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    Consumer behaviour concerning food safety in Brazil and New Zealand : modelling food safety risk in the home : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Food Technology (Food Safety) at Massey University, Manawatu, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2016) Olinto da Motta, Sergio Paulo
    Foodborne illnesses are among the most widespread public health issues, killing about 2.2 million people annually worldwide, and costing hundreds of billions of US dollars for governments, companies, families and consumers. In Brazil, foodborne illness in the home accounts for 44% of identified disease outbreaks and in New Zealand it represents 27% of notifiable disease outbreaks. Several studies have investigated aspects of consumer behaviour concerning food safety, but it remains a challenge to obtain a full picture of critical control points (CCPs) and key factors contributing to food contamination, pathogen growth or survival, when the food is under the consumer’s responsibility. This study aimed to assess threats to food safety in the home in Brazil and New Zealand. From August 2011 to March 2012, survey questionnaires from 2,775 consumers most responsible for cooking in the home in Brazil were collected. From September 2012 to November 2012, 658 households in New Zealand responded to the same survey. Both surveys found similar CCPs with the potential to threaten food safety in the domestic environment – food preparation, cooking and handling leftovers. Information from New Zealand suggests that choosing and purchasing food, and for Brazil food transportation, are also steps of concern. The age, marital status, gender, ethnicity, first-aid in response to illness and the way a person learned to cook had a significant influence in the risky practices of consumers in both countries, suggesting that similar consumer behaviour concerning food safety can be found in countries of substantially different degrees of economic development and culture. The young, the men, socioeconomic minorities, people most susceptible to illness and ethnic groups were people of most concern, often ranked at-risk, demanding special attention of public health authorities in both countries. The CCPs of most concern and contributing factors identified in this study were officially reported in New Zealand, helping to validate the methodology used in this study and its possible use in other countries. Furthermore, food safety educational campaigns built on the steps of most concern and groups ranked at moderate or high risk, have the potential to be most effective in reducing food poisoning in the home.
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    Speaking the unspeakable : the construction and presentation of narratives in literary and popular trauma novels : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in English at Massey University, Manawatu, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2014) Greenfield, Sheryl
    Focusing on Purple Hibiscus (2003) by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Housekeeping (1980) by Marilynne Robinson, The Secret Life of Bees (2002) by Sue Monk Kidd and Cat’s Eye (1988) by Margaret Atwood, my thesis considers a range of contemporary portrayals of trauma within novels featuring girls or women as autodiegetic narrators. These texts are examined in dialogue with theories of representations of trauma in literature from contemporary trauma critics Roger Luckhurst and Michelle Balaev, theories of memory taken from Paul Antze and Michael Lambek, and readings of clinical psychiatrists Judith Herman Lewis and Lenore Terr. The 1972 work Survival by Margaret Atwood is critical in my interpretations of the protagonists as they attempt to heal from their trauma and become accommodated into society. I commence the thesis with an overview of the history of the medical study of trauma and the complementary study of representations of trauma in literature. Through a study of prominent critic Cathy Caruth’s investigations into Freud, I establish the signs of symptoms of trauma, and their typical presentation in a novel. In the work of contemporary theorists I establish the typical features of a trauma novel; however, I aim to establish that a wider range of techniques is utilized, examining the concepts of narrative closure, psychic integration, temporal disruption, and the reconciliation with flawed maternal and paternal figures. The thesis is structured in four chapters, each examining within a novel the relationship between the types of trauma suffered, the presentation of the traumatic symptoms, and the healing process of the protagonists. Each chapter is structured around a significant relationship, their titles reflective of the faults of the perpetrator of the trauma, for example The Sins of the Father, where analysis of the effects of these flawed relationships takes place. Kambili’s narration in Purple Hibiscus shows the effects of colonisation on the formation of identify; Housekeeping demonstrates the continuing effects of abandonment; The Secret Life of Bees demonstrates the necessity of truth to overcome repressed traumatic memories; and Cat’s Eye demonstrates the ongoing effects of repressed memory on the formation of character. Together these novels form a coherent argument that representations of trauma have become an organising concept for female identity in the late twentieth century.