It appears that we know surprisingly little about how judges frame linguistically the rationale behind their decisions and how such texts are structured. Using the concept of rhetorical moves, this paper adopts a genre-based approach to examine the rhetorical structure of legal justifications provided in the decisions of the Polish Constitutional Court. The goal of the study is to verify the claim that the way justifications are drafted is becoming more and more uniform and conventional. The results show that there (...) is a common core of rhetorical structure realized by means of recurrent functional segments of text. This paper proposes a prototypical move structure of a Constitutional Tribunal justification and it argues that that the way justifications are drafted are subject to very concrete, even if not explicitly stated constraints. (shrink)

This article presents a seven-step corpus-based approach to discourse analysis that starts with a detailed analysis of each individual text in a corpus that can then be generalized across all texts of a corpus, providing a description of typical patterns of discourse organization that hold for the entire corpus. This approach is applied specifically to a methodology that is used to analyze texts in terms of the functional/communicative structures that typically make up texts in a genre: move (...) analysis. The resulting corpus-based approach for conducting a move analysis significantly enhances the value of this often used methodology, while at the same time providing badly needed guidelines for a methodology that lacks them. A corpus of ‘birthmother letters’ is used to illustrate the approach. (shrink)

Writing a thesis or dissertation is a challenging procedure as it is one of the requirements of getting a graduate and postgraduate diploma. Writing an abstract like other parts of a thesis or dissertation has its criterion. For this reason, due to globalism, those abstracts written by non-native English speakers may lack some of the features of the abstract genre and move that must be included. This study examines the moves of M.A. and Ph.D. abstracts written by Turkish students (...) between the 2009 and 2019 academic years on foreign language education at Cyprus International University. The data consisted of 50 abstracts chosen randomly from the ELT department. For the analysis, Hyland’s five-move model has been used. The study results reveal that 40 abstracts did not follow the five moves that Hyland has put forward. Moreover, it can be stated that the absence of some moves in the abstracts may cause restraint for readers to comprehend these studies in terms of communicative purposes. (shrink)

This book builds on existing work in genre analysis and move analysis in English for Specific Purposes and applies this new framework to academic philosophical discourse, offering new insights into how ESP traditions can elucidate shifts in language conventions across disciplinary contexts. The volume begins by surveying the state-of-the-art in English for Specific Purposes and genre theory, as well as other genre theory paradigms before turning the focus on move analysis. Lucas and Lucas seek to (...) maximize the potential of move analysis to precisely operationalize functional units of discourse by implementing a cognitive theory of genre grounded in frame semantics. Using the case of academic research articles in philosophy, the authors demonstrate how this framework can reveal distinctive dimensions unique to philosophical discourse and in turn, how such an approach might be applied more broadly to examine nuances in language across disciplines and inform ESP research in the future. This book will appeal to students and researchers in English for Specific Purposes, discourse analysis, academic writing, applied linguistics, and rhetoric and composition. (shrink)

This article has four aims. First, it will consider explicitly, and polemically, the hierarchical relationship between conversation analysis and membership categorization analysis. Whilst the CA ‘juggernaut’ flourishes, the MCA ‘milk float’ is in danger of being run off the road. For MCA to survive either as a separate discipline, or within CA as a focus equivalent to other ‘generic orders of conversation’, I suggest it must generate new types of systematic studies and reveal fundamental categorial practices. With such (...) a goal in mind, the second aim of the article is to provide a set of clear analytic steps and procedures for conducting MCA, which are grounded in basic categorial and sequential concerns. Third, the article aims to demonstrate how order can be found in the intuitively ‘messy’ discourse phenomenon of membership categories, and how to approach their analysis systematically as a robust feature of particular action-oriented environments. Through the exemplar analyses, the final aim of the article is to promote MCA as a method for interrogating culture, reality and society, without recourse to its reputed ‘wild and promiscuous’ analytic approach. (shrink)

In this article, I address some of the issues for the analysis of categorial features of talk and texts raised by Stokoe’s ‘Moving forward with membership categorization analysis: Methods for systematic analysis’. I begin by discussing a number of points raised by Stokoe, relating to previous conversation analytic work that has addressed categorial matters; the implicit distinction in her article between ‘natural’ and ‘contrived’ data; and ambiguity with respect to the relevance of categories, in particular practices or (...) utterances. I then discuss how my own previous work could be located in light of Stokoe’s discussion of debates and divergences between conversation analysis and membership categorization analysis, and argue that being bound by the integrity of the data on which an analysis is based should take precedence over attempting to characterize the analysis as exemplifying either a CA- or MCA-based approach. I conclude by calling for a commitment to doing analysis, and pointing to the value of the resources Stokoe offers in this regard. (shrink)

This article proposes using structural description for graphical objects to solve an urgent task of trajectory analysis. A range of modern trajectory analysis approaches were analyzed and the best that is based on Graph Convolutional Neural Networks and Suffix Tree Clustering algorithm was chosen. Descripted ways to reduce computational sources for this neural network approach. This neural network was adapted to analyze structural description and advantages of this approach are shown.

Funding agencies and large public scientific institutions are increasingly using the term “research portfolio” as a means of characterizing their research. While portfolios have long been used as a heuristic for managing corporate R&D, they remain ill-defined in a science policy context where research is aimed at achieving societal outcomes. In this article we analyze the discursive uses of the term “research portfolio” and propose some general considerations for their application in science policy. We explore the use of the term (...) in private R&D and related scholarly literature in existing science policy practices, and seek insight in relevant literature in science policy scholarship. While the financial analogy can in some instances be instructive, a simple transposition from the world of finance or of corporate R&D to public research is problematic. However, we do identify potentially fruitful uses of portfolio analysis in science policy. In particular, our review suggests that the concept of research portfolio can indeed be a useful analytical instrument for tackling complex societal challenges. Specifically, the strands of scholarship identified suggest that the use of research portfolio should: i) recognize the diversity of research lines relevant for a given societal challenge, given the uncertainty and ambiguity of research outcomes; ii) examine the relationships between research options of a portfolio and the expected societal outcomes; and iii) adopt a systemic perspective to research portfolios – i.e. examine a portfolio as a functional whole, rather than as the sum of its parts. We argue that with these considerations, portfolio-driven approaches may foster social inclusion in science policy decisions, help deliberation between “alternative” portfolios to tackle complex societal challenges, as well as promote cost-effectiveness and transparency. (shrink)

A growing number of multinational companies (MNCs) report on their progress toward contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in their annual reports, yet the amount and quality of the information they disclose varies significantly. The aim of this study is twofold: First, we investigate how transparent MNCs report on their SDG engagement and second, we study how the reported SDG engagement changed over time due to major shifts in sustainability reporting requirements. Using a dataset of the largest German MNCs, (...) we analyze their disclosure of SDG contribution reporting practices. Our results show that, overall, between 2016 and 2021 all German MNCs increased their SDG reporting activity and that the MNCs adopted four different practices to report their SDG engagement. We also found that the largest MNCs were more transparent and systematic in their SDG reporting than smaller MNCs, whose reporting was more heterogeneous. Our study contributes to legitimacy research and the role of transparency in corporate reporting as well as the debates on the efficacy of sustainability reporting legislation in the context of SDG engagement. Our findings imply that regulations on environmental and social regulation increase the transparency of sustainability reporting. (shrink)

This study investigated various manifestations of gravestone inscriptions to find different types of moves in the formation of such inscriptions in two Iranian social classes. The sample of the study included forty epitaphs in two shrines in the north and west of Tehran. Each epitaph was then photographed for analysis. Swales’ genre move model was used to analyze the data. The moves involved word choice, content, graphics, socio-cultural values, and written communicative practices. Considering socio-cultural factors characterizing the social (...) classes, the results revealed four moves in the epitaphs in the Shrine located in north of Tehran, and eight moves in the Shrine located in west of Tehran. Out of the total of eight moves observed, three were different in the two classes. Comparing these patterns of moves and their frequencies, various emotional, structural, lexical, gender-specific, and age-specific differences were observed. (shrink)

Cost-effectiveness analysis for health interventions is traditionally conducted in a risk-neutral way, insensitive to risk attitudes in the population, which are potentially non-neutral. While the standard outcome metric of quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) aims to be deferential to people's valuations of health states, cost-effectiveness analysis of risky interventions using the QALY metric is not similarly deferential to people's risk attitudes. I argue that there is no good justification for this practice. Non-neutral attitudes to risk, especially where they concern (...) individually life-changing interventions need not be irrational, and so imposing neutrality is not justifiable as a way of debiasing preferences. Many common justifications for deference to health state preferences extend to risk attitudes. But even if reasons for deference do not extend, imposition of risk neutrality as opposed to any other rationally permissible risk attitude is under-motivated as default practice. Thus, either methods for measuring risk attitudes separately and incorporating them into cost-effectiveness analysis should be used more widely or a richer set of information should be presented to political decision-makers and the public to enable them to decide how to take into account the individual risks faced by members of the population, on top of aggregate effects on population health. (shrink)

Philosophers sometimes refer to ‘moves’ made in the context of a philosophical debate. Once familiar with these recognizable tropes, we then possess them as tools – a suite of possible moves to make in novel contexts. In this paper, I outline three such philosophy moves, then demonstrate how moves can be combined. Examples of moves and some combinations feature throughout the paper.

As an important tool to influence stakeholders’ perception, leader messages, subsumed under public relations discourse, play an integral role in corporate communication. Drawing on the analysis of linguistic move structure and communication styles employed by researchers, this study adopts a multidimensional framework by using both discourse and quantitative analysis to compare how leaders in Global 500 corporations in China and the United States rely upon specific linguistic features to engage stakeholders in corporate discourse published on their websites. (...) The results show pertinent differences in communication styles, where Chinese corporations tend to be more instrumental, elaborate and competitive while US corporations are more affective, succinct and harmonious. These observations depart from previous findings on interpersonal communication styles in cross-cultural research. This study also extends the boundary of corporate genre analysis by suggesting that the moves adopted in the structure of corporate messages are highly specific to the particular genre. (shrink)

This article is a theoretical examination of the relationship between truth and forms of dialogue, in discursive psychology. To do this, I mainly draw on Bakhtin and Kiekegaard . In contrast to a hermeneutic tradition that has sidelined the importance of the author to discourse , these authors offer an understanding of truth that depends on the author's emotional connection to the truth they are expressing. They most clearly demonstrate the dynamics of our emotional connection to truth in their descriptions (...) of different forms of speech. Kierkegaard describes the relationship between self and truth in irony, while Bakhtin does the same in the epic, the confession and the quarrel. It is my argument that these forms of speech interact with truth and help organise selfhood. I also argue that our current methodological emphasis on the function of words or the play of dominant discourses tend to overlook the experiential landscape of language and its reciprocal relationship with our subjectivity. (shrink)

This paper is a contribution to the ongoing studies revolving around the fields of Afro-Pessimism and Non-Philosophy. It is focused mostly on a short essay that Francois Laruelle wrote in 1989 called "The Concept of Generalized Analysis or 'Non-Analysis" that eventually became part of a larger work called Theorie des Etrangers, while also drawing on the latter for support. The focus is set not in terms of exegesis or commentary but in tandem with the work of Frank Wilderson (...) III to borrow from both of their works and formulate a move from the "White restrained Unconscious" to the " generalized Unconscious". In the first section I articulate Laruelle and Wilderson's critiques of the common-sense image of the Unconscious. And in the second section I make the move from the White restrained Unconscious to the generalized Unconscious by arguing that the former is embedded within a metaphysical sovereignty of desires that excludes desires. The "White restrained Unconscious" is constituted by what Laruelle calls a "half loss" or a loss which loses itself. For this reason the generalized Unconscious cannot appear within it, for it is an absolute loss, or what Laruelle calls the Joui-sans-Jouissance. The White generalized Unconsicous blocks loss out by a transference mechanism. The opening up of the White restrained Unconscious to the generalized Unconscious which is its Identity in the last instance can only be done by "ending the World". Using Jared Sexton's notion of the "social life of social death" I show that this desire to end the world allows for a seeing from perspective of the "One" which is the subject position of the Non-Analyst and allows for a dualysis of the desires of the White restrained Unconscious. (shrink)

There is near universal recognition that human participant protection is both morally and practically essential for all forms of research involving humans. Yet most of the discourse around human participant protection has focussed on norms—rules, regulations and governance arrangements—rather than on the actual effectiveness of these norms in achieving their ends—protecting participants from undue risk and ensuring respectful treatment as well as advancing the generation of useful knowledge. In recent years there has been increasing advocacy for evidence-based human participant protection (...) that would be grounded on the careful investigation of the effects of research on human participants. We offer an analysis of evidence-based protection and then focus on Canadian examples of research on evidence-based protection. We consider the prospects for such research being put into practice in Canada. Finally we connect our remarks to the theme of “the changing landscape of human participant protection.”. (shrink)

Understanding the 'making-up' relations, to put things neutrally, posited in mechanistic explanations the sciences is finally an explicit topic of debate amongst philosophers of science. In particular, there is now lively debate over the nature of the so-called 'realization' relations between properties posited in such explanations. Despite criticism (Gillett, Analysis 62: 316-323, 2002a), the most common approach continues to be that of applying machinery developed in the philosophy of mind to scientific concepts in what is known as the 'Flat' (...) or 'Subset' model of 'realization' (Kim, Mind in a physical world, 1998; Shapiro, J Philos XCVII: 635-654, 2000; Clapp, J Philos XCVIII: 111-136,2001 ; Wilson, Philos Stud 145: 149-169,2009). My primary goal in this paper is to show in still more detail that the Subset model of realization is inadequate for the descriptive task of describing the 'making-up' relations posited between properties or their instances in mechanistic explanations in the higher sciences. And my secondary goal is to highlight why this critique of the Subset view as a first-order descriptive account also shows there are deep difficulties in using the Subset account to address second-order issues in the philosophy of science as well. (shrink)

In the intelligent transportation system, the license information can be automatically recognized by the computer and the vehicle can be tracked. Red light running, illegal change of lanes, vehicle retrograde, and other illegal driving events are reasonably recorded. This is undoubtedly an effective help for the traffic police to relieve the huge work pressure. However, in China, a considerable number of vehicle tracking methods have certain limitations in resisting complex external environmental influences. The external environmental factors include but not limited (...) to variable factors such as camera movement, jitter, and severe rain and snow. These factors cannot be controlled well, so the tracking accuracy is greatly reduced. In regard to this, this paper proposes an optimization method for moving vehicle tracking based on SPF. First, according to the size of the overlapping area of the motion area between the two images, the researcher can construct and simplify the vertex adjacency matrix that reflects the characteristics of the undirected bipartite graph. Then according to the corresponding relationship between the vertex adjacency matrix and the regional behavior and vehicle behavior, the researcher completes the regional behavior analysis and vehicle behavior analysis. On this basis, a particle filter vehicle tracking algorithm based on segmentation compensation is introduced, and the vector sum of the tracked segmentation area is used as the final position of the target vehicle. In this way, as many scattered particles fall on the target area as possible, which will greatly improve the efficiency of particle utilization, enhance tracking accuracy, and avoid the problem of tracking failure caused by too fast vehicle movement. Through experimental simulation, it can be seen that the method proposed in this paper can greatly enhance the vehicle tracking ability when tracking vehicles in “complex environments.”. (shrink)

Spiritual pedagogy (SP) as a new educational theory aims to apply cultural and spiritual values in classroom practices. It has been the focus of research in different fields such as counselling, management, and science in the past decades. However, its application in second/foreign language research and practice has been widely overlooked by L2 researchers, to date. To fill this gap, the present study made an effort to provide a theoretical analysis of the conceptualizations, scientific background, benefits, and practical techniques (...) to implement SP in the context of L2 education. In so doing, this paper suggests a number of practices through which SP can be integrated into L2 education among which positive psychology (PP) was more highlighted. Additionally, some practical implications were provided for EFL teachers, teacher trainers, students, curriculum designers, and researchers to enhance their knowledge of spirituality and education. In the end, different suggestions for future research were presented to move this research domain forward. (shrink)

In their 2020 paper ‘Unfreezing the spotlight’, Correia and Rosenkranz argue that the spotlight theory – the mix of the view that, always, everything always exists and the view that there is a metaphysically robust property of presentness for times – is sufficient for temporal passage, and that the fact ‘that this robust property of presentness attaches to different times as time goes by … is unnecessary’. In this paper, I shall reveal that Correia and Rosenkranz’s spotlight theory is a (...) moving spotlight theory in disguise. (shrink)

For some time we have seen a shift away from direct marketing, a core feature and dominant exchange form in the alternative food world, towards a greater role for intermediation. Yet, we still need to better understand to what extent and in what ways new mediated Alternative Food Networks represent an evolution of or departure from core tenets of alternative food systems. This paper focuses on AFNs with new intermediaries that connect small-scale producers with urban end-consumers. Based on original research (...) in Frankfurt, Berlin, and Calgary, we analyze three different types of mediated AFNs: one driven by consumers, one by an external intermediary, and one by producers. Our cases include non-capitalist, capitalist, and alternative capitalist economic practices as identified by Gibson-Graham. Conceptually, we base our analysis on the three-pillar-model of alternative agri-food systems, which we further refine. Besides comparing our cases with each other, for heuristic purposes we also compare them with an ideal-type model that adheres to core tenets of alterity in all three pillars. Our empirical analysis shows that intermediary organizations can bring important benefits and that mediated AFNs are in principle able to hold true to the core tenets of alternative agri-food systems. However, it is very important to develop models of democratic control and ownership as well as economic arrangements in which created value is fairly shared. Only then can the potentials of new mediated models be realized while the pitfalls of the conventional systems they seek to replace be avoided. (shrink)

This paper is a systematic investigation of motion expressions in programmatic music description. To address issues with defining the Source MOTION and the Target MUSIC, we utilize Gestalt models (Figure-Ground and Source-Path-Goal) while also critically examining the ontological complexity of the Target MUSIC. We also investigate music motion descriptions considering the role of the describer’s perspective and communicative goals. As previous research has demonstrated, an attentional Goal-bias is common in physical motion description, yet this has been found also to lessen (...) due to audience accommodation effects. We investigate whether this also occurs in music description. Using cognitive linguistic frameworks, we conducted an analysis of 21 English speakers’ written descriptions of dynamic orchestral excerpts. All participants gave a description of one excerpt reporting their own personal experiences and the other excerpt reporting the events of the excerpt for a fictional future participant. We find that addressee accommodation shapes the choice of the ontological types of Figures used from being more subjective and creative in describing music for oneself versus being more objective in describing music for others. However, our investigation does not find sufficient evidence for a Goal-bias in music like there is in physical motion event descriptions. (shrink)

Automatic moving object detection and tracking is very important task in video surveillance applications. In the present work the well known background subtraction model and use of Gaussian Mixture Models have been used to implement a robust automated single object tracking system. In this implementation, background subtraction on subtracting consecutive frame-by-frame basis for moving object detection is done. Once the object has been detected it is tracked by employing an efficient GMM technique. After successful completion of tracking, moving object recognition (...) of those objects using well known Principal Component Analysis, which is used for extracting features and Manhattan based distance metric is used for subsequent classification purpose. The system is capable of handling entry and exit of an object. Such a tracking system is cost effective and can be used as an automated video conferencing system and also has applications like human tracking, vehicles monitoring, and event recognition for video surveillance. The proposed algorithm was tested on standard database on complex environments and the results were satisfactory. (shrink)

The education systems can be analysed by using the distinction along different types of welfare regimes. Esping-Andersen (1990) described the Scandinavian universalistic, Continental corporatist, and Anglo-Saxon liberal models. The purpose of the paper is a comparative analysis of the development of educational systems in the Baltic states. We used the PISA 2012 survey data and compared the Baltic countries with three “old” EU member states: UK representing the Anglo-Saxon liberal model, Germany for the Continental corporatist model and Finland as (...) an example of the Scandina­vian model. PISA 2003, 2006 and 2009 data were used for a retrospective analysis of countries’ performance. We considered four aspects of the organization of the national school systems: human and material resources in schools, leadership and the level of school autonomy, assessment, school selectivity and ability grouping. We found that three Baltic states do not represent a single Central and Eastern European model. (shrink)

This study investigated the rhetorical move structure of the dental sciences research article abstract (RAA) genre using Swales’ (2004) model of move analysis, CARS (Create a Research Space), to find the frequency of rhetorical moves and steps in RAAs of the selected journals and also to examine the association between the frequency of moves and steps in the RAAs. To this end, 251 abstracts from articles published in 2018, 2019, and 2020 in four Iranian PubMed-indexed dentistry journals (...) were selected and examined. The frequencies were counted and compared using the Chi Square statistic. The findings revealed that all of the abstracts included M3S4 and M3S5, and all but only one, included M3S1. Yet, M3S2 and M3S7 had not been used in the abstracts whatsoever, and M1S3 had been employed only once. It was also found that the RAAs in the Journal of Dentistry and the Dental Research Journal used the steps considerably more frequently than the RAAs in the Journal of Dental Research and Frontiers in Dentistry. The findings of this study can provide EAP instructors with practical insights into the needs and wants of dental students, and also serve as a complement to the guidelines for academic writing for dental researchers to produce more received RAAs. (shrink)

As a discourse genre, statements of purpose are characterized by their occluded status in the academy and by their hybrid nature. Statements of purpose are required in applications for a place in a postgraduate course, and they are requested to obtain information about the academic and professional background and skills of each applicant. A study of the genre’s linguistic and textual features is needed in Spanish to discover and understand writers’ and readers’ perception of this genre. A corpus of 50 (...) motivation letters in Spanish is analyzed here. We study the distinguishing macro- and microtextual features of this particular genre and co-occurrences between both kinds of features. At the macrotextual level, statements of purpose display prototypical rhetorical moves, which can be classified as writers’ moves and readers’ moves. On the microtextual level, modalization resources and discourse markers are discussed. This multiple perspectives analysis of the corpus shows evidence of significant co-occurrences among modalization, discourse markers, and rhetorical moves. Writers’ ideal representations of this discourse genre, which spans the academic and professional fields, can also be deduced. (shrink)

Using dimensional analysis, we demonstrate that it is possible to quantify changes in the topological structure of cardiac dynamics over long periods of time. A method was developed to calculate a dimension-like measure (referred to here as apparent dimension) from a correlation algorithm within a data window of 500 heart beats which is moved in equidistant steps over the time series of the RR intervals over 24 hours. The correspondence between the apparent dimension and the correlation dimension was tested (...) using artificial data sequences. Furthermore 24 hour electrocardiographic recordings of two healthy subjects and of a patient with acute myocardial infarction were examined. The reliability of the analysis could be demonstrated and changes in dimension reflecting physiological as well as pathophysiological changes were observed. (shrink)

With a vast majority of the land in the Driftless Region of the Midwestern United States dedicated to agricultural production, the future of farming has significant economic, social, recreational, agricultural, and ecological implications. An important literature stream has developed on ways agriculture can change to impact both human and ecological communities positively. In this study, we examine the processes and extent to which community narratives assert and inform regional identities that shape the meaning of being a good farmer. Using a (...) mixed methods approach, we examine what farmers consider good farming and how they utilize community narratives to assert their perspective of good farming. Employing a correlational analysis, we examined the relative importance of the four dimensions of good farming (productivist, conservationist, civic-minded, and naturalist). In addition, we used narrative analysis to explore the development of community narratives that assert a multi-dimensional view of good farming. Data for this study was collected through 21 semi-structured interviews with farmers, two focus groups of farmers, and a survey of farmers with 82 survey participants. The mean scores for conservationist, civic-minded, and naturalist dimensions were significantly higher than those for productivists. There was no significant correlation between the productivists dimension and the three other dimensions of good farming. Through analysis of transcripts, we identified a community narrative that actively problematized a dominant cultural narrative centered on production agriculture. Collectively, a community narrative is emerging in the Driftless Region that sought to normalize agricultural practices that promote profitable farms, vibrant communities, and a wide array of ecosystem services. (shrink)

Some species face extinction if they are unable to keep pace with climate change. Yet proposals to assist threatened species’ poleward or uphill migration (‘assisted migration’) have caused significant controversy among conservationists, not least because assisted migration seems to threaten some values, even as it protects others. To date, however, analysis of ethical and value questions about assisted migration has largely remained abstract, removed from the ultimately pragmatic decision about whether or not to move a particular species. This (...) paper uses the case study of the whitebark pine, a keystone species of sub-alpine habitats in western North America, to consider how particular cases of assisted migration may be ethically approached. After taking into account the value of species, wildness, place, ecosystems, culture and sentient animals, we conclude that, on balance, there appear to be good reasons to move the whitebark pine. (shrink)

In 2013, controversy sparked student protests, campus debates, and national attention when Smith College denied admittance to Calliope Wong—a trans woman. Since then, eight women’s colleges have revised their admissions policies to include different gender identities such as trans women and genderqueer people. Given the recency of such policies, we interrogate the ways the category “woman” is determined through certain alignments of biology-, legal-, and identity-based criteria. Through an inductive analysis of administrative scripts appearing both in student newspapers and (...) in trans admittance policies, we highlight two areas U.S. women’s colleges straddle while creating these policies: inclusion/exclusion scripts of self-identification and legal documentation, and tradition-/activism-speak. Through these tensions, women’s college admittance policies not only construct “womanhood” but also serve as regulatory norms that redo gender as a structuring agent within the gendered organization. (shrink)

According to Ross Cameron's version of the moving spotlight theory of time, (1) Past and future entities exist; (2) the properties and relations they have are those they have now; but nevertheless (3) there are no fundamental past- or future-tensed facts; instead, tensed facts are made true by fundamental facts about the possession of temporal distributional properties and facts about how old things are. I argue that the account isn't sufficiently distinct from the B-theory to fit the usual A-theorist's tastes (...) and arguments, since i) like the traditional spotlight it consists of a B-theoretic metaphysics with one small A-theoretic element tacked on, and since ii) in a sense it does not admit fundamental change. I also argue that the proposed grounding of tensed facts in tenseless facts does not work in certain cases. (shrink)

Patient competence, defined as the ability to reason, appreciate, understand, and express a choice is rarely discussed in patients with obsessive compulsive disorder, and coercive measures are seldom used. Nevertheless, a psychiatrist of psychologist may doubt whether OCD patients who refuse treatment understand their disease and the consequences of not being treated, which could result in tension between respecting the patient’s autonomy and beneficence. The purpose of this article is to develop a notion of competence that is grounded in clinical (...) practice and corresponds with the experiences of patients with obsessions and/or compulsions. We present a naturalistic case study giving both the patient’s and the therapist’s perspective based on in-depth interviews and a narrative analysis. The case study shows that competence is not merely an assessment by a therapist, but also a co-constructed reality shaped by the experiences and stories of patient and therapist. The patient, a medical student, initially told her story in a restitution narrative, focusing on cognitive rationality. Reconstructing the history of her disease, her story changed into a quest narrative where there was room for emotions, values and moral learning. This fitted well with the therapist’s approach, who used motivational interventions with a view to appealing to the patient’s responsibility to deal with her condition. We conclude that in practice both the patient and therapist used a quest narrative, approaching competence as the potential for practical reasoning to incorporate values and emotions. (shrink)

This article begins to undertake a human rights analysis of the increasing number of migrants who die annually while trying to cross the borders of Europe in an irregular manner. Over the past 20 years, border policies increasingly focus on border management instead of on classical border control. On the basis of existing data, it seems plausible to assume that the increasing migrant mortality is an unintended side-effect of this shift from control to management. The article argues that it (...) is possible to collect data, which are more reliable than those presently available, and presents data from a pilot project carried out on Sicily in November 2011. Presuming better data can be collected; two diverging human rights approaches are developed – a conventional approach holding that European states are not accountable under human rights law for these side-effects and a functional approach holding that human rights law does impose obligations on European states in this context. On all four doctrinal issues which are relevant to the problem , these diverging approaches lead to diverging doctrinal positions. A choice between the two approaches implies not only legal but also moral, ethical, and political choices. (shrink)

In exploring ways to speak about perception and feeling within the framework of a deconstructive cultural analysis, the article contributes to a narration of methodologies for research so as to better their capacity for engaging with the more faint or elusive manifestations of the real. The argument is grounded in a view of affective presence as involving a way of apprehending the world. Based on an exploration of affectivity and perception in a research project on prostitution in North Norway, (...) it argues that the body and its affects form a crucial site of intervention in developing transformative methodologies. An intuition that informs my inquiry is that attending to such subtle realities holds great potential for confronting injustice and suffering in transformative ways. (shrink)

This paper discusses ethnomethodology's program in relation to the phenomenological life-world analysis of Alfred Schutz. A recent publication of Garfinkel's early writings sheds new light on how he made use of phenomenological reflections in order to create a new sociological approach. Garfinkel used Schutz's life-world analysis as a source of inspiration, called for 'misreading' in the sense of an alternate reading and developed a new, empirical approach to the analysis of social order which he called 'ethnomethodology'. Ethnomethodologists (...) usually acknowledge the historical importance of Schutz but emphasize that Garfinkel succeeded to overcome the limitations of phenomenological analyses and moved beyond. This view has spread above all in the Anglosaxon countries. In German sociology, Schutz's life-world analysis still has a much stronger standing than ethnomethodology and is interpreted as a systematic whole. Following Luckmann, it is discussed as a protosociological foundation of the methodology of social sciences or, following Srubar, as a philosophical anthropology with two poles: a subjective and a social, pragmatic pole. Both versions claim to analyze the meaningful constitution of the social world, to serve as a foundation of sociological methodology and to provide guidelines for an `adequate' sociology. While Garfinkel used phenomenological concepts for sociological analysis, Luckmann clearly distinguishes the two: you either do phenomenology (protosociology) or you do sociology (a theoretically guided, empirical sociology of knowledge). This paper describes the present-day debate in German sociology and compares ethnomethodology's program with these interpretations of Schutz's life-world analysis. (shrink)

As Nelson Goodman highlighted, there are two main senses of “abstract” that can be found in discussions about abstract art. On the one hand, a representation is abstract if it leaves out certain features of its target. On the other hand, something can be abstract to the extent that it does not represent a concrete subject. The first sense of “abstract” is well-known in philosophy of science. For example, philosophers discuss mathematical models of physical, biological, and economic systems as being (...) abstract in this sense. However, it is the second sense that dominates discussions of abstract art in aesthetics. For example, abstract art was (and is) considered revolutionary precisely for being non-figurative. Through an analysis of artists including Kandinsky, Malevich, and Mondrian, we develop a reading of this second sense, which we call “generative abstraction,” as opposed to “subtractive” abstraction. Generative abstraction is a process in which a new artifact is created which does not represent the initial concrete target system that inspired it (if there was one), where the artifact’s features are explored for their own sake, and where the “language” of the new artifact is in some way more “universal.” Focusing on this sense of abstraction is helpful in revealing the complexity of the process of crafting an abstract artifact, in problematizing the notion that abstraction can always be un-done (or concretized), as well as revealing new ways for abstractions to be epistemically (un)successful. (shrink)

Here is something puzzling. Still Lifes can be expressive. Expression involves movement. Hence, (some) Still Lifes move. This seems odd. I consider a novel explanation to this ‘static-dynamic’ puzzle from Mitchell Green (2007). Green defends an analysis of artistic expressivity that is heavily indebted to work on intermodal perception. He says visual stimuli, like colours and shapes, can elicit experienced resemblances to sounds, smells and feelings. This enables viewers to know how an emotion feels by looking at the (...) picture. The hypothesis is intriguing, but I show that his suggestion that we empathize with the pictorial content is implausible and that this exposes a flaw in the way his argument moves from experiential mappings to experiential-affective mappings. Consequently, I register some reservations about the way Green supposes we detect these cross-modal qualities. (shrink)

This article examines the impact of female leadership on corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices in publicly traded corporations. Our analysis finds that female leadership matters. For example, female leadership at the board level increases the likelihood of having a female CEO and the overall percentage of women executives in firms. The study measures CSR practices using the Thomson Reuters corporate responsibility ratings (TRCRR) from the Thomson Reuters ASSET4 database for 1242 firms over a 7-year period, from 2009 to 2015. (...) Panel regression estimates indicate that board gender diversity (BGD) has a positive impact on CSR, while two other measures of female leadership (presence of female CEO and percentage of female executives) were largely insignificant. We perform our analysis in the context of upper echelons theory and expand on recent studies of the impact of female leadership on CSR practices by using a different and a larger data set than previous research studies. (shrink)

Variability in the symptom experience in patients diagnosed with chronic conditions may be related to social determinants of health (SDoH). The purpose of this critical review was to (1) summarize the existing literature on SDoH and symptom clusters (i.e., multiple, co‐occurring symptoms) in patients diagnosed with common chronic conditions, (2) evaluate current variables and measures used to represent SDoH, (3) identify gaps in the evidence base, and (4) provide recommendations for the incorporation of SDoH into future symptom cluster research. We (...) identified 118 articles including information on SDoH in chronic condition symptom cluster research. Articles primarily focused on cancer populations. Few articles had the explicit purpose of investigating relationships between SDoH and symptom clusters, and the inclusion of SDoH was often limited to variables used to describe samples. Future studies should be designed to “move beyond Table 1” in their utilization of SDoH as variables and examine relationships between SDoH and symptom clusters. Attention should be paid to the appropriateness of measures being used to collect information on SDoH, and analysis methods that estimate causal connections between variables should be considered. Research regarding the relationship of SDoH with symptom clusters in patients with chronic conditions has the potential to reveal mechanisms of symptom disparities and guide changes to alleviate these disparities. (shrink)

BackgroundThis paper represents a portion of the findings from one of the first research studies eliciting the lived experience of adults with an early diagnosis of Phenylketonuria living in Ireland. Ireland has one of the highest prevalence rates of PKU in Europe, however, little is known about the experience of Irish adults with PKU. Furthermore, Ireland is one of the first countries in the world to introduce neonatal screening followed by the introduction of long-term dietary therapy over 50 years ago. (...) This study presents the first comprehensive assessment of the lived experience of Irish adults with PKU on long term dietary therapy.MethodsNarrative data was collected from eleven self-selected participants, using semi-structured interviews. The interviews were divided into five sections focused on eliciting a holistic understanding of the lived experience of adults with PKU living in Ireland. Thematic analysis was guided by Colaizzi's Framework in conjunction with NVivo qualitative data analysis software.FindingsFindings from the original research encompassed a broad understanding of the lived experience of adults with PKU living in Ireland, including factors influencing dietary therapy and managing PHE blood levels. The themes being discussed within this article are those which appear to be least represented within current literature: living with PKU, including reproductive health, the importance of self-management and establishing routine, support networks in adulthood and concerns regarding aging with PKU.ConclusionIt was evident from the findings that a diagnosis of PKU can influence how adults with PKU may experience aging and their own mortality. These findings offer new insight into the vulnerability attached to the experience of aging with PKU and may be beneficial to advocacy groups and for future development of policy and practice. (shrink)

This paper draws on an in-depth phenomenological analysis of some interviews taken from volunteers, inviting them to reflect on their lived experiences of meaningfulness in the context of volunteering and citizenship. It is found that while some testimonies reinforce the standard conceptions of meaningfulness, other testimonies vary from it. The main challenge of this contribution consists in phenomenologically describing this alternative picture of meaningfulness, depicted as the event of witnessing. In a final part, the authors consider how volunteering is (...) at times especially prone to further experiences of witnessing. (shrink)

In _Abductive Analysis_, Iddo Tavory and Stefan Timmermans provide a new navigational map for constructing empirically based generalizations in qualitative research. They outline an accessible way to think about observations, methods, and theories that nurtures theory-formation without locking it into predefined conceptual boxes. The authors view research as continually moving back and forth between a set of observations and theoretical generalizations. To craft theory is to then pitch one’s observations in relation to other potential cases, both within and without one’s (...) field. The book provides novel ways to approach the challenges that plague qualitative researchers across the social sciences—how to think about the relation between methods and theories, how to conceptualize causality, how to construct axes of variation, and how to leverage the researcher’s community of inquiry. _Abductive Analysis_ is a landmark work that shows how a pragmatist approach provides a more productive and fruitful way to conduct qualitative research. (shrink)

The present article is based on a interview with a Japanese experienced caregiver who specializes in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, which generally leads to the locked-in syndrome. Professional caregivers for ALS patients with ventilator experience two particular temporalities in their practice. First, they must monitor the patient continuously during a seven-hour stay. Because a single problem in the ventilator can have fatal consequences, the care of an ALS patient with a ventilator requires long periods of sustained concentration. Second, trying (...) to understand the signs of a patient with a ventilator sometimes requires three hours to go through ten alphabets. In addition to the huge effort that such communication requires, caregivers must complete the meaning of the signs with their imagination: the ten alphabets are not sufficient to understand what the patient really wants to say. This imaginative capacity, however, is based on a long relationship, which started when the patient was still able to speak and move. That is why, as this article will show, even when a patient has entered total LIS, the caregiver can continue to realize his or her wishes. (shrink)