Chang Liu

Information seeking and use is now routine in people’s everyday lives. Searching through various information retrieval systems such as web search engines or search functions within information systems allows users to gain access to information on the Internet. Whereas most research in this area has focused on the algorithms behind the search engines from technical perspectives, in this monograph, the authors focus on the search interface, the place where searchers interact with the search system.Search Interface Design and Evaluation reviews the research on the design and evaluation of search user interfaces of the past 10 years. The authors’ primary goal is to integrate state-of-the-art search interface research in the areas of information seeking behavior, information retrieval, and human-computer interaction. The monograph describes the history and background of the development of the search interface and introduces information search behavior models that help conceptualize users’ information needs. The authors also characterize the major components of search interfaces that support different subprocesses based on Marchonini’s information seeking process model, review the design of search interfaces for different user groups, and identify evaluation methods of search interfaces and how they were implemented. Lastly, they provide an outlook on the future trends of search interfaces that includes conversational search interfaces, search interfaces supporting serendipity and creativity, and searching in immersive and virtual reality environments.

In the United States, the bottom 50 percent of households hold only 1 percent of the nation’s wealth. Scholars and commentators have long viewed democracy as the antidote to economic inequality, but US electoral politics bears little resemblance to a struggle between the haves and the have-nots. What makes extreme disparities of wealth and income so persistent, and why has the political process failed to address the problem?Based on data from an innovative experiment, this book presents a bold new theory that shows why American politics revolves around status differences, not class conflict. Analyzing a sample of nearly 2,600 participants, the authors investigate whether Americans are more likely to support a social-change organization if it explicitly opposes racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, and religious bigotry or if it focuses exclusively on economic equality. Drawing on the results, they argue that privileged groups’ desire to preserve their status is the primary obstacle to forming progressive alliances. Status hierarchies are at the heart of political polarization, which stalls legislative efforts to reduce economic inequality or tackle pressing issues such as climate change, gun violence, and access to health care. Rigorous and timely, Politics and Privilege demonstrates why an agenda that simultaneously addresses economic and status inequalities is essential to progressive politics today.

In the United States, the bottom 50 percent of households hold only 1 percent of the nation’s wealth. Scholars and commentators have long viewed democracy as the antidote to economic inequality, but US electoral politics bears little resemblance to a struggle between the haves and the have-nots. What makes extreme disparities of wealth and income so persistent, and why has the political process failed to address the problem?Based on data from an innovative experiment, this book presents a bold new theory that shows why American politics revolves around status differences, not class conflict. Analyzing a sample of nearly 2,600 participants, the authors investigate whether Americans are more likely to support a social-change organization if it explicitly opposes racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, and religious bigotry or if it focuses exclusively on economic equality. Drawing on the results, they argue that privileged groups’ desire to preserve their status is the primary obstacle to forming progressive alliances. Status hierarchies are at the heart of political polarization, which stalls legislative efforts to reduce economic inequality or tackle pressing issues such as climate change, gun violence, and access to health care. Rigorous and timely, Politics and Privilege demonstrates why an agenda that simultaneously addresses economic and status inequalities is essential to progressive politics today.

In real-world applications, new data, patterns, and categories that were not covered by the training data can frequently emerge, necessitating the capability to detect and adapt to novel characters incrementally. Researchers refer to these challenges as the Open-Set Text Recognition (OSTR) task, which has, in recent years, emerged as one of the prominent issues in the field of text recognition. This book begins by providing an introduction to the background of the OSTR task, covering essential aspects such as open-set identification and recognition, conventional OCR methods, and their applications. Subsequently, the concept and definition of the OSTR task are presented encompassing its objectives, use cases, performance metrics, datasets, and protocols. A general framework for OSTR is then detailed, composed of four key components: The Aligned Represented Space, the Label-to-Representation Mapping, the Sample-to-Representation Mapping, and the Open-set Predictor. In addition,possible implementations of each module within the framework are discussed. Following this, two specific open-set text recognition methods, OSOCR and OpenCCD, are introduced. The book concludes by delving into applications and future directions of Open-set text recognition tasks.This book presents a comprehensive overview of the open-set text recognition task, including concepts, framework, and algorithms. It is suitable for graduated students and young researchers who are majoring in pattern recognition and computer science, especially interdisciplinary research.

For courses in Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) taken by advanced undergraduate students, beginning graduate students, and professionals. Foundations of MEMS is an entry-level text designed to systematically teach the specifics of MEMS to an interdisciplinary audience. Liu discusses designs, materials, and fabrication issues related to the MEMS field by employing concepts from both the electrical and mechanical engineering domains and by incorporating evolving microfabrication technology — all in a time-efficient and methodical manner. A wealth of examples and problems solidify students’ understanding of abstract concepts and provide ample opportunities for practicing critical thinking.

For courses in Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) taken by advanced undergraduate students, beginning graduate students, and professionals.Foundations of MEMS is an entry-level text designed to systematically teach the specifics of MEMS to an interdisciplinary audience. Liu discusses designs, materials, and fabrication issues related to the MEMS field by employing concepts from both the electrical and mechanical engineering domains and by incorporating evolving microfabrication technology — all in a time-efficient and methodical manner. A wealth of examples and problems solidify students’ understanding of abstract concepts and provide ample opportunities for practicing critical thinking.

This book explores rural political change in China from 1850 to 1949 to help us understand China’s transformation from a weak, decaying agrarian empire to a unified, strong nation-state during this period. Based on local gazetteers, contemporary field studies, government archives, personal memoirs and other primary sources, it systematically compares two key macro-regions of rural China – the North China plain and the Yangzi delta – to demonstrate the ways in which the forces of political change, shaped by different local conditions, operated to transform the country. It shows that on the North China plain, the village community composed mainly of owner-cultivators was the focal point for political mobilization, whilst in the Yangzi delta absentee landlordism was exploited by the state for local control and tax extraction. However, these both set the stage, in different ways, for the communist mobilization in the first half of the twentieth century.Peasants and Revolution in Rural China is an important addition to the literature on the history of the Chinese Revolution, and will be of interest to anyone seeking to understand the course of Chinese social and political development.

This book explores rural political change in China from 1850 to 1949 to help us understand China’s transformation from a weak, decaying agrarian empire to a unified, strong nation-state during this period. Based on local gazetteers, contemporary field studies, government archives, personal memoirs and other primary sources, it systematically compares two key macro-regions of rural China – the North China plain and the Yangzi delta – to demonstrate the ways in which the forces of political change, shaped by different local conditions, operated to transform the country. It shows that on the North China plain, the village community composed mainly of owner-cultivators was the focal point for political mobilization, whilst in the Yangzi delta absentee landlordism was exploited by the state for local control and tax extraction. However, these both set the stage, in different ways, for the communist mobilization in the first half of the twentieth century.Peasants and Revolution in Rural China is an important addition to the literature on the history of the Chinese Revolution, and will be of interest to anyone seeking to understand the course of Chinese social and political development.