The Loss and Persistence of Black-Owned Farms and Farmland: A Review of the Research Literature and Its Implications *
A method of forming an improved planarization mask for shallow trench isolation process area in integrated circuit manufacturing is disclosed. The planarization mask is generated automatically by using actual mask data as a reference. The invention discloses an algorithm which measures the geometric and relative separation distances of the active areas and performs the necessary merging, deletion and differential biasing to produce the planarization mask which has relaxed geometric boundaries, thereby allowing low cost and simplified manufacturing.
A devil's bargain: Rural environmental injustices and hydraulic fracturing on Pennsylvania's farms
Rural Pennsylvania, the epicenter of the Marcellus Shale region, hosts the most prolific unconventional natural gas extraction and production activity in the US. Farmers of small and midsized operations in Marcellus counties depend increasingly on incomes from booming natural gas operations, while the industry needs their land to access energy resources. These farmers thus bridge two economic sectors—unconventional natural gas production and agriculture. Related dynamics rapidly transform the social, economic, and environmental landscapes for Pennsylvania's rural communities. We ask: What, if any, are the environmental justice implications of the unconventional natural gas industry's presence in rural agricultural spaces, particularly for farmers with small and midsized operations? Presenting findings from 42 in-depth interviews, participant observation, and archival analysis, we show how farmers benefit from natural gas leases to support their agricultural livelihoods. However, they face a devil's bargain. Farmers risk entrenchment in a long-term web of natural resource dependence, increasingly unable to determine their livelihoods or land use on their own terms. Our study demonstrates how farmers' intersectoral dependence conditions procedural inequities and greater environmental risk. We show how farmers of small and midsized operations experience rural environmental injustices as they endure corporate bullying; face procedural inequities negotiating and enforcing lease terms; and increasingly contend with environmental risks associated with unconventional natural gas production.
Annual review article: Is it time to rethink the gender agenda in entrepreneurship research?
This article develops a critique of contemporary approaches to analysing the impact of gender upon entrepreneurial propensity and activity. Since the 1990s, increasing attention has been afforded to the influence of gender on women’s entrepreneurial behaviour; such analyses have highlighted an embedded masculinity within the entrepreneurial discourse which privileges men as normative entrepreneurial actors. While invaluable in revealing a prevailing masculine bias within entrepreneurship, this critique is bounded by positioning women as a proxy for the gendered subject. This is a potentially limiting analysis that does not fully recognise gender as a human property with myriad articulations enacted throughout entrepreneurial activity. To progress debate, we engage more deeply with the notion of gender as a multiplicity, exploring the implications of such for future studies of entrepreneurial activity.