rejected in November 1909 by the House of Lords, who were outraged by the measures to redistribute wealth. Asquith dissolved Parliament to hold an election in January 1910; his government lost its majority but remained in office with the support of the Irish Parliamentary Party. In the wake of the election, the House of Lords dropped its opposition to the People's Budget, including funding for the dreadnoughts, which passed in April 1910 and was a significant escalation of the arms race.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: In 1912, German Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg ended the naval arms race. His aim was to secure an understanding with the British to end the increasingly isolated position of Germany. Russian military expansion compelled the Germans to prioritise spending on their army and therefore less on the navy, a policy known as the "Rüstungswende" or ‘armaments turning point'. The initiative led to the Haldane Mission in which Germany offered to accept British naval superiority in exchange for British neutrality in a war in which Germany could not be said to be the aggressor. The proposal was rejected, as Britain felt that it had nothing to gain by such a treaty since its naval superiority was secure, but the British Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey favoured a more assertive policy against Germany.


title: Anglo-German naval arms race

text: By 1913, there was intense internal debate in Britain about new ships because of the growing influence of Fisher's ideas and increasing financial constraints. It is now generally accepted by historians that in the first half of 1914, the Germans adopted a policy of building submarines instead of new dreadnoughts and destroyers, effectively abandoning the arms race, but since they kept the new policy secret, other powers would be delayed in following suit. By the start of the First World War, Britain had 20 commissioned dreadnoughts and 9 battlecruisers, compared with Germany's 15 commissioned dreadnoughts and 7 battlecruisers.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Allan David Bloom (September 14, 1930 – October 7, 1992) was an American philosopher, classicist, and academician. He studied under David Grene, Leo Strauss, Richard McKeon, and Alexandre Kojève. He subsequently taught at Cornell University, the University of Toronto, Tel Aviv University, Yale University, École normale supérieure, and the University of Chicago.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom championed the idea of Great Books education and became famous for his criticism of contemporary American higher education, with his views being expressed in his bestselling 1987 book, "The Closing of the American Mind". Characterized as a conservative in the popular media, Bloom denied the label, asserting that what he sought to defend was the "theoretical life". Saul Bellow wrote "Ravelstein", a "roman à clef" based on Bloom, his friend and colleague at the University of Chicago.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom was born in Indianapolis, Indiana to second-generation Jewish parents who were both social workers. The couple had a daughter, Lucille, two years earlier. As a thirteen-year-old, Bloom read a "Reader's Digest" article about the University of Chicago and told his parents he wanted to attend; his parents thought it was unreasonable and did not encourage his hopes. Yet, when his family moved to Chicago in 1944, his parents met a psychiatrist and family friend whose son was enrolled in the University of Chicago's humanities program for gifted students. In 1946, Bloom was accepted to the same program, starting his degree at the age of fifteen, and spending the next decade of his life enrolled at the university in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. This began his lifelong passion for the 'idea' of the university.


title: Allan Bloom

text: In the preface to "Giants and Dwarfs: Essays, 1960–1990", he stated that his education "began with Freud and ended with Plato". The theme of this education was self-knowledge, or self-discovery—an idea that Bloom would later write, seemed impossible to conceive of for a Midwestern American boy. He credits Leo Strauss as the teacher who made this endeavor possible for him.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom graduated from the University of Chicago with a bachelor's degree at the age of 18. One of his college classmates was the classicist Seth Benardete. For post-graduate studies, he enrolled in the University of Chicago's Committee on Social Thought, where he was assigned classicist David Grene as tutor. Bloom went on to write his thesis on Isocrates. Grene recalled Bloom as an energetic and humorous student completely dedicated to studying classics, but with no definite career ambitions. The committee was a unique interdisciplinary program that attracted a small number of students due to its rigorous academic requirements and lack of clear employment opportunities after graduation. Bloom earned his Ph.D. from the Committee on Social Thought in 1955. He subsequently studied under the influential Hegelian philosopher Alexandre Kojève in Paris, whose lectures Bloom would later introduce to the English-speaking world. While teaching philosophy at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris, he befriended Raymond Aron, amongst many other philosophers. Among the American expatriate community in Paris, his friends included writer Susan Sontag.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom studied and taught in Paris (1953–55) at the École Normale Supérieure, and Germany (1957). Upon returning to the United States in 1955, he taught adult education students at the University of Chicago with his friend Werner J. Dannhauser, author of "Nietzsche's View of Socrates". Bloom went on to teach at Yale from 1960 to 1963, at Cornell until 1970, and at the University of Toronto until 1979, when he returned to the University of Chicago. Among Bloom's former students are prominent journalists, government officials and political scientists such as Francis Fukuyama, Robert Kraynak, Pierre Hassner, Clifford Orwin, Janet Ajzenstat, John Ibbitson, James Ceaser, and Thomas Pangle.


title: Allan Bloom

text: In 1963, as a professor at Cornell, Allan Bloom served as a faculty member of the Cornell Branch of the Telluride Association, an organization focused on intellectual development and self-governance. The students received free room and board in the Telluride House on the Cornell University campus and assumed the management of the house themselves. While living at the house, Bloom befriended former U.S. Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins. Bloom's first book was a collection of three essays on Shakespeare's plays, "Shakespeare's Politics"; it included an essay from Harry V. Jaffa. He translated and commented upon Rousseau's "Letter to M. d'Alembert on the Theater", bringing it into dialogue with Plato's "Republic". In 1968, he published his most significant work of philosophical translation and interpretation, a translation of Plato's "Republic". Bloom strove to achieve "translation ... for the serious student". The preface opens on page xi with the statement, "this is intended to be a literal translation." Although the translation is not universally accepted, Bloom said he always conceptualized the translator's role as a matchmaker between readers and the texts he translated. He repeated this effort as a professor of political science at the University of Toronto in 1978, translating Jean-Jacques Rousseau's "". Among other publications during his years of teaching was a reading of Swift's "Gulliver's Travels", titled "Giants and Dwarfs"; it became the title for a collection of essays on, among others, Raymond Aron, Alexandre Kojève, Leo Strauss, and liberal philosopher John Rawls. Bloom was an editor for the scholarly journal "Political Theory" as well as a contributor to "History of Political Philosophy" (edited by Joseph Cropsey and Leo Strauss).


title: Allan Bloom

text: After returning to Chicago, he befriended and taught courses with Saul Bellow. In 1987 Bellow wrote the preface to "The Closing of the American Mind".


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom's last book, which he dictated while in the hospital dying, and which was published posthumously, was "Love and Friendship", an offering of interpretations on the meaning of love. There is an ongoing controversy over Bloom's semi-closeted homosexuality, possibly culminating, as in Saul Bellow's thinly fictionalized account in Ravelstein, in his death in 1992 from AIDS. Bloom's friends do not deny his homosexuality, but whether he actually died of AIDS remains disputed.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom's work is not easily categorized, yet there is a thread that links all of his published material. He was concerned with preserving a philosophical way of life for future generations. He strove to do this through both scholarly and popular writing. His writings may be placed into two categories: scholarly (e.g., "Plato's Republic") and popular political commentary (e.g., "The Closing of the American Mind"). On the surface, this is a valid distinction, yet closer examinations of Bloom's works reveal a direct connection between the two types of expression, which reflect his view of philosophy and the role of the philosopher in political life.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom's translation and essay on the "Republic" is radically different in many important aspects from the previous translations and interpretations of the "Republic". Most notable is Bloom's discussion of Socratic irony. In fact, irony is the key to Bloom's take on the "Republic" (see his discussion of Books II–VI of the "Republic".) Allan Bloom says a philosopher is immune to irony because he can see the tragic as comic and comic as tragic. Bloom refers to Socrates, the philosopher "par excellence," in his Interpretative Essay stating, "Socrates can go naked where others go clothed; he is not afraid of ridicule. He can also contemplate sexual intercourse where others are stricken with terror; he is not afraid of moral indignation. In other words he treats the comic seriously and the tragic lightly". Thus irony in the "Republic" refers to the "Just City in Speech", which Bloom looks at not as a model for future society, nor as a template for the human soul; rather, it is a city presented ironically, an example of the distance between philosophy and every potential philosopher. Bloom follows Strauss in suggesting that the "Just City in Speech" is not natural; it is man-made.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Some reviewers, such as Norman Gulley, criticized the quality of both the translation and the essay itself.


title: Allan Bloom

text: "The Closing of the American Mind" was published in 1987, five years after Bloom published an essay in "National Review" about the failure of universities to serve the needs of students. With the encouragement of Saul Bellow, his colleague at the University of Chicago, he expanded his thoughts into a book "about a life I've led", that critically reflected on the current state of higher education in American universities. His friends and admirers imagined the work would be a modest success, as did Bloom, who recognized his publisher's modest advance to complete the project as a lack of sales confidence. Yet on the momentum of strong initial reviews, including one by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt in "The New York Times" and an op-ed piece by syndicated conservative commentator George Will titled, "A How-To Book for the Independent", it became an unexpected best seller, eventually selling close to half a million copies in hardback and remaining at number one on "The New York Times Bestseller List" for nonfiction for four months.


title: Allan Bloom

text: The book is a critique of the contemporary university and how Bloom sees it as failing its students. In it, Bloom criticizes the modern movements in philosophy and the humanities. Philosophy professors involved in ordinary language analysis or logical positivism disregard important "humanizing" ethical and political issues and fail to pique the interest of students. Literature professors involved in deconstructionism promote irrationalism and skepticism of standards of truth and thereby dissolve the moral imperatives which are communicated through genuine philosophy and which elevate and broaden the intellects of those who engage with them. To a great extent, Bloom's criticism revolves around his belief that the "great books" of Western thought have been devalued as a source of wisdom. Bloom's critique extends beyond the university to speak to the general crisis in American society. "The Closing of the American Mind" draws analogies between the United States and the Weimar Republic. The modern liberal philosophy, he says, enshrined in the Enlightenment thought of John Locke—that a just society could be based upon self-interest alone, coupled by the emergence of relativism in American thought—had led to this crisis.


title: Allan Bloom

text: For Bloom, this created a void in the souls of Americans, into which demagogic radicals as exemplified by 1960s student leaders could leap. (In the same fashion, Bloom suggests, the Nazi brownshirts once filled the gap created in German society by the Weimar Republic.) In the second instance, he argued, the higher calling of philosophy and reason understood as freedom of thought, had been eclipsed by a pseudo-philosophy, or an ideology of thought. Relativism was one feature of modern liberal philosophy that had subverted the Platonic–Socratic teaching.


title: Allan Bloom

text: Bloom's critique of contemporary social movements at play in universities or society at large is derived from his classical and philosophical orientation. For Bloom, the failure of contemporary liberal education leads to the sterile social and sexual habits of modern students, and to their inability to fashion a life for themselves beyond the mundane offerings touted as success. Bloom argues that commercial pursuits had become more highly valued than love, the philosophic quest for truth, or the civilized pursuits of honor and glory.