This chapter deals with Constantine Manasses’ Astrological Poem. The first section discusses the editorial problems of the work, in the light of Emmanuel Miller’s edition and the new data that the poem’s enriched manuscript tradition has to offer. The second section traces and presents some of Manasses’ possible sources. The third section delineates the cultural milieu in which the poem was composed, which includes Manasses’ association with the circle of sebastokratorissa Irene, as well as the poem’s (possible) relation to other relevant works written during the reign of Manuel I Komnenos – one of them by none other than the emperor himself.

Materials collection and organization was an essential part of recycling operations, as it allowed owners and workers to plan their operations and trade. This chapter offers a model for understanding organization and stockpiling and how it relates to recycling at villas and in other contexts.

This chapter delves into the phenomenon of the so-called mixed style, a distinctive feature found in certain literary compositions of the twelfth century. While focusing primarily on the renowned collection of four supplicatory poems known as Ptochoprodromika, it also examines instances of blending lower and higher language registers in the Grottaferrata version of the Digenis Akritis poem and in the Verses from Prison penned by Michael Glykas. The objective of this study is to re-evaluate existing scholarly viewpoints regarding the principles and functions underlying the shifts between language registers in these works, adopting a narratological perspective. In other words, by analysing the employed types of voice, such as direct speech, narration and metanarration, the chapter seeks to determine whether we can identify more specific principles governing the changes in language levels, beyond the general distinction between ‘more popular’ and ‘more learned’. It endeavours to demonstrate that the selection between lower and higher registers is intricately linked to the narrative distance of the speaking voice from the events being recounted.

This chapter begins by surveying the linguistic history of Ireland. Although it is situated on the periphery of the British Isles, there is evidence of contact between the island, other regions of Britain and indeed other countries in western Europe for centuries. It explores early and later contacts between the indigenised Celts and more recent colonisers and immigrants, including the Normans, the English, the Scots and twentieth-century settlers from the European Union prior to Brexit. These contacts have created a set of contemporary Irish English varieties that are not only distinctive with respect to other world Englishes but are also differentiated diatopically, ethnically and socially. Two main topics are addressed. The degree to which Irish English from different time frames is structurally similar to other dialects spoken elsewhere is considered alongside evaluating the extent to which contemporary Irish Englishes vary internally and externally with respect to their lexis, phonology, morphosyntax and discourse pragmatics. Some space is also devoted to examining how the study of Irish English has developed and what directions research might take in the twenty-first century in response to new approaches to modelling linguistic contact as well as the availability of larger and more diverse digital datasets.

This chapter presents on overview of present-day Welsh English(es) with a focus on regional variation and diachronic developments over the past fifty years. The Anglicisation of Wales has progressed in several phases over the centuries, which is why the accents and dialects of English in Wales are regionally distinctive, the Welsh language and neighbouring English English dialects impacting them to different degrees. The chapter takes the Survey of Anglo-Welsh dialects (Parry 1999) as a starting point and uses corpus and survey data compiled in the twenty-first century as well as recent research publications, thereby examining the main trends of development in the different domains of English. Phonological variation and change are described across a broad North–South continuum, whereas in morphosyntax the greatest differences can be found between the predominantly English-speaking Southeast and the bilingual, historically Welsh-dominant North and West Wales. In regional lexicon, sociolinguistically and nationally salient items are relatively few, originating from both Welsh and English. Finally, the chapter draws attention to recent research, and highlights some caveats and future directions for the study of English in Wales.

The chapter addresses the notion of psychological harm inflicted upon consumers by AI systems. It ponders what phenomena could be considered psychological harm, analyzes how AI systems could be causing them, and provides an overview of the legal strategies for combating them. It demonstrates that the risk posed to consumers’ mental health by AI systems is real and should be addressed, yet the approach taken by the EU in its AIA Proposal is suboptimal.

The following five chapters exhibit further contributions of the theory of time-variant and quasi-separable systems to matrix algebra. This chapter treats LU factorization, or, equivalently, spectral factorization, which is another, often occurring type of factorization of a quasi-separable system. This type of factorization does not necessarily exist and, when it exists, could traditionally not be computed in a stable numerical way (Gaussian elimination). Here we present necessary and sufficient existence conditions and a stable numerical algorithm to compute the factorization using orthogonal transformations applied to the quasi-separable representation.

Manga communicates diverse qualities of sound through visual effects applied to writing. Voices in spoken dialogue, thoughts, and voiceovers are often represented through different type fonts or handwriting. This serves as a narrative tool to differentiate between text categories but also gives each one of them a specific resonance in the reader’s mind. Manga employs a multitude of usually handwritten mimetic words to express sounds and other sensations. Among the various graphic shapes these words assume is a semi-materialization of the written characters, which can undergo physical effects of the represented phenomenon and enter the spatial depth of the storyworld. The Japanese writing system heavily facilitates the visual characteristics of mimetics in manga, be it with the expressive use of the hiragana and katakana syllabaries, the vowel-lengthening symbol, or the sonant mark.

Centuries of contact between Older Scots and the Scandinavian language of Norn, coupled with geographic isolation, has resulted in the highly distinctive dialects spoken in the Orkney and Shetland Isles today. In this chapter, we document the socio-historical context which led to the formation of these dialects, and look to a range of studies which describe these dialects’ lexical, phonological and morphosyntactic forms. We note forms shared with other varieties of Scots but concentrate mostly on the highly localised features not found in mainland Scotland. In addition to broad comparisons between Orkney and Shetland, we also document the dialect diversity within each location. Finally, we turn to bidialectalism, and specifically how speakers may have access to two ‘codes’ in their linguistic repertoire, where Standard Scottish English is used alongside localised vernaculars, and how this might impact on dialect attrition in the coming years.