Berger's Theory Research Articles

Hijab dalam Pandangan Muslimah

This article discusses the hijab in the view of the Muslim community Caring for the Hijab Purwokerto. This research is a type of field research. In analyzing data, the instruments that researchers use are in-depth interviews, observations, and data that researchers get from journals, books, and newspapers. Researchers, in this case, use the Social Construction Theory from Peter L Berger's theory. This theory is more focused on the meaning and joint interpretation constructed in community networks. From the research conducted, the researchers focused on two main things, namely: (1) The view of the Muslim community caring for Hijab Purwokerto on the hijab. (2) Genealogy of Muslim Hijab Care for Hijab Purwokerto community understanding hijab

Defending the Family, Defending the Faith: An Analysis of The Family: A Proclamation to the World, Religious Identity, and the Politics of Same-Sex Marriage in a Mormon Community

ABSTRACTIn this article, we apply Peter Berger's theory of religion as a social construct to learn how The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormon Church) advances a heteronormative view of family relationships in the United States using a document titled The Family: A Proclamation to the World. Furthermore, applying cultural studies theory, we examine how believing Mormons negotiate the tension that arises when their secular values compete with those expressed by Church leaders. We argue that, although the Proclamation addresses a number of issues, the Church offers a closed text that emphasizes war narratives in which same-sex marriage is portrayed as a threat to LDS identity and the heteronormative family. This closed text is further legitimized by emphasis on the authority of Church leaders as oracles of God. The study participants largely accept the dominant narrative, and those who reject it, do so with some trepidation.

Managing Conflicts between Physicians and Surrogates.

Two articles in this issue of the Hastings Center Report explore two sides of the same problematic coin. In "The Limits of Surrogates' Moral Authority and Physician Professionalism," Jeffrey Berger discusses the moral problem of a surrogate refusing a treatment, palliative sedation, on behalf of a patient whose suffering is refractory to intensive palliative efforts provided by a multidisciplinary team. In "After the DNR: Surrogates Who Persist in Requesting Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation," Ellen Robinson and her colleagues analyze data from a study of cases in which physicians wished not to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation on patients whom they thought it would harm. Both articles begin from the idea of a professional determination about a physician's duty to a patient that conflicted with a surrogate's determination about what should or should not be done for that patient. Berger's argument stops just short of a solution, however, because a physician's professional obligation to help patients, even within guidelines set by other professionals, is insufficient protection for patients. But if Berger's theory is right-that sometimes surrogates lack moral authority to make decisions on behalf of patients-then the Robinson team has developed a careful and public process for attending to that conflict.

The sacred comedy: The problems and possibilities of Peter Berger's Theory of Humor

AbstractPeter Berger is one of the world's best known sociologists of religion, having made significant contributions to the theories of the social construction of religious worlds and secularization theory. He is also a lay theologian who has never been shy about putting forth his religious interpretations of modernity and combining his theological concerns with his sociological insights. This article considers the role of humor in Berger's overarching theoretical framework, demonstrating its consistency over a thirty-six year period in his writings from

The Role of the State in the Repression and Revival of Religiosity in Central Eastern Europe

The aim of this article is to present two different roles of the state affecting individuals' religiosity. First, we provide evidence for the effectiveness of socialist regimes in influencing citizens' opinions by comparing religious beliefs among several generations of Eastern Europeans. Second, the article explores whether the democratization process in Eastern Europe led to a revival of religiosity by applying two strands of reasoning from the secularization framework: Berger's theory of plausibility structures (Berger 1969) and Norris and Inglehart's (2004) existential security hypothesis. The results show that due to an increased plausibility structure created by the democratic states a slight religious revival can be observed in several postcommunist countries.

Virtually real: Fake religions and problems of authenticity in religion

This paper offers a theoretical exegesis of fake religions, a category of phenomena that formally resembles authentic religion, except for the lingering suspicion that the intention is to satirise, parody or mock. Working from the observation that usually there is considerably more agreement about what does not count as religion than what does, I propose this putative category as a means to approach the intractable problem of authenticity in religion. The discussion begins by reflecting on theoretical orientations towards this problem and notes that an approach suitable to understanding fakery must account for the subversive qualities inherent in imitation. In the main discussion, I explore registers of authenticity in fake religions. With reference to Michael Taussig's theory of defacement, Walter Benjamin's theory of the dialectical image, and Peter Berger's theory of redeeming laughter, I argue that fake religions produce sacrality in their connecting the body of the perceiver with the movements of concealment and revelation.

Nonlinear flexural vibrations of composite shallow open shells

AbstractThis paper addresses geometrically nonlinear flexural vibrations of open doubly curved shallow shells composed of three thick isotropic layers. The layers are perfectly bonded, and thickness and linear elastic properties of the outer layers are symmetrically arranged with respect to the middle surface. The outer layers and the central layer may exhibit extremely different elastic moduli with a common Poisson's ratio ν. The considered shell structures of polygonal planform are hard hinged supported with the edges fully restraint against displacements in any direction. The kinematic field equations are formulated by layerwise application of a first order shear deformation theory. A modification of Berger's theory is employed to model the nonlinear characteristics of the structural response. The continuity of the transverse shear stress across the interfaces is specified according to Hooke's law, and subsequently the equations of motion of this higher order problem can be derived in analogy to a homogeneous single‐layer shear deformable shallow shell. (© 2006 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

Moderately large vibrations of doubly curved shallow open shells composed of thick layers

This paper addresses nonlinear flexural vibrations of shallow shells composed of three thick layers with different shear flexibility, which are symmetrically arranged with respect to the middle surface. The considered shell structures of polygonal planform are hard hinged simply supported (i.e. all in-plane rotations and the bending moment vanish) with the edges fully restraint against displacements in any direction. The kinematic field equations are formulated by layerwise application of a first-order shear deformation theory. A modification of Berger's theory is employed to model the nonlinear characteristics of the structural response. The continuity of the transverse shear stress across the interfaces is specified according to Hooke's law, and subsequently the equations of motion of this higher order problem can be derived in analogy to a homogeneous single-layer shear deformable shallow shell. Numerical results of rectangular shallow shells in nonlinear steady-state vibration are presented for various ratios of shell rise to thickness, and non-dimensional load amplitude.

A Pedagogy of Dealienation: A Case Study in the Application of Peter Berger's The Sacred Canopy

Abstract. This paper explores the use of Peter Berger's theory of religion and its features of alienation and dealienation to lead students to the critical awareness of the role that human beings play in the construction of social worlds, including most especially our religious worlds. After summarizing Berger's theory of the alienating and potentially dealienating capacity of religion, the paper describes how the author used the study of certain biblical texts, the Wisdom of Solomon and the pericope of the controversy over clean and unclean foods, as presented in both Matthew and Mark, to explore both the alienating and dealienating aspects of religion as presented in these selected biblical texts. The paper also describes how the author encouraged students to embrace as the most responsible stance a dealienating stance toward religion, especially one's own.

Sheltering under the Sacred Canopy: Peter Berger and Xunzi

This article brings Xunzi's views on religious practice into conversation with Peter Berger's sociological understanding of religion in an effort both to deepen our understanding of their theories concerning the constructed nature of religious worldviews and to consider critically the plausibility of their arguments. The author suggests that comparison of Berger's theory in The Sacred Canopy with Xunzi's account of the Dao enables us to explain why certain weaknesses arise in Berger's theory—namely, the difficulty of imagining how the self could ever escape the sacred canopy to achieve authenticity and the tension between his assertions about the precariousness of the social order and the apparent stability of the social order suggested by his descriptions. By uncovering Berger's hidden assumptions about the self, comparison with Xunzi's work also suggests a way the problems might be remedied.

Of Nakedness and Children's Books

Of Nakedness and Children's Books Perry Nodelman In Ways of Seeing, John Berger modestly quotes a conventionally-minded art professor's huffy comment about how "John Berger manages to interpose himself . . . between us and the visible meaning of a good picture" (107). Berger proves to my satifaction that the professor is wrong about the painting in question; but the professor is right about Berger. After reading Berger's discussions of pictures, I can't see them the way I did before. And while I don't particularly like seeing the aspects of pictures that Berger points out to me, I believe that they are there to see, and that being able to see them is important. Pictures are things to look at, whenever we feel like looking at them. Looking at them should give us pleasure, and if it doesn't, we have every right to dismiss them. These are truisms; but after reading Berger's Way of Seeing, I find myself unable to take them for granted. Instead, I am tempted to consider the implications of my own language. What if, in these sentences that so accurately describe pictures, I assumed that pictures were people? I would have to conclude that the kind of people they are is the kind called prostitutes. If I did, I would be noticing something interesting about the act of looking at a picture. It is always an act of supremacy-of having power over something. The viewer is always making use of the picture on his own terms and for his own pleasure; the picture is always being used, and it is only satisfactory to a viewer if it gives him what he wants or likes. Those are facts, but not necessarily significant ones; they are equally true of most of the physical objects in our lives. But Berger makes use of these simple facts to develop a persuasive theory of seeing. For people interested in children's picture books, it's particularly significant that Berger's theory begins with the idea that all art is illustration. There is always a vast gulf between what we see and what we can say about what we see: "each evening we see the sun set. We know that the earth is turning away from it. Yet the knowledge, the explanation, never quite fits the sight" (7). Consequently, pictures, which are records of what people see or have seen, always make sense only in terms of the words used to explain them. In this way, all pictures demand and depend on words-the words of their names or their captions, the words the artist used as he tried to formulate his theory of art, the words evoked by conventional images like death's heads and naked little boys with wings. Berger's fear is that we often attach the wrong words to pictures, particularly pictures from other periods: If we "saw" the art of the past, we would situate ourselves in history. When we are prevented from seeing it, we are being deprived of the history which belongs to us. Who benefits from this deprivation? In the end, the art of the past is being mystified because a privileged minority is striving to invent a history which can retrospectively justify the role of the ruling classes, and such a justification can no longer make sense in modern terms (11). As this quotation makes clear, Berger's position is radically political; he wants to make us see implications of pictures that we would otherwise take for granted, lest they co-opt our values and attitudes without our even being conscious that they are doing so. To be conscious of those meanings is to be radicalized in the truest sense of the word-to recognize how ideas and values that we might prefer to despise become rooted in our unconscious. The best example of the insidious means by which pictures communicate attitudes we might not want to share is Berger's discussion of the sort of [End Page 25] traditional European painting that we think of as being realistic. This sort of realism assumes that reality is what one can see from one fixed point in space...

Government by Judiciary: The Transformation of the Fourteenth Amendment

It is Berger's theory that the United States Supreme Court has embarked on a continuing revision of the Constitution, under the guise of interpretation, thereby subverting America's democratic institutions and wreaking havoc upon Americans' social and political lives.

Magnetoresistivity of single-crystal films of iron, cobalt, and nickel binary alloys

Magnetoresistivity measurements of binary systems of alloy films Fe-Co, Fe-Ni, and Co-Ni in the [100] direction for the alloy systems Fe-Co and Fe-Ni up to 25 wt. % Co and Ni, respectively, and in the [100] direction for the remaining alloys are presented. A test of Berger's theory on the influence of spin-orbit interaction on transition processes in ferromagnetic alloys of nickel is carried out. The results obtained are compared with the results derived from bulk polycrystalline samples [1, 2].

Some Problematical Aspects of Peter Berger's Theory of Religion

Some Problematical Aspects of Peter Berger's Theory of Religion

Sleep disturbance in children with visual-motor deficits.

The sleep patterns of 6 normals and 6 boys with visual-motor deficits were compared. While none of the usual symptoms of sleep pathology, e.g., insomnia, enuresis, night terrors, or somnambulism, were present in either group, the visual-motor boys showed a marked increase in Stage REM and correlated decrease in Stage 2 sleep. Results were interpreted as in accord with Berger's theory that the biological function of REM sleep is the innervation of anatomical pathways necessary for oculomotor control during waking.