Presentation of self (via Goffman) is becoming increasingly popular as a means for explaining differences in meaning and activity of online participation. This article argues that self-presentation can be split into performances, which take place in synchronous “situations,” and artifacts, which take place in asynchronous “exhibitions.” Goffman’s dramaturgical approach (including the notions of front and back stage) focuses on situations. Social media, on the other hand, frequently employs exhibitions, such as lists of status updates and sets of photos, alongside situational (...) activities, such as chatting. A key difference in exhibitions is the virtual “curator” that manages and redistributes this digital content. This article introduces the exhibitional approach and the curator and suggests ways in which this approach can extend present work concerning online presentation of self. It introduces a theory of “lowest common denominator” culture employing the exhibitional approach. (shrink)

Among Tolstoy's absolute statements are those that exhibit characteristics of both biblical commands and proverbs—and of other types of absolute statements as well. He also draws, for example, on logical propositions, mathematical deductions, laws of nature and human nature, dictionary definitions, and metaphysical assertions. The language of all these forms is timeless, anonymous, and above all categorical. Their stylistic features imply that they are not falsifiable and that they are not open to qualification: they characteristically include words like "all," "each," (...) "every," "only," and "certainly" and phrases like "there neither is nor can be," "the human mind cannot grasp," and "it is impossible that." Even in sentences that omit such phrases, the very refusal to use a qualifier of any kind can assert unqualifiability. When Tolstoy's absolute statements take the form of syllogisms, the use of the word "therefore" or some explicit or implicit equivalent carries the force of logical inevitability. It carries the same force with Tolstoy's enthymemes, which omit the major premise for the reader to reconstruct. [An example] from The Death of Ivan Ilysch,1 cited above, for instance, contains a minor premise and a conclusion of a syllogism; the reader himself must supply the major premise, which would be: "The simpler and more ordinary a life is, the more terrible it is."· 1. "Ivan Ilysch's life was the most simple and the most ordinary, and therefore the most terrible."Leo Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Ilysch, ed. John Bayley, trans. Louise and Aylmer Maude , p.225.Gary Saul Morson is an associate professor of Russian literature at the University of Pennsylvania, and the author of The Boundaries of Genre: Dostoevsky's Diary of a Writer and the Traditions of Literary Utopia, and The Broken Frame: The Anti-tradition of Russian Literature. The present article is from a theoretical study of literary creativity and the biography of authors. (shrink)

The more we spoke, the more we discovered disagreement behind our agreements and envisaged different implications for the same—or were they the same—ideas. “I suppose that’s what Bakhtin meant when he wrote that agreement, not just disagreement, is a dialogic relationship,” she reflected. “Agreement is never identity. It always presupposes or becomes the occasion for differences—which I guess may be one reason why it can be so profitable to agree.” I could detect Kuhn’s concept of a scientific consensus here but (...) agreed anyway.It turned out, in fact, that I had hidden disagreements with all the contributors to the collection. I had undertaken the project with the evidently quixotic hope that we could create, in imitation of Bakhtin’s eccentric circle of linguists, Marxists, Christians, biologists, and literary theorists, a circle of our own. “You want to be a living allusion,” she would say. By the end of that afternoon, however, neither she nor I were confident that we could—despite all the views we did share—ever sign both our names to the same introduction. “Not to be a Formalist,” she interrupted, “perhaps it’s a question of form…”Moi: …You know, the most appropriate form for an article introducing Bakhtin would be a dialogue, since dialogue is his central concept.Elle: Of course, if you can speak of a center in a writer so eccentric. How would it begin?Moi: Well, like Notes from Underground, on an ellipsis…That would illustrate his idea that all speech is a response to words that have been uttered before, that we never confront a linguistically virgin world, that each utterance is a response to other utterances and is formulated in expectation of a response to it—all that might be developed later on in the dialogue. Moi could explain it all to Elle. Gary Saul Morson, associate professor and chairman of Slavic languages at the University of Pennsylvania, is the author of Boundaries of Genre: Dostoevsky’s “Diary of a Writer” and the Traditions of Literary Utopia. His previous contribution to Critical Inquiry, “Tolstoy’s Absolute Language,” appeared in the Summer 1981 issue. (shrink)

Examines indirect learning, suggestion, trance, psychodrama, relaxation, autogenics, bio-feedback, visualization, intuition, mind-control and meditation as approaches and techniques which can contribute to teaching and learning.

The return of a classic book about games and play that illuminates the relationship between the well-played game and the well-lived life. In The Well-Played Game, games guru Bernard De Koven explores the interaction of play and games, offering players—as well as game designers, educators, and scholars—a guide to how games work. De Koven's classic treatise on how human beings play together, first published in 1978, investigates many issues newly resonant in the era of video and computer games, including social (...) gameplay and player modification. The digital game industry, now moving beyond its emphasis on graphic techniques to focus on player interaction, has much to learn from The Well-Played Game. De Koven explains that when players congratulate each other on a “well-played” game, they are expressing a unique and profound synthesis that combines the concepts of play (with its associations of playfulness and fun) and game (with its associations of rule-following). This, he tells us, yields a larger concept: the experience and expression of excellence. De Koven—affectionately and appreciatively hailed by Eric Zimmerman as “our shaman of play”—explores the experience of a well-played game, how we share it, and how we can experience it again; issues of cheating, fairness, keeping score, changing old games (why not change the rules in pursuit of new ways to play?), and making up new games; playing for keeps; and winning. His book belongs on the bookshelves of players who want to find a game in which they can play well, who are looking for others with whom they can play well, and who have discovered the relationship between the well-played game and the well-lived life. (shrink)

This article explores the 'second chance' myth that surrounds the role of adult education in society. This myth apparently offers all citizens an equal chance to access educational opportunities to improve their life chances. I argue that recent developments in educational policy-making are increasingly shaped by neoliberal discourses that adapt adult education principles, such as lifelong learning and emancipation, for its own economic and political logic. This has important implications for adult education, especially equality of opportunity and social inclusion.

Compares the myths of yoga to stories that have influenced Western culture and explores how these spiritual stories can work at an unconscious level to provide road maps for navigating through modern life.

Despite their professed multiculturalism, educated Americans find it hard to imagine that others do not share their liberal values. Does not everyone love their children and want peace? The author of the article, a Tolstoy scholar and student of Russian culture, discusses topics—war, revolution, and what one scholar has called “secular kenosis”—that mark radical differences between Russians and Americans. He then describes a debate between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky over whether morality demands military intervention when a barbarous regime practices widespread torture (...) and massacre. The two novelists pose the issues in ways that shed light on a question still relevant today. (shrink)

In the 21st century, educators seem to have more capacity for thinking pluralistically about teaching than they did a few decades ago. It is now commonplace to talk about multiple intelligences, a variety of teaching and learning styles, different acceptable outcomes of education. If we take the lead from archetypal psychology, the Greek pantheon can provide us with language for talking about a wide range of distinct philosophies, value systems, energies, feeling states, habits of behavior and teaching styles as they (...) can be observed in the classroom. The gods are many, and if we follow the advice of the ancient Greeks we will be careful not to neglect any of them—and not get too carried away in worshiping any single one of them. (shrink)

One particularly interesting aspect of Hirschkop’s essay is the repertoire of “double-voiced words” it displays. I will enumerate just three of them:1. The Misaddressed Word. Apparently, Hirschkop has been arguing these points with someone else, whose voice has drowned out what was actually said by myself and the other contributors to the Forum on Bakhtin. In a number of cases, Hirschkop objects that we failed to say things that were, in fact, explicitly stated and attributes to us a different, phantom (...) position, which he then cites as evidence of “liberal,” individualistic, and “cold war” biases . Likewise, I ostensibly “implied” a number of things, thought Hirschkop offers no direct quotations as evidence .2. The Word That Lies in Ambush . In a way that has become increasingly common in theoretical essays, Hirschkop contents himself with stating only what is not the case and neglects telling us his conception of the alternative, correct position. For example, Hirschkop says: “Such ambiguities [in Bakhtin] are not the sign of an open and skeptical mind, but neither are they mere inconsistencies which can be safely ignored” . In consequence, respondents who presume to guess at his position, whether they guess rightly or wrongly, are subject to an accusation of total or partial misrepresentation of his position or, perhaps worse, of drawing typically liberal inferences.3. The Preemptive Word . Using a strategy familiar to most polemicists, Hirschkop attempts to discredit his adversaries by anticipating their objections within his own argument. Unfortunately, he projects responses—that no one has made—as if those responses were inevitable and seeks to dismiss them simply by naming them rather than answering them. Thus, he accuses my fellow contributors and me of a “kind of relativism, whose ideological affinities with the commonplaces of Western cold war discourse cannot be missed” and which “crops up again and again when Bakhtin is interpreted” . The phrase in parentheses and the word in quotation marks are an example of preemptive discourse. Gary Saul Morson is the author of The Boundaries of Genre: Dostoevsky’s “Diary of a Writer” and the Traditions of Literary Utopia and the editor of Literature and History: Theoretical Problems and Russian Case Studies . He is currently completing a book on Tolstoy, one chapter of which appeared in the Summer 1981 issue of Critical Inquiry. He was the guest editor of Critical Inquiry’s Forum on Mikhail Bakhtin, for which he wrote the introduction, “Who Speaks for Bakhtin?”. (shrink)

What is the meaning of Shiva dancing on a dwarf named Avidya? Why does Vishnu sleep upon an endless snake? To what did the Buddha awaken? What do we mean by soul? The practice of Yoga has become quite common and popular in the West; however, the stories of Yoga are still strange to Western ears. What do these ancient symbols mean, what are they trying to teach us, and how should we incorporate the knowledge skillfully into our Western lifestyle? (...) By looking at the myths of Yoga along with the stories that have influenced Western culture, we are presented with opportunities to select the best of both worlds, and create new maps to help guide us through the uncertainties of modern living. Stories are fun! Important stories guide us and educate us; they create mental models which work at an unconscious level to help us navigate through our modern society and govern our reactions to the ups-and-downs of life; they provide meaning and purpose for our life; and our stories entertain and entrance us. In this book, Bernie Clark looks at the spiritual stories found in the West that create a base map for our lives and then looks at the stories found in the East to see how they could improve our base maps. The stories offered are mix of light-hearted and enjoyable, and deep and profound. The importance of stories East and West are illustrated through the model proposed by the great 20th century mythologist, Joseph Campbell: myths, or stories, serve four great functions - the mystical, the cosmological, the sociological and the psychological function. The stories chosen illustrate these four functions of mythology and show how we can take these stories into ourselves to create a deeper experience of life. "You may find that, with a proper introduction, mythology will catch you." Joseph Campbell: The Power of Myth. (shrink)

L’articolo discute intorno alle lezioni di Michel Foucault tenute al Collége de France nel 1981-1982, pubblicate in Francia recentemente e tradotte in italiano nel 2003 col titolo L’ermeneutica del soggetto. Foucault analizza la filosofia antica greca e romana in particolare quella stoica. Egli vuole mostrare come tale filosofia, al contrario della filosofia cristiana, non si preoccupa tanto della conoscenza di sé quanto di prendersi cura del sé. Infatti la filosofia cristiana pensava di cercare la verità all’interno del soggetto proponendo di (...) trovarla con tecniche quali l’inchiesta, lo svelamento, la fede. Invece la filosofia greca e romana dava più importanza alla creatività del soggetto nello sforzo di migliorarsi e di rafforzare il proprio sé e il proprio corpo.This article is focused on Michel Foucault’s lectures held at the Collège de France in 1981-1982, entitled, The Hermeneutic of the Subject. Foucault analyses the Greek and Roman philosophy, especially the stoicism. In opposition to the Christianity, the Stoics, instead of trying to achieve the knowledge of the self, took care of the self. According to Foucault, Christians believed to be able to find the absolute truth into the subject: their purpose was to make inquiries, discoveries in order to find the truth. On the contrary, the Greek and Roman philosophy gives more importance to the creativity, the improvement, the reinforcement of the self and the body. (shrink)

Personhood arguments for the moral permissibility of abortion -- Personhood arguments for the moral wrongness of abortion -- What if we cannot determine the concept of personhood? -- Women's rights and abortion -- The ethics of killing and abortion -- A virtue ethics approach to abortion -- Feminism and abortion -- Prenatal screening and human genetic ethical issues -- Law and abortion in the United States.

In this paper, the historical alignment of nursing with divinity‐based perspectives and modern New Age nursing theories are explored. The nature of divinity in nursing is examined, together with the complexities and issues that arise in adopting a spiritual basis for care. The work of the key theorists in this area (Rogers, Newman, Parse, Watson, Dossey) is reconsidered and fundamental epistemological problems inherent in this approach reviewed. Specific concerns with the interpretation of holistic care, adoption of doxastic logic, faith‐based rationales, (...) influence of Caucasian Judeo‐Christian and New Age values, misappropriation of science, use of pseudoscience and development of divinity as social consumer product are discussed. Practical problems with using a spiritual basis in contemporary nursing practice are also explored and the alignment of divinity‐based nursing theories with the modern antiscience movement is examined. Overall, the re‐emergence of divinity‐based nursing and spiritual basis for care may be problematic, and would seem to counter the development of an inclusive profession. Additionally, the alignment of nursing with antiscience movements rejecting biomedicine has significant public health implications. This is argued as a regressive step for the advancement of the profession. (shrink)

This paper describes how bilingual colleagues living in Hong Kong make small talk in instant messaging to achieve various business-oriented goals and construct multiple identities in the discursive process. Guided by James Paul Gee’s revised framework of discourse analysis, the analyses evidenced that, overall, colleagues use small talk in instant messages to maintain minimal ties with distant partners, fill in silence during computer work, affect informal decision-making at work, and to diffuse useful surrounding information into business talk. These instances interplay (...) with different affordances provided by the gadgets in the instant messenger interfaces. Such creative usage, together with the perceived nature of online interaction and instant messaging, results in multiple and turbulent identities circulating in the broader context of workplace discourse. The article concludes by arguing that computer-mediated communication has offered participants an emerging modus of interacting socially, beyond the physical and psychological constraints of time and space. (shrink)

In a memorial essay on the philosopher Stephen Toulmin (1922–2009), the author discusses ideas that he and Toulmin drew, over the years, from their reading and coteaching of Tolstoy. He speculates that Toulmin's interest in Tolstoy may have been encouraged by Wittgenstein, Toulmin's teacher and a lover of Tolstoy. All three men understood philosophy as having taken a wrong turn with the rise of rationalism, which occasioned to the idea that social life could be shown to conform to a hard (...) science modeled on Newtonian physics. They saw the dream of a social science as entirely spurious, the superstition of the modern world. They found the idea—held by economists and disciplines inspired by their models—that social processes tend to a predictable optimality absurd, both because the hallmark of real life is imperfection and because (so far as predictability is concerned) time is open to alternatives. Although he did not use the term “casuistry,” which Toulmin revived, Tolstoy saw ethics as a matter of case-based reasoning irreducible to a system; and both thinkers regarded the realist novel as the natural home of ethics viewed this way. Anna Karenina also contains an argument about modernization and reform similar to the one that Toulmin advances in Return to Reason. Toulmin took a special, and evidently personal, delight in that novel's portrait of the shortcomings of intellectuals, for whom abstract theory and solidarity with other intellectuals count above all. Such intellectuals, portrayed in the novel and all too common in Toulmin's time, smugly dismiss truly independent thinkers as “reactionary,” unenlightened, or unable to rise above the messiness of lived experience to the theoretical world of which intellectuals are the masters. Such thinking, the essay concludes, assures intellectuals' sense of superiority but at the cost of real understanding. (shrink)

Natural Law, Science, and the Social Construction of Reality looks at changes in knowledge and the relationship to values from the modern era to today. Author Bernie Koenig examines Newton's influence on Locke and Kant, how Kant influenced Darwin and Freud, and the implications of their work for both anthropology and moral theory.

In recent times there have been increasing efforts at reinterpreting core CSR theories such as stakeholder theory with new perspectives as well as applying them to different contexts away from its Western masculinist connotations. This work seeks to add to these efforts by exploring the impacts that the African philosophical worldview of Afro-communitarianism has on small business stakeholder relationships. Specifically it discusses the kinds of relationships that owner/managers of small businesses, in adherence to Afro-communitarianism, maintain with their families, employees, local (...) communities and competitors- all key stakeholders. The contention is that such ethics demand more extensive ethical responsibilities from owner/managers of small businesses than owner/managers motivated by traditional stakeholder theory with its Western masculinist undertones. It is hoped that this effort will add significant perspectives to stakeholder theory as well as having implications for both small and large business practice. (shrink)

This book addresses the processes behind how we resolve moral issues and the factors that can impact that such as differing values and cultures.