Biographical Perspective Research Articles

ALCOHOL-RELATED PROBLEMS IN PORTUGAL: SEARCHING FOR CONNECTIONS

Based on a doctoral thesis, the study investigates the relationship between alcohol consumption and social problems. The main goals were to recognize the social problems most associated with alcohol, find interconnections and understand how society looks at the problem, especially in what concerns this particular relationship. This study employs document analysis and interviews as qualitative data collection methods, using a non-probability sampling. Were analyzed public records, namely national annual reports from 6 different official organisms, regarding 2015?. Were also interviewed 62 alcoholic patients, from 5 distinct support services? The interview data were analyzed from a biographical perspective, which allowed the analysis of the parallel evolution of social problems within the history of consumption. The results of this research confirm a dynamic systemic and multidimensional relationship between alcoholism and social factors/problems, especially family, legal, and work issues. The results also reveal that society devalues and neglects this association, by not analyzing or recording alcohol consumption. The findings of this study suggest that the lack of recognition of the problem interferes in the early detection and difficult alcoholism intervention.

Social-ecological and biographical perspectives of principals’ involvement in comprehensive school physical activity programs: a person-centered analysis

ABSTRACT Background The World Health Organization recommends a whole-of-school approach to promoting youth physical activity (PA) and there are several examples of this approach internationally. In the United States, the comprehensive school PA program (CSPAP) model serves as the national framework for school-based physical education (PE) and PA. Part of the implementation support structure for a CSPAP is staff involvement. Although there is a growing body of research that examines the CSPAP-related involvement of school staff, few studies have focused on school principals. Principal involvement is critical to the success of school-based PA programming. Investigating principals’ CSPAP involvement is a necessary step toward maximizing efforts to leverage CSPAP implementation. This study drew upon social-ecological and biographical perspectives and used a person-centered analytic approach to investigate principals’ CSPAP involvement. Purpose Building on recent research using a variable-centered approach to examine school principals’ CSPAP involvement in the U.S., the purpose of this study was to examine distinct profiles among these same principals in terms of their CSPAP involvement, social-ecological based perceptions of CSPAPs, and satisfaction with personal experiences in K-12 PE. Methods Stratified random sampling was used to recruit a national sample of 2941 public school principals in the U.S. for participation in an electronic survey that measured CSPAP involvement, social-ecological perceptions (intrapersonal, interpersonal, and environmental), PE satisfaction, and several demographic, background, and school context variables. A total of 291 principals completed the survey. Only data from respondents who indicated their school has a CSPAP (N = 198) were used for this study. Data analysis involved principal component analysis and latent profile analysis. Results All PE satisfaction items were found to be good measures with factor loadings ranging from .879 to .962 and a Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of .932 (previous research provided validity and reliability evidence for the CSPAP involvement and social-ecological measures contained in the survey.) The optimal latent profile model included four profiles, which were labeled Average (average scores for all three social-ecological factors), Above Average (above average scores for all three social-ecological factors), Below Average (below average scores for all three social-ecological factors), and Low-Interpersonal (high scores for the intrapersonal and environmental factors and low scores on the interpersonal factor). Latent profiles did not vary significantly on any measured demographic, background, or school context variables. The Kruskal–Wallis test yielded significant differences across the four latent profiles on both PE satisfaction (H (3) = 24.527, p < .001) and CSPAP involvement (H (3) = 34.469, p < .001). Conclusion This study supports the idea that there are distinct groups of principals, based on intrapersonal, interpersonal, and environmental perceptions regarding CSPAP implementation. Additionally, PE satisfaction was an important predictor of latent class membership, which in turn predicted principals’ CSPAP involvement. Future interventions to increase principals’ CSPAP involvement can incorporate the results of this study to design tailored professional trainings that target appropriate levels of social-ecological influence. Further, even though previous experiences with PE cannot be changed, helping principals understand the value of quality PE programs to whole-child learning and development may be worth exploring as a strategy to bolster CSPAP implementation efforts.

Parentification: identification and analysis of educational environments. Biographical perspective

Parentification is a phenomenon of reversal of intrafamily roles between children and parents (Minuchin, 1968). Children become persons responsible for the family system, assuming the roles, instrumental and emotional, of adults – parents. The available literature on the subject of research allows for the identification of specific family situations as circumstances favourable for the occurrence of this process. Each family as a group with specific bonds functions in various contexts, which in social pedagogy can be called "environments". This article transmits the category of educational environments to the biographical experiences of parentified people. The author identifies, analyses and describes them using fragments of (auto)biographical narrative interviews. Retrospective approach to family experiences allows, by narrators, to define the distinguished environments as a potential and a biographical reference point that helps to apply individual strategies of coping with difficult, sometimes traumatic experiences, related to the reversal of roles in the family.

Social Inequalities in Argentina and Chile: A Comparative Analysis of Welfare Models, Labour Policies, and Occupational Trajectories from a Biographical Perspective

The article analyses the configurations of social inequality in Argentina and Chile between 2000 and 2019 through a comparative biographical approach that combines three dimensions: macro-social (welfare models), meso-social (labour policies), and micro-social (occupational trajectories). In Argentina, welfare schemes oscillated between moderate protectionism and a liberal approach; in Chile, a movement was observed between revised neoliberalism and a protectionist liberal welfare approach. Regarding labour policies, a transition from employment regulation to self-management was observed in the Argentine job market; in Chile, a meritocratic discourse remains that advocates for worker self-management, regardless of changes in welfare schemes. These differences have no appreciable impact on the configuration of class trajectories, which are similar in both countries. While the service classes generally construct advantageous trajectories, the intermediate classes are ambivalently affected by crises and insufficient protection and the working classes accumulate disadvantages since they are conditioned by welfare schemes and social-labour policies.

Adult learning facilitators' professional identity: An exploratory review based on a selection of empirical studies

Abstract This paper is an exploratory review of selected literature that focused on adult learning facilitators' professional identity. We employed the snow-ball technique for selection and followed the review protocol by Beijaard, Meijer, and Verloop (2004) to explore empirical studies that discussed how professional identity is defined, what constructs encompass professional identity, which methodologies are relevant when studying professional identity and what are adult learning facilitators' common characteristics as professionals. Our review shows that the studies included have a common understanding of professional identity: it is conceived of as a dynamic construct which encompasses job motivation and future vision as well. Narrative interview with biographical perspectives was used as the main research method in all the reviewed studies. This exploratory review offers a set of perspectives which could be considered as entry points into an in-depth (empirical) study of adult learning facilitators' identity formation in various regional and national contexts.

Модель исследования социально-психологических особенностей студентов-курильщиков

The article considers the problem of tobacco smoking from the standpoint of system analy-sis of personality’s social relations. The proposed model for studying of the psychosocial characteristics of smokers includes: socializing factors, socialization problems, description of socialization and psychosocial characteristics of tobacco smokers. The modelled system represents a dynamically unfolding character both in its biographical perspective and in its immediate actuality. The subsystem component is the subjects’ socialization starting from the early childhood in their families in communication with their mothers. The degrees of addiction to smoking are viewed as necessary components for analysis of social relations of smokers in their young adulthood. The sample for the study consisted of 374 individuals. The research techniques were the following: 1) unfinished sentence method; 2) observation of the subjects’ behavior and the statements they make; 3) “My family” mini-essays; 4) “Psychosocial characteristics of youth” questionnaire survey. The above-mentioned tech-niques were used to study the causes of socialization problems in the respondents, as well as their attitudes to themselves and to their surroundings. Student’s t-test was used to reveal the distinctions between the control and experimental groups (p&lt;0.01; p&lt;0.05). Tobacco smoking should be viewed both as a violation of standard, rule-based behavior in one’s ear-ly adulthood and as one’s behavior striving to pave a constructive way into the future.

Profesionalni identitet nastavnika u obrazovanju odraslih u Mongoliji - biografska perspektiva

Adult learning professionals lack a unified identity due to the diversity of adult learning and education, which poses challenges to recognizing adult learning professionals and may lead to a fragmented focus on their professional development. However, a coherent and unified professional identity can be determined by referring to adult learning professionals' specific roles and sub-fields. Hence, how adult learning facilitators, who belong to a non-formal sub-field, conceptualize themselves as professionals may be an example of coherent, yet unified, professional identity. Moreover, it is essential to know how adult learning facilitators understand themselves as professionals because this knowledge provides a framework for facilitators to construct their own ideas of being professional. Thus, this research aims to bring insights to the questions of how adult learning facilitators became professionals, how they define their profession, how they determine themselves as professionals and how they perceive their future in the professional context. Thirty-five adult learning facilitators were interviewed using semi-structured interviews with biographical perspectives. Results revealed that adult learning facilitators seem to have a conflicted identity resulting from a gap between ideal and real. Concerns about current qualification and competences were also articulated. Findings implied that professional development programmes for adult learning facilitators need to pay close attention to identity formation, concerns about appropriate qualifications, and adequate support for professionalism through systematic policy-making.

Uwagi o przestrzeni w Empuzjonie Olgi Tokarczuk

This paper analyses the construction of space as depicted in Olga Tokarczuk’s novel Empuzjon. The novel is set in the autumn of 1913 in the spa town of Gërbersdorf located in the Sudetes. The town, with a spahouse at its centre, is situated in a valley surrounded by forested hillsides. This location encloses the space, unlike the surrounding mountainous landscape. This contrast can be reflected by the oppositions of “civilisation–nature” and “masculine–feminine” (where the space of nature is feminine and “wild/primal”, while the world of the town is dominated by the masculine element). From the biographical perspective of thema in character, the androgynous Mieczyslaw Wojnicz, the vertical axisof the world plays an important role. His development proceeds from the memories of trips to the basement during his childhood to the atticin the guesthouse in Gërbersdorf.

Rodzina z pominiętym pokoleniem: doświadczenia życiowe dziadków wychowujących wnuki

Aim: In the last decade, many countries around the world have seen an increase in the number of skip-generation families in which grandparents take over the responsibility of raising grandchildren. The phenomenon described is also becoming more common in Poland. This article presents selected results of a study aimed at better understanding the experiences of grandparents raising grandchildren in skipped generation families. Methods: Participants were purposively selected from grandparents raising grandchildren living in skipped generation families in the Podlaskie Province. Data were collected through semi-structured in-depth interviews with 20 participants. The use of a biographical perspective in the research provided detailed narratives of the life experiences of older grandparents in skip generation families. Results and conclusions: The grandparents’ stories show the duality of experience consisting simultaneously of stress/satisfaction, sadness/joy, being seen/not seen. Addressing the issues faced by grandparents living in households with the skipped generation is important as it can reduce stress levels. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a model of support for grandparents raising grandchildren in skipped generation households which could be relevant for adapting to a new life situation and increasing psychological well-being.

„Jesteśmy ludźmi o dwóch sercach. Pierwsze zostało w Bośni, a drugie bije dla Polski”. Międzypokoleniowe konceptualizacje tożsamości w rodzinie dolnośląskiej – perspektywa biograficzna

&lt;b&gt;Cel badań.&lt;/b&gt; Celem projektu badawczego &lt;i&gt;Migrujące Biografie – potomkowie reemigrantów z Bośni w procesie rekonstruowania tożsamości – pedagogiczne atrybuty przekazu międzygeneracyjnego w świetle historii życia&lt;/i&gt; realizowanego w latach 2018–2019 jest zanalizowanie i skategoryzowanie zasobów znaczeniowych zgromadzonych w autobiograficznych narracjach przedstawicieli kilku pokoleń rodzin reemigrantów z Bośni, które w 1946 roku osiedliły się na Dolnym Śląsku. Celem niniejszego artykułu jest analiza wybranych fragmentów narracji przedstawicieli dwóch kolejnych pokoleń ze wskazaniem dylematów w identyfikacji ich tożsamości. &lt;b&gt;Materiały i metody.&lt;/b&gt; Analizie poddano 25 wywiadów narracyjnych przeprowadzonych wśród dolnośląskich rodzin po-jugosłowiańskich. Ponadto posłużono się strategią jakościową, paradygmatem konstruktywistyczno-interpretatywnym i krytycznym, metodą biograficzną, w tym autobiograficznym wywiadem narracyjnym Fritza Schützego oraz historią mówioną (oral history). &lt;b&gt;Wyniki i wnioski.&lt;/b&gt; Wyniki badań ukazują transformacje narratorów w identyfikacjach tożsamościowych w zależności od kontekstu społeczno-kulturowego oraz biograficznych doświadczeń osobistych i rodzinnych przekazywanych pokoleniowo. Wiedza na temat różnorodności sposobów rekonstruowania tożsamości osobowej ma znaczenie dla władz lokalnych w kontekście projektowania rozwoju regionu. Dla pedagogów wiedza ta może mieć kluczowe znaczenie dla wizualizacji i implementacji integracyjnych programów prorozwojowych, uwzględniających różne potrzeby grup kulturowych i wiekowych.

Lwów i jego mieszkańcy w latach 1847-1850 w świetle „Pamiętników” Ksawery z Brzozowskich Grocholskiej

LVIV AND ITS INHABITANTS IN 1847-1850 IN THE LIGHT OF THE SO-CALLED “MEMOIRS” OF KSAWERA GROCHOLSKA NEE BRZOZOWSKA &#x0D; The purpose of this article includes reflection on the issue of how the so-called “Memoirs” of Ksawera Grocholska nee Brzozowska (1807-1872), a landowner from Podolia – elaborated by the Archbishop Zygmunt Szczęsny Feliński – show the life of the Polish aristocracy and landed class in Lviv in the first years after an event called in historiography as the Tarnów Slaughter (Galician Rabacja). Due to many reasons, it is a special biographical perspective. The text presents the figure of Countess Ksawera Grocholska nee Brzozowska, outlines the character of the source which should become a reference point for considerations included in this work. Furthermore, the most important endeavours that dominated the charitable activity of Countess Grocholska during her stay in Lviv have been described. These actions included purchase of a residential building for the needs of an orphanage being founded at the cloister of Sacré Coeur Sisters in Lviv, educational activities in favour of a finishing school for maidens, managed by this cloister, and philanthropic activity in aid of patriotic activists imprisoned in the Lviv jail, the so-called “Magdalenka”, and their families.

“You must kneel, compañero”: The Making of Graham Greene’s Monsignor Quixote

Abstract In the 1970 s and 1980s Graham Greene took up the habit of travelling around Spain to holiday in the company of his Spanish friend, the priest and professor Leopoldo Durán. The most outstanding fruit of these trips, almost always in summer, was the inspiration for Monsignor Quixote (1982), which Greene came to regard as his most accomplished novel (Cloetta 2004: 77). Centred around an idealistic, innocent, and somewhat foolish priest who establishes an intimate friendship with a communist ex-mayor, with whom he travels around Spain and talks about the divine and the human, the novel was initially conceived as a kind of friendly caricature of Father Durán, but it soon served as a vehicle to express various concerns that haunted the writer’s mind. The opening of the “Durán papers” collection at Georgetown University enables scholars to delve into unpublished material kept by Durán over the years, which may cast insights into the genesis of Monsignor Quixote from both textual and biographical perspectives. Taking as a major source Durán’s diaries, 16 notebooks recording his meetings and telephone conversations with Greene from 1976 to 1991, this paper aims to clarify some of the relevant background to the book’s inception, complementing the diaries with other accounts such as Greene’s letters to Durán and other friends, Durán’s letters to Greene, and testimonies by witnesses present at the events described.1

Rebellion as a learning experience in the light of narrations of adults participating in protests. Selected issues

The aim of this article is to show the learning potential of participation in protests in the narratives of several adults. Participation in rebellions is seen as a specific learning experience here. What is the relationship between experience and learning on the example of participation in rebellions? The author analyses this relationship, inter alia, on the example of critical practices described by Usher. This article is a part of a broader research project on learning mechanisms of adults participating in various forms of rebellion. The study is concerned with answering the questions: what and how do protesters learn? what are the social and cultural mechanisms of their learning? In this research project a biographical perspective was used. Within it, the biography is understood in a processual way. The biographical method focuses on the subjective level of experience in the socio-cultural and institutional context. The empirical material was analysed by searching for similarities and differences in rebels’ narratives. The results of the study are above all the identification of learning outcomes and identity-building processes.

Transnational marriages: National policies, generational transmissions, and gender dynamics – a biographical policy evaluation perspective

ABSTRACT A significant challenge to the understanding of generational transmissions and decisions in migrant families is the unexpectedly emerging orientation of well-educated and socially integrated young German women of Turkish or Moroccan descent towards transnational marriages with husbands from the country of origin of their parents or grandparents. Marriage migrations from Turkey and Morocco may involve trans-border migrations between an EU and a non-EU country with one non-citizen spouse; alternatively, they may take place as family reunification within transnational communities. Our article, by using the method of biographical hermeneutic interpretations of narrations of migrant couples, tries to avoid ‘the state’s lens’ on marriage migration by reconstructing ‘biographical policy evaluation’ by the subjects involved. In conclusion, we will present our reflections regarding the analysis of our empirical case studies.

Biographical perspectives on political agency and migration: The struggle of workers from the Maghreb against institutional discrimination in France’s National Railroad Company SNCF

ABSTRACT In France, in the early 2000s, a group of several hundred Maghrebi-born workers engaged in a legal case against their former employer, the national railway company SNCF. For decades, they had been denied the same wages, promotions, retirement pay, and further benefits as their French colleagues. In 2018, they finally won their case at the Paris Court of Appeal, thus setting an important precedent in the struggle against institutional discrimination. Based on biographical interviews, mainly with SNCF workers from Morocco, this article analyses the structural and biographical conditions for engaging in this political and legal struggle and sheds light on, amongst other things, the importance of transnational dynamics in collective resistance within a postcolonial context. This article thus aims to contribute to the discussion on migrants’ political agency, and how it is hindered or fostered by the different policies of relevant institutions both in the country of residence as well as in the country of origin.

Jugendfreiwilligendienste als ›Orte‹ der Selbstoptimierung?

Abstract Youth Volunteer Services as ›Places‹ of Self-Optimization? Considerations on Biographical Narratives in the Transition after School The article is concerned with self-optimization from a biographical perspective. The focus is on the ›biographisation‹ of life and the ›optimization promise‹, made by educational institutions in school to work transitions. By drawing on life stories of participants in the Voluntary Social Year [Freiwilliges Soziales Jahr], it can be shown how norms of self-optimisation are translated by ›biographisation‹ and how educational biographies are thus produced.

My Pilgrimage to the Missional in South Africa

The Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa at its 2013 General Synod made a bold resolution—to be a missional church. This resolution was not only an acknowledgement of past failures, but also a commitment to deep and lasting reform. In this article one of the pastors (and leaders) of the church tells this story from a personal, biographical perspective. It is a story of learning and growth and conversion. In this story we see how historical occurrences, personal experiences, reading the Bible and theology, meetings and conversations with friends and strangers and friendships, old and new, can help people change their minds. We also see how being missional is not only bound up with our understanding of scripture and theology, but also with the context in which we live and work. It becomes very clear that it is impossible to isolate the missional work of the church from the political, social and economic realities in which we live. We also see that being missional should not be romanticized as an ideal situation. Most of the time being missional is conducted in the messy chaos we call life.

Gratitude. The Red Army Memorial in Szczecin: A Geographical, Topographical, and Biographical Perspective

In March 1945, the combined Polish-Soviet forces captured the German city of Stettin. On 26 April, the 65th Army of the 2nd Belorussian Front entered the city, in which the rule of the Soviet military command was soon established. Due to its unresolved status and territorial disputes, Polish politicians, self-government officials, and first settlers were forced to leave Szczecin twice. In the period of the Polish-German “race for Szczecin”, which ended with the Potsdam Conference, the only stable element having control over the lower Oder was the USSR, whose emissaries treated the conquered territories as if they already belonged to their communist state. As early as in 1945, the Polish civil authorities came up with an idea to erect a memorial dedicated to the “democratic armies”. The competition for the Red Army Gratitude Memorial was officially launched in Spring 1949, once the USSR-born doctrine of socialist realism was introduced to Poland. Out of twenty-two submission, the first award was given to Józef Starzyński from Zakopane, a former citizen of Lvov. The commemorative complex located at the Polish Soldier’s Square was completed in April 1950. The aim of the present paper is to analyse the very memorial which remained in Szczecin until 2017. Of special importance to my investigation are: the geographical context of Western Pomerania considered one of the Reclaimed Territories and in a feudal relationship with the historical regions of the Republic of Poland, as well as with the Russian “Seigneur”/”Lord”; the topographical context, namely the act of re-building the former German city destroyed in warfare; as well as the biographical context, i.e. the life of the monument’s designer. The paper takes special interest in the formal and ideological links between the Szczecin memorial and one of Starzyński’s earlier projects, namely the Sacred Heart of Jesus Gratitude Memorial in Poznań (1927; a competition submission; never erected). A careful reconstruction of the memorials’ history will offer a valuable case study which showcases the 20th-century sculptor in a politically-charged environment.

Teachers in Transition. A Biographical Perspective on Transnational Professionalisation of Internationally Educated Teachers in Germany

Teachers trained in one country are often not allowed to serve as teachers in another country because their teacher’s license is not recognised as equivalent. The barriers these teachers have to overcome in order to work in their profession again are high and often require further (full) teacher training at the university. The paper provides insights into the conditions for teachers who participate in (re-)qualification programmes in Germany and Europe. By linking the theoretical concepts of a biographical approach to teacher professionalisation and transnationalisation in education, the results of an interview study with teachers who have participated in a programme for refugee teachers at a university in Germany are presented. The Grounded Theory analysis reconstructs the strategies of internationally educated teachers managing to keep up their hope to be able to work as teachers again and thus counter the formal de-professionalisation they are facing.

Ritual dispositions, enclosures, and the passing of time: A biographical perspective on the Winchester Farm earthwork in Central Kentucky, USA

Long-term interactions between people and places has been a focal point for archaeologists since the beginnings of the discipline. Monuments are one analytical unit of analysis that archaeologists regularly study and interpret as evidence for the ways people organize cooperative labor and inscribe on the landscape their connections to it. However, it is rare to acquire data that affords a rich and long-term description of the landscape before, during, and after a monument was built. In addition, archaeologists who study pre-textual societies are seldom afforded an opportunity to explore detailed questions relating to how monuments were engaged with after social dispositions toward them changed. In this article we present diverse datasets obtained from a small Middle Woodland (ca. 200 cal BC – cal AD 500) ditch and embankment enclosure in the Middle Ohio Valley, USA. Drawing on those data, we offer a detailed biographical description of the site that illustrates how pre-construction use of the area influenced construction of the enclosure, describes how the enclosure was used after construction, and indicates what happened when the enclosure became evaluated differently in society.