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Education-UK and British private schools more specifically are often framed as a global brand of 'world-class' quality. However, the increased competition within the international education market has meant British private schools cannot rest on their laurels but instead must continue to project their 'world-classness' in a way that does not diminish their brand image. Drawing on interviews of parents and key gatekeepers, this paper examines how British private schools in Nigeria (BPS-NIG) and British private boarding schools in the UK (BPBS-UK) evoked and projected their supposed world-classness through the strategic use of white symbolism and the expensive admission process. The paper contends that the latter are types of soft-sell marketing techniques utilised by BPS-NIG and BPBS-UK to sell British schools without imperilling their brand image. The paper concludes by drawing attention to the racial implication of framing whiteness and white British specifically as synonymous with high-quality, 'world-class' education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Trade policy and negotiations have lain at the heart of the Brexit process. Initial UK trade policy has been characterised by: (1) the need to limit the impact of changes in trading relations (mainly with the EU) to minimise challenges for businesses and the possibility of economic losses; (2) a strong ideological commitment to free trade, and related to that; (3) symbolic and 'placebo' actions designed to show that the UK can enact an independent trade policy. Negotiation of free trade agreements (FTAs), thus, became a priority of trade policy. This article explores how approaches to FTAs have evolved, focusing specifically on post-Brexit FTAs with Australasia. Overall, the desire to complete speedy agreements has at times trumped business and societal interests, and precluded the development of a coherent long-term UK FTA vision, revealing the symbolic motivation of being seen as 'delivering Brexit' behind the initial years of post-Brexit trade policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Craig Gallagher describes the strength of Presbyterian anti-Popery in Scotland between 1550 and 1690, and the political consequences; and Peter W. Walker carefully explains how both anti-Popery and anti-Puritanism were deployed in the late-eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century campaigns to extend religious toleration in Britain. Each essay is valuable in itself, but, additionally, many of the essays contribute to overarching themes: chiefly, perhaps, that anti-Catholic ideology/ideologies, not uniform but protean, could promote political and cultural cohesion in Britain itself and its empire but could also erode or fracture it. Tim Harris and Evan Haefeli emphasize this too, examining the varying and not always consistent definitions of "anti-Catholicism" and "anti-Popery"; the charge of "Popery" could be used not only against Catholics but also against Protestant rivals or enemies. [Extracted from the article]

Abstract As multiple representations are common in math education, we examined different combinations of representations (text, formula, graphic) in the field of propositional logic. In two experiments, we investigated whether participants benefit from multiple representations, and whether the kind of representational combination affects performance. For the first experiment, 146 university students were divided into six groups: two single-representation groups (text or formula), three dual-representation groups (all possible pairs), and one triple-representation group. Results indicate that the combination of multiple symbolic representations (text + formula) was as helpful as combining analog and symbolic representations (text + graphic and text + formula + graphic): the participants provided with all such types of multiple representations outperformed all single representation groups. In a second experiment (N = 19, within-subjects) we compared the gaze behavior when working with multiple symbolic representations (text + formula) or combined symbolic and analog representations (text + graphic). The results demonstrate that text was the one representation that was attended most and can therefore be regarded as the reference representation in all useful combinations. Even though fewer gaze switches were observed between text and formulas than between text and graphics, performance (time on task and accuracy) did not differ. This research emphasizes the importance of various forms of multiple representations in mathematics learning and assessment, and sheds light on how different kinds of representations and their combinations are processed. Highlights • Multiple representations can foster problem solving in mathematics. • Two experiments investigated the multimedia effect for multiple symbolic representations. • The combination of formula and text fostered problem solving in propositional logic. • Combining text and formula was as helpful as the combination of text and graphic. • Eye tracking confirms text to be the reference representation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the role of comfort as an affective encounter across bodies, objects (namely clothing) and spaces. I focus on how bodies that are marked as strange and a source of society’s discomfort negotiate this positioning through the presentation of one’s body. What does it mean for these bodies to be comfortable or uncomfortable? This question is answered through work done with Black Muslim women in Britain. By exploring how comfort is felt in relation to racially marked bodies, this article develops work on emotional geographies. Comfort is understood as both an emotional product and process that changes as bodies move across different spaces. In noting this movement, I also explore how boundaries around the body (enacted through e.g. the multi-dimensional hijab) presents a particular form of territorialisation that facilitates comfort as we present our bodies across different spaces. These boundaries can be both a source of comfort and discomfort through their positioning as deviant from social norms. In understanding the different roles of boundaries, I explore the social processes that construct comfort (or discomfort) as we move through different spaces. This is intertwined with furthering work on Muslim geographies by challenging the overwhelming focus placed on ‘public’ facing garments like the headscarf and abaya. Such a focus limits an understanding of the fluidity of Black Muslim women’s identities, and how these changes in our clothing practices affect and are affected by the relationships built across spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The author discusses the kissing of a Bible by Queen Elizabeth I of England during her coronation procession in 1559. He mentions her stop at one of the pageant shows where she received the Bible, the subsequent kissing of presentations to Elizabeth, and the symbolism involved in the kissing.

This article examines cultural depictions of firemen during the Second World War in film, radio and the press. It focuses on the masculine identities ascribed to those unable to fulfil the idealised masculine role of being in the armed forces. The article argues that firemen's role in the defence of Britain gave them access to many, if not all, of the ideal attributes more commonly associated with the venerated image of the armed forces hero. However, such an image was temporally specific and only prominent during the months of the Blitz. As such, this article imparts important knowledge about men and masculinity in this period. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In the aftermath of the Second World War, as post-colonial regimes in Africa and Asia hauled down imperial iconography, to the surprise and approval of many Western observers, India evidenced little interest in sweeping away remnants of its colonial heritage. From the late 1950s onwards, however, calls for the removal of British imperial statuary from India's public spaces came to represent an increasingly important component in a broader dialogue between central and state governments, political parties, the media, and the wider public on the legacy of British colonialism in the subcontinent. This article examines the responses of the ruling Congress Party and the British government, between 1947 and 1970, to escalating pressure from within India to replace British statuary with monuments celebrating Indian nationalism. In doing so, it highlights the significant scope that existed for non-state actors in India and the United Kingdom with a stake in the cultural politics of decolonization to disrupt the smooth running of bilateral relations, and, in Britain's case, to undermine increasingly tenuous claims of continued global relevance. Post-war British governments believed that the United Kingdom's relationship with India could be leveraged, at least in part, to offset the nation's waning international prestige. In fact, as the fate of British statuary in India makes clear, this proved to be at least as problematic and flawed a strategy in the two decades after 1947 as it had been in those before. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article analyses the ‘life history’ of Newcastle Brown Ale (NBA), examining its perceived embodiment of ‘Geordie’ culture and authentic, northern, ‘working class’ values, both for a UK and an emerging North American market. Despite no longer being produced in Newcastle, NBA continues to be promoted as a product of the city, bound up with its industrial histories and heritage. Here, I use visual analysis and biography to examine various historic and contemporary advertising campaigns and cultural forms associated with NBA, in order to compare the way it is understood in the UK versus its transatlantic cultural appropriations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper draws on ethnographic research carried out in Birmingham, UK – a city significant for its sizeable Muslim population and its iconic role in the history of minority ethnic settlement in Britain – to consider how associations of place and ethnicity work in different ways to inform ideas about ‘Muslim community’ in twenty-first-century Britain. The paper charts happenings around a local event in an area of majority Asian settlement and how representations of the area as a place of Muslim community were used to implicate it in the ‘war on terror’. The paper goes on to show how this sensibility is disrupted by Muslims themselves through alternative engagements with space and ethnicity. The paper argues that these offer a ground for making Muslim community in ways that actively engage with histories and patterns of ethnic settlement in the city rather than being determined by them. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this essay, Jan Broadway considers the imaginative engagement with medieval England among the Elizabethan and early Stuart gentry and their use of certain forms to convey messages about their families and communities. The discussion focuses on two material art forms: a particular style of funeral monument and the genre of narrative painting. Broadway concludes that the most obvious engagements are those that were deliberately designed to convey false messages, while subtler uses of the past are more difficult to interpret. Nevertheless, there is evidence of the gentry's genuine and self-conscious engagement with the past as a means of establishing and maintaining status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on new empirical research on ‘the Bengal diaspora’, this paper explores the struggle over Bangladeshi identity in East London, as exemplified in the monument of the Shahid Minar and the related celebration ofEkushe, which marks the beginning of the Bangladesh national liberation struggle. Bringing together theories of diaspora consciousness and memorialization, the paper explores the ways in which rituals and memory work both as a form of continuity with the homeland and as a method of claims-staking for minority groups in multicultural spaces. Using original interviews with community and religious leaders, the paper explores the ways in which the establishment of the monument and the memorialization of the Liberation War represents the re-imagination of the Bangladeshi community in London and draws the lines for the contestation of this identity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article investigates the significance of Elizabethan dress and behaviour in conveying unspoken messages, in particular accusations and insults. It takes as a case study the appearance of Sir Robert Stapleton and his confederates at the York Assizes in 1583, where they had been ordered to make an apology to the Archbishop of York, Edwin Sandys. The case reveals how dress and conduct were significant in conveying non-verbal messages, but also that this form of communication was open to interpretation. It will be argued that, because the meaning of dress and symbols was culturally constructed, the message they communicated was as reliant on what was 'read' by an audience as it was on what the wearer intended to convey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of the phrase 'basic research' as a term used in science policy discussion dates only to about 1920. At the time the phrase referred to what we today commonly refer to as applied research in support of specific missions or goals, especially agriculture. Upon the publication of Vannevar Bush's well-known report, Science - The Endless Frontier, the phrase 'basic research' became a key political symbol, representing various identifications, expectations and demands related to science policy among scientists and politicians. This paper tracks and evaluates the evolution of 'basic research' as a political symbol from early in the 20th century to the present. With considerable attention having been paid to the on-going evolution of post-Cold War science policy, much less attention has focused on the factors which have shaped the dominant narrative of contemporary science policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In many parts of the world, excavations of British military sites have unearthed material reflecting lifeways in the British Empire. Specifically, studies of historical ceramics and glass have greatly advanced our understanding of status and material expression. This study highlights the current body of knowledge on British military crested ceramics, contrasting the rarity of archaeological finds with their abundance in documentary sources. An elemental stylistic analysis reveals that these crests expressed regimental affiliation as the fundamental unit of self-identification. Symbolic interpretation of these crests stresses their active role in the socialization of officers and structuring collective memory, particularly through the mess institution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the series of eight paintings done between 1715 and 1721 by English artist James Thornhill to decorate the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral in London, England. The mural paintings depict eight images taken from from New Testament account of the life of Saint Paul the Apostle taken form the Acts of the Apostles. The author considers the cultural milieu in which the painting was created, focusing on the work as part of the English history painting genre, the political aspects of the Church of England during the period, and the history of the erection of St. Paul's Cathedral, designed by Christopher Wren.

The article takes a look at the radical movement that produced the famous 'Peterloo massacre' of August 1819 in Lancashire, England, and how it was experienced by women and men in different ways. Catherine Hall's article "The Tale of Samuel and Jemima" is based upon Samuel Bamford's classic memoir about the massacre. Bamford was among the local radical secretariat who organized the event, constructed the ceremonial and rituals, and trained the men to march in disciplined ranks. While Jemima contributed a short account to her husband's work in the hope that it might not be devoid of interest.

The article explores the use of yellow stockings in William Shakespeare's play "Twelfth Night" to depict illicit sexuality and marital betrayal in sixteenth-century England. An excerpt from the play describing Count Malvolio's views on yellow stockings is presented. An overview of various interpretations of the symbolism of yellow stockings is provided. Other literary works using the symbol are discussed.

The article discusses the role that comprehending symbolism and images in cities and towns played in the development of British urban sociology from the 1950s through the early 1980s. An overview of the concept of social and cultural organization within British urban sociology, including in regard to social classes in Great Britain and the influence of capitalism on social structure, is provided.

This article talks about the sociology of hair. It attempts to describe developments in hair symbolism in North America and Great Britain. Hair is perhaps our most powerful symbol of individual and group identity. Powerful, because it is physical and therefore extremely personal, and because, although personal, it is also public rather than private. Furthermore, hair symbolism is usually voluntary rather than imposed or given. Finally, hair is malleable, in various ways, and therefore singularly apt to symbolize both differentiations between, and changes in, individual and group identities. The immense social significance of hair is indicated by economics. The hair industry is worth $2.5 billion in the U.S. as of September 1987. Hair symbolism has been extensively researched by anthropologists, particularly in initiation, marriage and mourning rituals, and in magic on a pars pro toto basis. The theory of hair developed in the article can be called the theory of opposites, since symbolic practice can be summarized in three propositions such as opposite sexes have opposite hair, head hair and body hair are opposite and opposite ideologies have opposite hair. This pattern of triple oppositions indicates the complexity and subtlety of hair symbolism and this complexity is possible for two distinct reasons. First, although hair grows all over the body, in terms of body symbolism there are only three zones of social significance: head hair, facial hair and body hair. Second, hair can be modified in four principal ways. Length can be changed. Colors and styles can also be changed and even the quantity of hair can be changed with the use of false or artificial hair.

In the wake of Peters and Waterman's In Search of Excellence few NHS managers are unaware of culture :management as a tool for shaping organisational change. Yet the first wave of post-Griffiths studies found little evidence of 'culture management' in action. This paper draws on data from an ethnographic study carried out in 1988-90 to suggest that the symbolic facet of management action is an important, though neglected, element in the 1991 NHS reforms. It argues that rhetorical skills were a valuable resource for general managers overseeing the change process, and explores some of the ways in which rhetoric may have influenced cultural adaptation. However, many of the specific claims of the 'excellence genre', including ideas about the importance of strong, homogeneous cultures, are rejected. Rhetoric is an aspect of micro-political struggles over meaning, which rarely result in straightforward cultural 'manipulation', and are more likely to re-shape organisations through pragmatic accommodation than to win the hearts and minds of members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors discuss the British monarchy following the 2011 marriage of Prince William and Catherine Middleton in London, England, and the relationship between the monarchy, the democratic state, and national identity in Great Britain. They discuss the differences between absolute monarchs and constitutional monarchs and argue that events such as royal weddings underscore the power of myths and symbols. The authors also explore the relationship between the British monarchy and the Labour Party.

The author offers literary criticism and commentary on "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The article focuses on Coleridge's use of imagery involving metals in the poem, which is said to tie in to a larger theme of alchemy and transformation. Supporting evidence for this reading of the text is provided.

The author offers literary criticism and commentary on "The Flea," a poem by John Donne. The article focuses on the erotic symbolism of the poem, which is said to involve a blurring of the distinctions between male and female. The concepts of gender and identity are discussed in this context. Supporting evidence for such a reading of the text is provided.

This article looks at a collection of paintings on Christian themes owned by the British Methodist Church. According to the article, the collection's history goes back to the 1960s when John M. Gibbs and Reverend Douglas Wollen wanted to see a more imaginative approach in Methodism to the commissioning and buying of paintings, sculpture and church furnishings. It also discusses the idea of a non-Christological curatorial approach to the collection. Moreover, this article describes the cultural value of the collection.