Title: Subscription or Subversion: Gender Representation in Pakistani TV Commercials. The current interdisciplinary research falls into the domains of semiotics, linguistics and cultural studies. Television commercials, having the power to (re)frame the ideology of larger audience through its visual/linguistic content and agency to pave the way to social change have become one of the most viable social institutions of disseminating information to a wider audience. In any of its forms, media construct the image of men and women differently associating with them specific traits regarding their activities, roles and position. The commercials are considered persuasive and efficient modes of representation, having strong impact on the social perception of the viewers. The current study aims to investigate the representation of gender-binary relations in the Pakistani television commercials. The study also imbues the broader socio-cultural factors which help to identify the representational and positional value of men and women. The study analyzes whether gender representation in the Pakistani television commercials subscribes to or subverts the traditional gender narratives. The researcher finds a gap in the area of research, as most of the studies have been produced on gender equality and representation in the Euro-American sphere and a few in Pakistani context, but there is a wide scope of research on gender representation with semiotic perspective. The current study draws its theoretical foundation on the theory of semiotics propounded by Dyer (1982) in her book Advertising as Communication. Semiotics is conceived as an appropriate tool for the critical inquiry of the television commercials because of its widely ranging acceptability and reliability in the meaning making process as suggested by Williamson (1978), Dyer (1982) and Jhally (1990). The data for the current study comprises television commercials broadcast on famous Pakistani television channels. The sampling technique is based on non-probability purposive sampling with the rationale of choosing this technique to include only those commercials which largely reflect gender representation. The study finds that the commercials present layers of meanings via semiotic modes at symbolic level where men and women are displayed in stereotypical manner, subscribing to patriarchal structures. The study recommends the change in the content of the televised material and also highlights the unexplored avenues which can be brought under considerations by the future researchers.
The deeds and actions of the Holy Prophet ﷺ is a practical interpretation of the Holy Qur'an. Allah Almighty has stated his Shari'ah in short but comprehensive words that “take what the Holy Prophet ﷺ has given you and which you forbid”. Therefore, his command is the command of Allah Almighty and not yours. That is why the Holy Qur'an has declared his obedience to be the obedience of Allah Almighty. And from the instructions of the selected scholars of the ummah, it is clear that the legislative status of The Sirah is authenticated. Allah Almighty has given him a special position of Shariah.
As for the legislative status of Sira-e-Taiba, both the special and the general legislation are specific or special to him. Special legislation etc i.e. you have legislated for a specific person at certain times like accepting the condition of a person that he will convert to Islam if he prays only two prayers. The other person cannot join. The general legislation in which you have enacted all kinds of legislation for the common ummah is included. The center and axis of Islamic law is your caste. You have complete control over the status and sanctity, likes and dislikes as you like, for whom you can make Shariah whenever you want. It is as if you are a follower of the Shari'ah. He also has full authority in the brief description of the Qur'an, in the adherence to the Absolute, and the explanation of similarities. You are authorized to legislate as a Shari'ah and Shari'ah in all areas of worship, affairs, debates, and crimes.
Therefore, in this article, the legislative status of His Sira-e-Taiba has been explained in the light of Qur'an and Hadith, Sahabah and Tabi'een, and the commandments of Imams and jurists.
This thesis presents a hardware based testing methodology for speeding up process of verification. With advent of VLSI technology the gate densities on a chip are increasing with rate predicted by Moor’s law. The designers are now mapping complex applications in silicon for enhanced performance and reduced cost. The testing of these designs is becoming more and more challenging. The simulation based testing is very slow and for moderately complex designs takes hours and even days to give decent coverage. The thesis presents novel methodology to test the design by inserting test logic in Hardware. The methodology best works for FPGA based verification. The design is first mapped on FPGA for functional verification. The thesis presents modules that are integrated with the DUTs and monitors the results for correctness. The model also provides white box testing whereby internal working of the design is exploited for exact location of a bug. The methodology also provides assertions based testing and provides coverage analysis of design for a set of test vectors. The thesis gives different examples of circuits that are tested using the proposed methodology. In-silicon White box verification with checkers and monitors holds a great potential in keeping pace with the rapid growth in VLSI technology. The basic idea of our proposed methodology can be termed as a hardware (tester circuitry) testing another hardware (Design under Test). The concept of an embedded layer of re-configurable/removable testing circuit or agent within the hardware of the DUT is proposed and experimented. Starting from simple combinational and sequential circuits to RISC processor and Medium Access Control (MAC) layer found in the IEEE 802.11e standard are tested through this methodology. Two main advantages have been observed: 1) The proposed methodology is found well suited for finding the root causes of the errors in the design under real time. 2) A considerable time saving is observed. The design which takes days in testing with simulation runs, gives equivalent results in minutes when it is run on FPGA prototype along with embedded test agent proposed in this thesis. When device is fully tested and ready for fabrication, this additional tester circuitry can be removed.