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Sulfate-induced degradation is one of the most important factors influencing the durability of concrete. The paper aims to clarify the transport-deterioration process of sulfates in concrete and thus to explain the mechanism and the deterioration of concrete by sulfates.

This paper presents an experimental study into the evolution of the transport-deterioration process of sulfate ions in concrete in a pure soaking environment.

The microscopic morphology of individual concrete layers at different depths and the change law of the sulfate ion concentration at the corresponding depths were investigated for different exposure times. Furthermore, the relationship between the changes in microstructure and the transport characteristics of the sulfate ions was studied.

A method to calculate the cracking level sulfate ion concentration was proposed.

Family dinner on Lunar New Year's Eve is the most important and most ritualized feast for families in China. It is the time for the entire family to reunite. Families gather together to reflect their past and talk about the future. Through the lens of consumer culture theories, this study explores how Chinese consumers construct family identity.

Based on constant comparative analysis of primary data including in-depth interviews and participant observation, and secondary data including historical archives, cultural tracing, documentary reports and essays, the authors deconstruct the consumption rituals of family dinner on Chinese Lunar New Year's Eve. The authors focus on four aspects, including participants, place, time and related activities, and analyze Chinese consumers' ritual experiences.

The authors’ findings show how young consumers construct and strengthen individual self-identity, relational identity and family identity in various ways through consumption and ritual practices during Chinese Lunar New Year celebration.

The study of family dinner on Lunar New Year's Eve helps the authors understand contemporary consumer culture in three aspects. First, it helps the authors understand the relationship between consumption and culture. Second, the study shows the changes and continuities of consumption rituals. Third, the research highlights the experience of “home” among contemporary Chinese consumers.

The balcony, an integral element in modernist housing, can be found in almost every Taipei apartment building. Even so, in Taipei most balconies have been enclosed by users of all social classes. This paper looks into the historical context of the enclosed balcony by arguing that the identity and origins of the Taipei balcony are inseparable from the 1960s birth of a modernist housing type—the Taipei walkup.

Balcony provision, governed by building codes inherited from a colonial past, has been incorporated into the system of speculative market housing. For builders, balconies are profitable floor areas that can be promoted as a symbol of modern living; for users, balconies are additional floor space that can be transformed into interior spaces. However, owing to the threefold combination of initial unfamiliarity of apartment buildings, underinvestment in the urban environment, and dire political circumstances, it is the balcony which has borne the brunt of the underdeveloped relationship between public and private life. In the context of this new housing type, the practice of enclosing balconies arose through the complicity of builders and users.

Simon Cowell, the impresario behind The X Factor, a popular television talent show, has often been compared to P.T. Barnum, the legendary nineteenth century showman. This paper aims to examine the alleged parallels in detail and attempts to assess this “Barnum reborn” argument.

Putative parallels between the impresarios are considered under the aegis of two long‐standing, if contentious, historical “theories”: time's cycle and the great man thesis.

Seven broad similarities between the showmen are identified: vulgarity, hyperbole, rivalry, publicity, duplicity, liminality and history. In each case, the arguments pro and con are explored, as is humanity's propensity to personify.

In accordance with the iconic literary critic Harold Bloom, who “strikes texts together to seek if they spark”, this paper strikes two celebrated showmen together to generate historical sparks.

RICHARD DE BURY'S prayer that war, the great enemy of the book and therefore of the library, be averted must have risen to the minds of some librarians recently. As we write these lines international relations seem to have reached a boding complexity unrivalled since 1939 and with potentialities for ill as great or even greater. By the time these words appear we hope sanity and a calmer spirit will prevail and that the Christmas we face as librarians may indeed be a happy one. However that may be, the many frustrations all development, including library development, have suffered in the past year, are not likely to be overcome soon. The 35 to 50 millions our interruption for good or ill in the Israel‐Egyptian affair has cost—a relatively small matter financially against our national annual spendings of thousands of millions—are not likely to make for library progress. Yet, paradoxically, our greater advances in modern times have been the outcome of conditions created it would seem by war. The Great World War showed the naked need of the public library service in a way that the previous seventy years of peaceful advocacy had failed to do. Even greater progress came out of the Second World War. What was lost in each of these catastrophes no one has been able to calculate.

So far as the London activities of librarianship are concerned, the Winter opened propitiously when Mr. J. D. Stewart and Mr. J. Wilks addressed a goodly audience at Chaucer House, Mr. Stewart on American, and Mr. Wilks on German libraries. There was a live air about the meeting which augured well for the session. The chief librarians of London were well represented, and we hope that they will continue the good work. It was the last meeting over which Mr. George R. Bolton presided as Chairman of the London and Home Counties Branch, and he is succeeded by Mr. Wilks. Mr. Bolton has carried his office with thorough and forceful competence, and London library workers have every reason to be grateful. The election to chairmanship of the librarian of University College, London, gives the Branch for the first time a non‐municipal librarian to preside. The change has not been premature, and, apart from that question, Mr. Wilks is cultured, modest and eloquent and will do honour to his position.

The paper aims to explore the role of outcome‐based education, criteria‐referenced assessment, and work‐integrated education in the teaching of law to non‐law students. The difficulties inherent in the use of such techniques in this particular context have not yet been thoroughly articulated or theorized because it is not clear what we want of our students: to think like lawyers, to do like lawyers, to be like lawyers – or none of the above. The paper proposes some answers.

Discussion within the paper draws on theories articulated within the established literature relating to the issues under consideration.

The paper reveals several gaps that need to be addressed by proposed empirical and longitudinal research projects to answer specific research questions.

The paper contributes to the developing theory of teaching law to non‐law students.

Institutionalized older adults in care homes and long-care facilities have been identified as being at greater risk of COVID-19 related morbidity and mortality. Thus, this paper aims to explore the impact of COVID-19 on care homes in south-east Nigeria given the recent increasing popularity of care homes in Nigeria.

The study adopted qualitative research method, and data was collected from 10 older residents and 5 caregivers using interviews from two care homes, while ensuring the safety of the researcher and participants. The collected data was analyzed using thematic analysis.

Findings revealed that the physical health impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is not a major problem in the homes. However, fear and anxiety, social disconnection and economic hardship were the major problems identified by the older residents and caregivers in the homes.

The popularity of care homes in Nigeria is growing as family structures continue to change. However, previous studies which have revealed devastating effect of COVID-19 on institutionalized older adults have been from the global north. This is the first study designed to bridge the gap in literature and contribute to knowledge on this topic from Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa.