Academic Definition Research Articles

‘A Polaroid of

On October 17, 2002, Will Self and Jonathan Coe delivered two papers that strove to tackle the following question: ‘Is a true literary Naturalism possible or even desirable?’ Whereas Coe chose to tell the story of B.S. Johnson and his obsession with Naturalism, Will Self summarised what he construes as the history of Naturalism to underscore his own rendition of this literary tradition. Far from presenting his readers with an academic definition of this term, Self chose to resort to apparently contradictory theories. Borrowing some tenets of French naturalism, Will Self also diverges from these seminal texts to redefine this literary concept. Self’s own naturalism seems to rely on the animality of the body and a subversive use of the notion of realism. For Self, the verisimilitude of the naturalist novel finds its origin in the Wildean notion that life imitates art and in Baudrillard’s simulacrum. Self’s need to ‘say something true with lies,’ bespeaks the way he sees the world. Thus, Self’s naturalism and realism rub shoulders with ‘dirty magical realism’, a phrase coined by Self, and demands the reader’s suspension of disbelief.

Practices and dynamics of immobility

PurposeAs its academic definition refers to, induction can be seen as a process designed to prepare newcomers in a company to integrate at least the way of working and collaborating in their new environment. Thus, induction as a process is somewhat a vector for institutionalization. The purpose of this paper is to consider induction as a practice embedded in specific contexts of action. In so doing, it proposes that induction can also be turned into an institution for itself, and this lead to a kind of organizational immobility.Design/methodology/approachThe paper introduces the case of a consulting company. Supposing that induction is firstly a practice, that is to say an aggregate of ostensive (explicit pattern of action), performative (what is actually done) elements and artefacts (tools and material productions), the dynamics of interactions between these elements are examined.FindingsOrganizational dynamics and change are often considered as synonymous. The paper asserts that, on the contrary, constant dynamics in practices may contribute to organizational immobility. This process can be depicted as “control through the institutionalizing of practice (in the meaning of ways of doing).”Research limitations/implicationsThe paper delivers an interpretation of such counterintuitive results, showing the role of modes of action in the way dynamics in practice can engender motion or stability. This research is based on a single case study in a specific range of activities. Additional analyses in other businesses should help deepen the understanding of such dynamics.Practical implicationsIntroducing the institutional dimension of practices, this paper offers the opportunity to broaden perspectives on control and responsibility. Change is not only a matter of process design or of culture, which are organizational variables. It should be dealt with in the institutional field.Originality/valueIt sounds original that an organization like a consulting company, supposed to be as highly adaptable as it suggests to be, finally shows to be embedded in such traditional patterns of action.

Citizen Police Academies: An Analysis of Enhanced Police-Community Relations among Citizen Attendees

One current initiative used by many police agencies across the United States to foster better police-community relations is the Citizen's Police Academy (CPA). While CPAs lack a precise academic definition, they can be considered to be a planned programme created by law enforcement agencies to educate their citizens on police operations and management. Over the last 20 years, CPA programmes have rapidly expanded among police agencies in the United States, where it is estimated that approximately 15% of all police agencies have some type of these programmes. This article expands upon the limited research on CPAs by analysing their impact on attendees. Specifically, this article explores changes in the attitudes of 48 CPA attendees who completed a 12-week/36-hour CPA programme at a Sheriff's Department in the state of Michigan. Based on the analysis of pre- and post-test responses, this study found that this particular CPA had a positive impact on the attendees' attitudes towards the police, and their understanding of police operations, crime, and quality-of-life issues in their community.

The Institutional vs. the Academic Definition of the Quality of Work Life. What is the Focus of the European Commission?

In recent years, we have seen how the quality of work life has been focused and defined by the European Commission (EC). In our study we compare the EC definition with the academic one and try to see how close they are. We also analyse the possibility of applying the institutional definition to the Spanish case through the development of specific indicators. Our main conclusions are that QWL is increasingly important for policy makers. In addition, it is essential to have objective indicators and to conduct surveys in order to reliably measure QWL.

Responses to Cohn's Discussion on the Zinkernagel-Hengartner 'Credo 2004'

Responses to Cohn's Discussion on the Zinkernagel-Hengartner 'Credo 2004'

Outsider and Insider Expertise: The Response of Residents of Deprived Neighbourhoods to an Academic Definition of Social Exclusion

The aim of this paper is to compare academic interpretations of the term social exclusion with the understanding of people with direct experience of the phenomenon. A preselected group of residents of deprived neighbourhoods were asked about various aspects of the concept and their responses compared with the definitions of social exclusion used by Burchardt, Le Grand and Piachaud in this Journal in 1999. In general, the residents’ understanding of the term corresponded well with the more academic definitions; however, in one or two key areas there were significant differences, suggesting that it might be useful for more academic concepts to be tested against the views of those with experience of the phenomenon which the concept is trying to capture.

Variations in Conceptions of Learning in Construction Technology: Implications for learning

The majority of studies on conceptions of learning have investigated learning from an instructional perspective involving university students from education programs. As such, these studies have not included other sources of variation that may arise from learners having a broader picture of learning which includes classroom instruction but is not limited to it, and have conceptions of learning that are mediated by context and work experience. This article reports a study that extends the scope for studies in conceptions of learning by considering general and subject-specific conceptions of learning, as well as comparing conceptions of learning of learners who have had at least two years of work experience and those who have come directly from school. The study involved students from a Construction Management course. This was to avoid familiarity with learning theories and processes. The findings indicated that while there is a degree of similarity between the general and subject-specific conceptions of learning there are also differences, probably caused by the context and intent of learners. Two new conceptions namely self-development and lifelong learning emerged from general conceptions, and self/career development and obtaining grades to complete the degree emerged from subject-specific conceptions. Even when the general and subject-specific conceptions of learning are similar there are differences in the meaning inherent in them. Learners are concerned with different aspects of learning such as application and acquisition of understanding. Similarly, differences were also seen in the emphasis placed on different conceptions of learning by the 'work experience' and the 'no work experience' groups. The findings suggest that, given the complexity of learning as a concept, it may be more beneficial to consider conceptions of learning in light of the context and intent of the learner rather than just as an academic definition.

Forget the `nation`: post-nationalist understanding of nationalism

There is a great failure and mental morass concerning theory and political practice of nation and nationalism, including not only traditional approaches but late nationalism studies as well. The reason is a long-standing and widely shared quest for adequate definition of what does not exist, in reality, as a collective body. Nation is a powerful metaphor which two forms of social groupings –polity (state) and ethnic entity (the people) –are fighting to have as their exclusive property. In its latest manifestation, it is an argument for geopolitical engineering and for questioning the legitimacy of weaker collective actors on the part of the winners. There is no sense in defining states and ethnic groups by the category of a nation. The latter is a ghost word, escalated to a level of meta-category through historic accident and inertia of intellectual prescription. A suggested ‘hard scenario’ for breaking the methodological impasse is a ‘zero option’, when both major clients for being a nation will be deprived of a luxury called by that label. The process of dismantling the non-operational category should be started with the intellectual courage to forget the nation as an academic definition and extend this logic into the domain of politics and everyday discourse.

Probe of quantum mechanics through cross section

We mean to emphasize a conceptual ambiguity which lies upon the academic definition of any cross section, in particle physics and quantum mechanics, and which, strictly speaking, might lead to noticeable discrepancies between experimental determinations at highest energies (according to specifications of beams and targets). Efficient tests of quantum mechanics are thus made obvious.

Secular Society/Religious Population: Our Tacit Rules for Using the Term 'Secularization'

The increasing discussion of secularization is hampered by several ambiguities. What we need is not some new, academic definition, but to recognize that we already adopt several different meanings for the word, depending on whether we are referring to a society, a population, an institution, an activity, or a mentality. Therefore, treating secularization as a general decline of religion is hardly meaningful. This recognition will make it possible to make sense of the fact that Christianity and secularization have sometimes increased together. Finally, the magnitude of the subject is vastly increased when it is viewed from the far side of a historical divide which seems real enough, despite measures of continuing religiosity.

Changing the Subject(s) of the "History of Canadian Sociology": The Case of Colin McKay and Spencerian Marxism, 1890-1940

Abstract: Although sociologists, responding to such issues as Canadianization, feminism, and postmodernism, have over past quarter century shown a strong interest in writing historical narratives about their discipline, they have tended to focus exclusively on university-based This focus has obscured extent to which was a broadly-based intellectual activity in North Atlantic world, especially among self-taught working-class intellectuals fired by evolutionary theory and a sense of sociology's emancipatory potential. Colin McKay, one of most prolific and important of these working-class in Canada, exemplified their general tendency to work within a paradigm influenced by both Karl Marx and Herbert Spencer. His work, taken as an outstanding example of radical sociological writings in this had important things to say about class, culture, and capitalism in Canada. Resume: Depuis 25 ans, les sociologues canadiens, repondant aux questions telles que l'independance canadien, le feminisme, et la condition postmoderne, ont construit des recits historiques au sujet de leur discipline, concentre presque exclusivement sur le monde universitaire, une strategie qui passe sous silence les traditions du sociologie populaire, souvent inspires par Marx et Herbert Spencer. Ici on examine les ecrits sociologiques de Colin McKay, un autodidact ouvrier, qui a propose des theses eclairantes a propos de la culture et le capitalisme au Canada. In every one of their recent great debates -- over Canadianization, Quebec, Marxism, feminism, postmodernism -- have been drawn into a discussion of significant events in history of sociology in Canada. A new development in field is often historicized by relating it to the sociological tradition, made up of a certain number of key events and personages (e.g., beginnings of sociology at McGill under C.A.Dawson in 1920s and 1930s, emergence of Toronto School in 1930s and 1940s, with Harold Innis and S.D. Clark as significant figures, Americanization in 1960s, Canadianization in 1970s, postmodernism and cultural studies in 1990s, and so on). Such historical narratives have naturalized a narrowly academic definition of Canadian sociology. A broader approach to history of sociology may bring rewards not just to but also to all scholars concerned with exploration of the social in Canada. I begin with a brief consideration of academic emphasis in existing histories of sociology, then proceed to an analysis of work of Colin McKay, a working-class intellectual who exemplified a wide-spread enthusiasm for radical sociology in turn-of-the-century Canada. Drawing upon theories of Karl Marx and Herbert Spencer, such sociologists as McKay developed their own critical understanding of capitalist development. a. Narratives of Sociological Development Accounts of history of sociology almost always work with an implicit equation: sociology = discipline taught in sociology departments. Gillian Creese is typical in remarking that The history of sociological research on British Columbia is not much older than BC Studies [b. 1969]. The first sociology course was offered at University of British Columbia in 1918 and first sociologist was appointed in 1929, but discipline did not develop until late 1960s.... This pattern was not unique to B.C. Until 1961 McGill University possessed only independent Sociology Department in Canada.... (Creese, 1993-1994: 21). The implicit assumption here is that sociological research is obviously same as academic sociology, and that nearly all sociologists, as intellectuals, worked as teachers in universities (see also Childers, 1973: 40). Frank E. Jones has claimed that sociology in Canada was largely neglected until 1950s (Jones, 1992: 21). …

Diagnosis and treatment of osteoporosis

A new definition of osteoporosis has been proposed by an expert panel of the World Health Organization, in which cutoff diagnostic and therapeutic values are derived from bone mass measurements, leading to the practical idea of densitometric osteoporosis with or without fractures. At the individual level, risk factors of bone fragility are not accurate enough to allow definition of an "at risk" population. Thus, bone densitometry remains the major parameter to be analyzed. In terms of therapy, all protocols refer to the more academic definition of osteoporosis, so that no true innovation appeared in the literature over the past year. The roles of calcium, exercise, hormone replacement therapy, calcitonin, fluoride, and bisphosphonates are more accurately defined in established osteoporosis. However, new studies are needed in the investigation of densitometric osteoporosis.

The politics of dislocation: Some mature undergraduate women's experiences of higher education

Mature women undergraduates bring to higher education a wealth of valuable, diverse, and common experiences, knowledge, and skills from which we all can share and learn. That is, knowledge and skills we have gained from our experiences of work, political activities, motherhood, our multicultural and class backgrounds, our diverse sexualities, friendships and special interests, to name just a few. These experiences constitute dimensions of who we are. Together they form our identities, consciousness-our whole living beings-and influence usin how we relate to other beings, nature, and society. Yet in general, in conventional Men's, and ironically in some Women's Studies courses, we find our knowledge continues to be devalued in higher education, and excluded from the shallow academic definition of what constitutes worthy knowledge. However, this is not to undermine or not to acknowledge that there are individuals in both Women's Studies and in some conventional disciplines who are determined in their concerns, efforts, and struggles to radically change learning/teaching practices and methods. How does the devaluation of our knowledge happen and why? What are the consequences of excluding large parts of our knowledge, experiences, and identities from our developing consciousness during three or four years within these institutions? These are some of the issues which are addressed in this article, originally researched and written in 1990 as part of my undergraduate Independent Study unit. I cannot begin to assess how much I owe some of my feminist sisters of the past and present, whose written, visual, and spoken experiences, knowledge, and courage have helped in altering my life. Those who also share our debt and concern may feel they also owe something to our sisters of the past, present, and future to continue to create a more women-centered educational system and world. The following is our consciously struggled-for contribution towards change. We hope you too will or continue to take up the challenge.

Potential Applications for Artificial Intelligence in the Petroleum Industry

Summary This article clarifies some concepts of artificial intelligence (AI), discusses some of its applications, and demonstrates its potential applicationin the petroleum potential application in the petroleum industry. AI is dividedinto two levels: the psychological, where it attempts to represent knowledgeexplicitly, and the intuitive, where explication of knowledge is not importantand the emphasis is on brain architecture. Expert systems, which implementexplicit knowledge, are discussed in more detail. A brief discussion of use of AI in Brazil, particularly at Petrobras, is presented. Petrobras, is presented. Introduction AI has been, and will be, a controversial subject because it involves suchtopics as human intelligence, knowledge, brain architecture, and things that wehumans do not yet comprehend. Furthermore, the knowledge of this science, itstechniques, and its applications is dominated by a few people. Therefore, AIgenerally appears like a science fiction story to outsiders. AI has beendefined in several ways, but each definition aims at the same thing: thecomputer has to be more intelligent. This means that the computer has to beable to imitate the human being performing what we consider 'intelligent tasks. This attempt to duplicate human intelligence in a machine requires anenrichment of the actual ability of the computer to perform fast calculationswith the reasoning and learning mechanisms common in our natural intelligence. These mechanisms are very complex, and we know very little about them. Althoughthere have been great advances in AI techniques, the intended reproduction ofnatural intelligence in its abundance is very difficult, if not impossible. Because of this complexity, AI research is proceeding in two directions. One isthe pure science concerned with the pure science concerned with theunderstanding and the perfect reproduction of the true mechanisms of naturalintelligence. The other is the engineering side that seeks to devise datastructures and algorithms that, although they do not copy the naturalmechanism, are good enough to reproduce some aspects of natural intelligence. These data structures and algorithms are used to perform some "learningability" and to perform some "learning ability" and to representreasoning through a limited and specific knowledge base. The latter approachhas shown more practical and profitable results. With this in mind and withoutbeing pessimistic, I believe that the reproduction of pessimistic, I believethat the reproduction of human intelligence is far from being achieved. Onlytime will reveal how and when this could happen, but there are those among uswho visualize the unknown more quickly and will accelerate achievement of thegoal of AI. Duda gives a more academic definition of AI: "AI is the subfield ofcomputer science concerned with the use of computers in tasks that are normallyconsidered to require knowledge, perception, reasoning, learning, understandingand similar cognitive abilities." Thus, the goal of AI is a qualitativeexpansion of computer capabilities. If the parameters Duda uses to define AIare accepted as adequate (humans have them all at a high level), then thesefactors, when incorporated into computer programs, reveal intelligence. Amongthe most-cited applications of AI are computer vision, intelligent robots, natural language interpretation, game theory, automatic theorem proving, andexpert systems. Among the problems to be solved by AI are diagnosis, planning, design, prediction, interpretation, monitoring, debugging, prediction, interpretation, monitoring, debugging, repair, control, and instruction. AI History In 1956, 10 scientists in a conference at Dartmouth C. delineated what todayis called artificial intelligence (AI). Those scientists assumed thatintelligence was based primarily on reasoning techniques and that human beings, because of their intelligence, would easily reproduce it in a computer. Theypredicted that in 25 years we would be involved only in recreationalactivities, while computers would be doing all the hard work. AI has proved tobe more complex than originally expected. However, the AI efforts of thatperiod were not without merit. Many new things were learned that havecontributed to AI's success today. It was learned that knowledge is veryimportant to the intelligence. Perception, both visual and in language, isbased on knowledge that is found to be cumulative, voluminous, and hard tocharacterize. An example is "common sense, found to be simple reasoningbased on a great amount of experimental knowledge. During the first 15 years, AI had few successes. Automatic machine translation was attempted, but withlittle success. JPT P. 1306

Who will follow the juniors now?

Empirical literature on value and growth style investing has found value style investing to be a favorable long-term investment strategy. However, value investing has lost its edge in the past 10–12 years. As a result, the value premium has been proclaimed dead by institutional investors who argue common valuation multiples, such as price to book, are not valid proxies for valuation. In this article we argue that the academic definition of value investing is structurally flawed. Common valuation multiples do not indicate mispricing (cheap vs. expensive) but rather investors’ discount rate, which is a denominator metric in valuation. We discuss the practical application of a new definition of value, and provide both theoretical and empirical evidence that a disruptive growth stock valuation premium exists in equity markets. We argue that in the past decade the valuation premium in growth stocks has been the main driver of their outperformance. <b>TOPICS:</b>Style Investing, private equity, portfolio construction, equity portfolio management, mutual funds/passive investing/indexing, security analysis and valuation <b>Key Findings</b> • The academic definition of value investing has markedly underperformed for more than a decade. • In this article we argue that the under performance of value investing is a result of the lack of a valid asset pricing model. • We introduce a new definition of ‘value’ and a value premium that can be captured in all stocks, regardless whether stocks are classified as growth, value, large or small cap stocks.

The Saved and the Regenerate: A Heresy

The following article raises a question about which few people think. It may be that the distinction between terms is one of academic definition, or it may be also that it involves a real difference as to moral values of religious experience. At any rate, the article will repay careful consideration.