ABSTRACTS (April 2009): 1) Jana Dvorackova This text is[be more specific, e.g., “This paper offers”, or “This contribution provides”] an analysis of discourses through which the discipline of sexology, particularly in the context of the Czech Republic[I would say either “in the Czech Republic” or “particularly in Czech context”], conceptualizes transsexuality. Based on the analysis of selected documents, the paper aims to map the essential turning points in the development of the sexological etiology of transsexuality [here, since you speak of development, I would add the time span, e.g., “from 1980’s till today”]. It also aims[repetition, use a different word, e.g., “attempts”] to identify the gender assumptions in which this[since you did not really tell us anything about the conception, the word “this” seems strange, I would use “the”] conception of the etiology of transsexuality is embedded. The second part of the paper focuses on how sexological preconceptions of gender and sexuality form the conventions of standardized diagnostic procedure, its singular techniques and its criteria for confirming or, on the contrary, disproving the diagnosis of transsexuality. The sexological discourses of transsexuality are theorized from a poststructuralist perspective, which accents the formative aspects of social discourses, and, above all, of the discourses of science. This is a good abstract. However, it seems a bit too general and vague to me – I cannot quite imagine what you are actually doing. Perhaps you could specify the character of the documents that you are analyzing – you speak of development, so perhaps you take documents from various times – what times then? You speak of Czech context – do you use only Czech documents or you compare them with some other documents? What method are you using to explain “how sexological preconceptions of gender and sexuality form the conventions of standardized diagnostic procedure”? What type of documents do you use to be able to address this point? These specifications would greatly improve your abstract. This way, it sounds interesting but one is not quite sure what is going on. 2) Jana Francova NOT AN ABSTRACT BUT “Beginning of a spe[DEL: a :DEL] ech for ANIMALITER conference”: The Main interest[rather “focus”] of this conference is a picture (of an animal) and a litera. In our culture, both is[are] tradi[DEL: c :DEL] tionally presented by a book. Though this fact has been radically changed recent[DEL: l :DEL] ly, we are focused on a book in original meaning. This means the book as a synergy of written and visual. [this is completely confusing! It is not clear at all what you want to say] I am from Pedagogical Fa[DEL: k :DEL] culty, from the visual art department [or: I am from the Department of Visual art of The Paedagogical Faculty]. I am a visual artist. So the point of [DEL: wiev :DEL] view I will be presenting is very subjective and so to say mostly visual. [Rather: So my perspective is very subjective and, so to say (if you insist – it is quite colloquial), visual] My speech will be illustrated [or “accompanied”, since you say the speech and the pictures can be perceived also independently] by pictures behind me. These pictures will[you can omit “will”] have the title and author`s name and in brackets the institution he or she came from. If this [+information] is missing, it means[you can omit “it means”] the person is not connected with art education [or: “is not affiliated to an institution”]. You can take [or “perceive”] the pictures as the main part of the speech[rather: “presentation” since you draw a dividing line between speaking and showing pictures!] and the words just[rather: “only”, or “as mere comments”] as comments to it. Or you can concentrate on literally[“the literary” or rather “the oral” or “the narrative”] part of my performance and that should be coherent too[if this is not an attempt at self-irony, it should be rephrased.] [DEL: Mine :DEL] My main task and ambition will be to balance between these two extremes[I would chose a different word, I do not see anything extreme about speaking and showing pictures; perhaps “media”? or “ways of presentation”?] pointing out the importance of the correlation between them. Because Animaliter[italics!] has been running since 2007, we can begin with the information[the word does not fit here, e.g.: we can begin by pointing out…] that the part that is a participation[rephrase] of the Pedagogical Faculty - Phenomenon the Book [italics! the “the” is part of the official translation (see http://www.ped.muni.cz/warts/FenKnih/d.htm), so it needs the be there!] has a longer tradition. PB is a student competition that started 10 years ago and has increased to[developed into] an international event. This proofs[proves] that the initiative of promoting the book as an object is something that interests people from many institutions concurrently[? I would omit]. This interest is probably caused by the internal fear of lo[DEL: o :DEL] sing one cultural period as the digitalization has been spreading. [??? how can you lose a cultural period due to digitalization? you may fear (internally? what does it mean?) that the books as objects will disappear, but there is no threat of a whole cultural period disappearing!] This is very confusing! For a speech it is all right to use informal language but it should be CLEAR what you want to say. 3) Vincent Kekeli title: The Problem of the[I would omit the article] Skepticism and the [I would omit the article] Relativism in Philosophy of Pragmatism abstract: In this work[There are many scholars who do not like this word in a scholarly context. You can use thesis, dissertation, article, paper, chapter, etc. ] iI try to present the substantial marks[I do not understand, you mean features?] of relativism and pluralism within the framework of philosophy of pragmatism. This[These] areas[skepticism and relativism are areas?] are the tools for pragmatism and try to keep out the main ideas of traditional philosophy. The ideas of traditional philosophy made of[omit “of”]the world a place where we have[“there is,” or “there exists”] the[I would omit the article] Truth. Pragmatism is against this project[? I would search for a different word]. Everything is made by society as a construct. We need the rules, but they are not from the "absolute world" which created Plato[(which was) created by Plato]. Pragmatism would like to get free [perhaps “get rid of”, but that is not too scholarly] of the Truth to the society.[The whole sentence is strange] Without the Truth we can live a better life in co-operation and understanding. [strange, see below] Pragmatism is the[a] reinterpretation of the old dogmas. For this,[for what? for the reinterpretation of old dogmas?] pragmatism employs in philosophy relativism a[and] pluralism. This is not clearly written. 1. In the title, you speak of “skepticism and relativism” but in the abstract itself of “relativism and pluralism”, there is absolutely no trace of skepticism! 2. Some of the general sentences should be explicitly connected to the philosophical ideas. For example the statement: “Without the Truth we can live a better life in co-operation and understanding” seems to be your opinion. If it is not, link it to the previous sentence, e.g. Pragmatism attempts to replace Truth with society in order to live a better life in co-operation and understanding. BUT: these two sentences actually seem completely redundant to me 3. The language of this abstract as a whole needs refining, many of the words used are suspicious in the context, and so is employing the branches of philosophical as subjects of active clauses. All in all, you basically say only one thing: “Pragmatism employs relativism and pluralism in order to fight traditional philosophy and replace its idea of the role of Truth by that of society.” Is this your hypothesis? If so, how are you going to prove it? Discuss briefly your methods and the context. If it is not your thesis, what is your claim then? The way it is presented now, it is a bunch of unfounded general statements. Your position and your contribution is not clear from it. 4) Jana Kristoforyova title[?][DEL: Topic :DEL] : Islamic Feminism: Claiming Women´s Equality in Private and Public Sphere in Muslim Communities in Europe Feminism as the movement for equality of women and men is not only connected to the W[DEL: w :DEL] estern[This is not a necessary change but you have Western capitalized in the next sentence, so you should decide and keep one style in the whole abstract. I suggest to capitalize it.] countries. It has responses in the context of Islam as well. Even if it could seem improbable from the Western media discourse of oppression and subordinate status of women in Islam, Islamic feminism has its defenders inside and outside [DEL: of :DEL] the Muslim community. This paper seeks to analyze the main arguments of the most important Islamic feminist authors. It explores the impact of Islamic feminist thoughts on movements aiming at women´s equality such as NGO human rights projects, conferences, women´s organizations, etc. The study concentrates on the influence of Islamic feminist thoughts in European Muslim communities. The study analyzed three most cited authors who challenge the traditional interpretations of woman´s position in Muslim community, Wadud, Mernissi and Barazangi [I would put full names here; if they are contemporary authors, (I suppose they are), I would write before: “three currently most cited authors”; if they are already dead, I would put the years of birth and death in bracket after each name]. Method of content analysis of their books identified common arguments and differences in the goals and measures leading to social justice and equal opportunities for men and women in Muslim community. Such analysis served as the starting point for the search of examples of Social Movements[why is it capitalized?] striving for equality of women and men in the realm[due to its connotations this does not seem to be the most fitting word here] of Islam. The project Imaan[italics!] in Britain and the Norwegian research on division of labour in Muslim families were presented. Their responses on[to?] Islamic feminist principles were demonstrated. The study documented significant similarities among goals and claims of secular feminists and religious feminists. This is a good abstract. It is nice that it does not begin with “This paper…” but introduces the topic first. Yet, it is not entirely clear what you are doing. 1. You make content analysis of three most cited Muslim feminist authors. 2. Then you search for social movement [?] and you present[?] two, a British and a Norwegian, and you demonstrate that they respond to Islamic feminist principles. HOW do you do that? What are your sources? Do they quote your authors? 3. finally, you note similarities “among goals and claims of secular feminists and religious feminists.” The last point does not follow and is not linked to the previous sentence. Is it perhaps linked to your content analysis of your three authors? Then it should be mentioned there and not at the end. You are clear as long as you analyse three particular authors, then you begin to be too vague. How could the content analysis of three books be a starting point for a search of social movements? Were these authors directly included in some movements? Before you say you will “explore the impact of Islamic feminist thoughts on movements aiming at women´s equality such as NGO human rights projects, conferences, women´s organizations, etc.” but then you only chose two particular projects – you should either justify your limited choice, or you should not give this long list at the beginning. Why and how do you choose the British and the Norwegian project? And how do you “present” them? It is just not clear how the three authors are linked to the social movements, how you present and analyse the projects, and how you demonstrate their responses to Islamic feminist principles. Making these points clear would greatly improve your abstract. 5) Silvie Kuranova Title: Interactive Materials in Teaching Differential Equations (or just Interactive Materials for Differential Equations) Abstract: With progress of blended learning it is big need to prepare good electronical materials, especially th[DEL: e :DEL] ose which use the greatest power of an electronical document - interactivity. This paper focuses on some kinds of such materials - interactive tests, maplets etc., which are used to explain and illustrate ordinary differential equations (differential equations are very important tools of continuous mathematical modeling), especially interactive tests created by LaTeX package - AcroTeX eDucation Bundle. Some other support materials, particularly graphs, were created using the computer algebra system Maple. While[DEL: As :DEL] quizzes verify student's knowledge, pictures and graphs help in better understanding of the topic. I definitely prefer the first version of the title, the second one is much less clear. The whole abstract is all right. It seems rather descriptive, though. If the aim of the author goes beyond description of the interactive study materials, it should be stated EXPLICITLY. The last sentence, a very obvious statement, is absolutely bad for a conclusion. In conclusion you should stress what is your NEW observation or a result. The sentence just before the last is not clear either. WHO created some other support materials? If it was you and these materials are part of the project, SAY IT. If it was not you, link it to the previous sentence. Below, see my suggestion for revision, which is avoiding those expressions in your abstract that I marked yellow above. “With progress of blended learning there is a need to prepare quality electronical materials, especially those which use the greatest advantage of an electronical document – its interactivity. This paper presents several types of such materials - interactive tests, maplets, quizzes, etc., used to explain and illustrate ordinary differential equations, which are very important tools of continuous mathematical modeling. It focuses especially on interactive tests created by LaTeX package (AcroTeX eDucation Bundle) as well as on other support materials, particularly graphs created using the computer algebra system Maple. +CONCLUSION!!!” 6) Zuzana Vaskova Aortic valve area measured by various sequences of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Aortic valve area (AVA) is one of the important[rather “key” or “crucial”?] parameters analysed in diagnose of[diagnosing?] aortic stenosis. It is the area through which blood from heart to aorta flows during the systolic phase of the cardiac cycle. Ultrasonography is a standard method for analysis of AVA. Evaluation of the AVA with this method is performed by continuity equation. Planimetry is another way of AVA evaluation, not performed by ultrasonography. We used MRI for AVA visualization with different sequences and their parameters and observed the [DEL: a :DEL] e?ffect to the standard deviation in our AVA measurements. The set of fifteen healthy volunteers underwent MRI examination with TrueFISP, FLASH and phase contrast sequences. Displayed areas were measured and results consequently compared. The results approved the [DEL: a :DEL] e?ffect of sequences and parameters not only to image quality, but also to the results of measurements. This is quite all right, but it would be better if you were more specific in your conclusion. As it is, your conclusion is rather obvious saying that the measurements which you did with different techniques were different. Well. If you were able find an optimal method and parameters, it should be clearly stated. Also, you provide a lot of information for non-specialists, which is fine, but such information should be integrated, so that it is not too boring for a specialist. For example: “Aortic valve area (AVA), the area through which blood from heart to aorta flows during the systolic phase of the cardiac cycle, is one of the key parameters analysed in diagnosing aortic stenosis.” For a non-specialist, the relationship between these statements is not quite clear: “Ultrasonography is a standard method for analysis of AVA. Evaluation of the AVA with this method is performed by continuity equation. Planimetry is another way of AVA evaluation, not performed by ultrasonography. We used MRI…” It could be rephrased and condensed but since I do not quite understand, I can only vaguely suggest: “The evaluation of AVA may be performed by continuity equation (used with ultrasonography, which is a standard method for AVA analysis), planimetry, or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). We used MRI…” 7) Lenka Zerzankova Title: Mechanism of Antitumor Effects of a New Dinuclear Platinum(II) Complex Based on the 1,2-diaminocyclohexane (DACH) Carrier Ligand Polynuclear platinum complexes represent a new class of anticancer agents, distinct from their mononuclear counterparts, in particular cisplatin, in terms of DNA binding features and the profile of antitumor activity[DEL: from :DEL] [DEL: their mononuclear counterparts, in particular cisplatin :DEL] [word order]. A concept of designing new platinum drugs is based on the observation that carrier amine ligands of cisplatin can modulate its anticancer properties. This concept has resulted in a new dinuclear platinum compound, [{PtCl(diaminocyclohexane)2(µ-7,10-diazahexadecane-1,16-diamine)]4+ (BBR3610-DACH). In this compound, the structural features of two classes of the platinum compounds with proven antitumor activity are combined, namely DACH carrier ligands and dinuclear platinum geometry with a polyamine linker. Common biophysical and biochemical methods were used to study the DNA binding mode of BBR3610-DACH [DEL: common biophysical and biochemical methods were used :DEL] [word order]and consequent findings have been compared with cytotoxicity and cellular uptake of this new complex in several human tumor cell lines. The results show [+that] BBR3610-DACH to have[has]has unique properties in coordination of DNA, different from that of mononuclear analog as well as from that of dinuclear spermine complex. Its enhanced interstrand cross-linking efficiency and the positively charged polyamine linker are critical[not rather: crucial?] features contributing to higher cellular uptake that result in a suppression of tumor growth. Thus, the results of this work[research?] are consistent with [or even: support?] the hypothesis systematically tested by us and others that platinum drugs that bind to DNA in a fundamentally different manner can exhibit different biological properties including the spectrum and intensity of antitumor activity. This is a very good clear abstract. If the results are not only consistent with but even support the more general hypothesis, you should say rather support. The change of word order is just a suggestion, it was ok as you had it, I just find it clearer this way. 8) Marketa Zampachova Title: Sexual Behaviour of Czech Adolescents and the Risk of HIV/AIDS The paper tries to shed light on a relationship between sexual behaviour of Czech adolescents and progressing HIV epidemic in the Czech Republic. There were 147 new diagnoses of HIV positive people[it is enough to say: “there were 147 new HIV diagnoses” it is clear that each diagnosis concerns one person] in the year 2008 and the number has been recognised as rapidly increasing every year. Adolescents are one of the most vulnerable groups because they are at the beginning of their sexual lives. The key research question of the whole project is: How has the sexual behaviour of Czech adolescents been changing in the light of the progressing HIV epidemic? The[A] research [+ “project entitled”] Youth and AIDS [put into italics!] that was [omit “that was”]mapping risky sexual behaviour of adolescents towards HIV/AIDS took place in the years 1997 and 2004 in the second largest city in the Czech Republic – Brno. A following research Panel of Pairs and Families 2008 [put into italics!], which was realized[carried out] in the whole Czech Republic, contained[included] the topic of risky sexual behaviour of adolescents, too/as well. These three sets of data allowed comparing the trends over the [omit “the”]time. The results show that the adolescents have a good knowledge of how to behave safely[safe sexual behavior] and in most cases [+they] show attitudes implying safe sexual[“such” for “safe sexual”] behaviour. Nevertheless, they do not behave safely. Approximately 75% of sexually active adolescents use some form of contraception. However, only 50% of adolescents use condom in their sexual lives[omit, where else?] – not because of the fear of getting infected with HIV, but because of the fear of unwanted pregnancy. Czech adolescents have not changed their sexual behaviour and [+the spread of/the existence of] HIV/AIDS has not been a motive for them to change it[do so]. This is a fine abstract clearly stating its starting point, method and results. My comments are only minor. Try to avoid repetition on such a small space. It is possible to use the verb realize but keep in mind that its primary meaning is different from Czech realizovat. The names of the researches should be either in italics or between quotation marks. The phrase “knowledge of how to behave” is not scholarly, “knowledge of behavior” is better. I do not understand “show attitudes implying safe sexual behaviour” – you mean “have attitudes from which safe sexual behavior could normally be implied”? I would try to rephrase the one but last sentence to avoid repetition, e.g.: “However, only 50% of adolescents use condom, and that is not because of the fear of getting infected with HIV but in order to avoid unwanted pregnancy. 9) Lukáš Gottwald The Social Network Facebook as an Event Promotion Platform: Comparative Research Targeted at the 17-24 Age Group Abstract The aim of this research paper is to assess usability of Facebook social network platform in event promotion. Facebook-specific promotional possibilities are explored and described. Findings of focused[can be safely omitted, no?] research targeted at the 17-24 age group are presented. Over 300 personal interviews have been conducted for this research study. Findings of this Facebook-focused research study are compared with [+the results of an] earlier research that focused [3^rd time you use this word! use, e.g., “concentrated”] on usability of e-mail messages in event promotion. Differences between these two online event promotion tools are pointed out and discussed. Research design and used metrics are also mentioned. This is ok, there is no conclusion, though. A last sentence could be invented hinting at the conclusions of the comparison. I do not quite understand what you mean by the last sentence but, in any case, I do not recommend saying “are also mentioned” – what you say should all be integrated into one meaningful whole, and I think you could include these two things earlier. I would consider rephrasing “the 17-24 age group”. It is not clear who were your respondents – casual users of Facebook or people trying to promote some event? You could be more specific on this point. Some of the sentences could be connected, for example: “I present the findings of the Facebook-focused research targeted at the 17-24 age group and based on 300 personal interviews. I compare them with the results of an earlier research that concentrated on usability of e-mail messages in event promotion.”