Focus Of Discourse Research Articles

Claiming Identity, Delineating Category

Identity is an important focus for discourse in the contemporary world, used as an indicator of elements that are felt by an individual to be an important part of how they see and understand themselves. Self-identification commonly employs terms that can also be used to signify an analytic category, and the understanding that underlies these different uses is often neither wholly shared nor entirely distinct. Recognition of different use is thus potentially significant in research related to the groups, behaviours or concepts signified by such terms. This paper utilises concepts of religion(ing) and kink - both terms which can be, and are, used as claimed identities and as analytic categories - to reflect upon the porosity of such concepts when they are deployed in individual and academic narratives. Qualitative research into kink (understood as a marker of identity) is used to explore how personalised practices contribute to religioning processes (understood as a category label). This offers opportunities to consider how personalised practices contribute to the religioning processes of world- and/or meaning- and/or story-making, and also demonstrates the porosity of concepts like kink and non-kink, religious and non-religious, as they are constructed, maintained and/or disrupted within individual and academic narratives.

Crisis Discourse in Human Resources for Health: A Move Towards Securitization?

Since the 1960s, a persistent shortage of health workers has led professionals managing Human Resources for Health (HRH) to frame their field as in “crisis.” Since the HIV/AIDS epidemic, this discourse has coincided with a general securitization of global health. I explore the extent to which crisis discourse in HRH potentially signifies securitization of HRH using a narrative review of 153 articles from the PubMed database and a case study of a global, USAID-funded HRH strengthening partnership (The Capacity Project). Findings show a marked discursive shift after a 2004 collaborative report by the “Joint Learning Initiative,” which led to increased and normalized crisis discourse focusing on the threat of systemic collapse. Programmatically, this shift enabled an emergency-oriented technical approach focusing on high-level solutions that increase efficiency and surveillance and establish a new type of emergency manager: the global HRH crisis expert. I argue that the discourse of crisis may be pushing HRH towards fast-track action scenarios common to securitization, potentially closing the door to community-oriented or upstream approaches. Anthropologists or other social scientists working with local communities should monitor these developments and become active participants in HRH steering groups or political-legal bodies to support upstream and alternative (non-biomedical) solutions, such as community health resources.

Using peer research processes to understand strategies to support those with severe, multiple and complex health needs

Objectives: There has been an increased focus in policy discourse on individuals with severe, multiple and complex needs. This paper seeks to understand how best to enable these individuals to take greater control over their health. Design: Qualitative, user-led, peer research. Setting: Large urban UK city. Method: Trained peer researchers with previous experience in contexts of severe and multiple disadvantage gathered data using a snowball sampling approach from 21 individuals engaged in a service specifically designed to provide for their needs. Results: The study identified enabling factors that create conditions for individuals with severe and multiple disadvantage to take greater control of factors impacting on their health and social situations. These included working holistically with individuals, understanding the interconnected issues impacting on health, developing trusting relationships with professionals and working within a positive framework that fosters self-belief and which is focused on salutogenesis rather than pathogenesis. Conclusion: There exists a set of enabling factors that may support individuals facing particular challenges in their lives. While derived from within a specific geographical context, findings have relevance to other settings in relation to ways of working. Peer research demonstrates itself to be a research approach well suited to understanding lived experiences.

Maritime economy: Insights on corporate visions and strategies towards sustainability

As the ocean has moved into the focus of the political discourse on the “blue economy“, ocean industry plays a key role in shaping “blue growth” as sustainable. However, little is known about the meaning of sustainability and the status of its implementation by corporations invested in the maritime economy. The present paper addresses this gap. Drawing on the discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe (2001 [1985]), the study explores the discourse on corporate sustainability. It was found that of 396 surveyed companies only 61 provide commitments to and reporting on the issue of sustainability. A detailed analysis of these companies showed that there has been a shift from a voluntary to a mandatory commitment to the concept as a direct consequence of being exposed to massive pressures to meet the expectations of their employees, customers and shareholders to prevent any harm to the environment, to save resources, and follow international regulations. It is argued that Laclau and Mouffe's discourse theory provides an approach to help to explain the practice of corporations in re-framing these challenges as an entrepreneurial opportunity to save costs, i.e. by avoiding fines, lawsuits, and clean-up costs, to optimize efficiency in all business sectors, to stay competitive, and to gain a better public image. The paper concludes that it is likely that the current efforts of companies with regard to the anticipated increases in the exploitation of marine resources will not be sufficient to preserve ocean health in the long run. However, there are corporate opportunities for strengthening the SDGs and contributing to a “sustainable blue growth”.

Marital Rape and the Marital Rapist: The 1976 South Australian Rape Law Reforms

This article charts a genealogy of marital rape law reform in South Australia in the 1970s, arguing that the new laws were based on constructing the marital rapist as a certain kind of man. South Australia is a significant case study, as it was one of the first Western jurisdictions to attempt to criminalise marital rape. Despite South Australia’s generally progressive politics, the legislation was highly contested, and resulted, in the end, only in a partial criminalization. To overcome the strident opposition to rape law reform, we show that supporters explicitly developed a discourse focusing on concepts of sexual normativity and deviance. The marital rapist, it was argued, had deviated from patriarchal standards of masculine decency: this, not the rape itself, was crucial to determining whether his conduct was unlawful.

Comprehensive internationalisation of Slovenian higher education? The rhetoric and realities

Policies on comprehensive internationalisation are currently in the focus of discourses on the development of internationalisation in European higher education. However, it remains to be answered, whether in Slovenian higher education, internationalisation policies and practices are indeed being implemented consistently and comprehensively, contributing to the overall quality of the higher education system. The paper obtains answers to this question through the analysis of different documentary sources and findings from semi-structured interviews, which were conducted as part of the PhD research. Firstly, it provides a general overview of the Slovenian higher education system, whilst afterwards, it explores the comprehensiveness of internationalisation in Slovenian higher education through the analysis of internationalisation policies before and after the Bologna Process. Based on the distinction between the ‘abroad’ and ‘at home’ dimension of internationalisation in higher education (Knight 2008), it continues with the examination of trends in mobility and internationalisation at home, which represent essential parts of comprehensive internationalisation policies and strategies. On this basis, it discusses the real importance of internationalisation for the quality of (Slovenian) higher education and concludes that the existence of different internationalisation models results from diverse approaches and rationales for internationalisation and hence, from often-contrasting views of individual actors and stakeholders on what is the quality of higher education and its (comprehensive) internationalisation.

Measuring Compensation System Structure: The Interrelation Between Equitable Pay and Firm Performance

Recent political and popular discourse focusing on income inequality between ordinary workers and top executives concentrates on the ratio of chief executive officer (CEO) compensation to “average” or median employee compensation (CEO pay ratio). Largely ignored in the income inequality debate is the importance of the underlying firm’s compensation system that determines the CEO’s and the average employee’s compensations. I propose employee perceptions of pay equitability are a function of how employees’ compensation fits in the firm’s compensation system, so CEO pay ratios may be incapable of detecting the underlying firm compensation system structure. Because the structure of the compensation system dictates the relative differences between superior and subordinate pay, I measure the compensation system structure using the promotional pay ladder (PPL), which measures how percentage increases in compensation correspond to increases in employee responsibility. I find that firms with “unequal” PPL (those which deviate from a theorized effective threshold) are associated with lower future economic performance. Deviations above and below the theorized effective level affect different groups of employees in the firm and have different impacts on firm performance. This study contributes to the growing literature on income inequality by providing evidence that employee compensation amounts need to be examined within the context of the firm’s compensation system.

Contradestinación inclusiva. El discurso de Macri y de Scioli en Facebook

<p class="Default">En este artículo nos proponemos analizar la destina­ción y contradestinación en el discurso político de Mauricio Macri y de Daniel Scioli durante el <em>ballotage </em>presidencial del año 2015, en la República Argentina. Nuestro corpus discursivo se conforma a partir de los posteos realizados por ambos candidatos en sus pági­nas oficiales de la red social Facebook. Para llevar a cabo el análisis cualitativo utilizamos las herramientas inter­pretativas tanto del enfoque post-marxista del discurso de Laclau y Mouffe (2008, 2007, 2005, 2002, 1996, 1993, 1985) como de la polifonía enunciativa de García Ne­groni (2016, 1988). Este estudio plantea como resultado la emergencia de un nuevo modo de contradestinación en el discurso político.</p>

Spaces for support: Discursive negotiations of supporter positions in online forum discussions about suicide

This article investigates self-organized peer-to-peer support in online forum discussions about suicide. It analyzes how the discursive strategies through which participants introduce themselves as supporters relate to the support they provide. The analysis shows that the strategies employed to construct supporter identities commonly draw on what has been described as ‘somatic individuality’ – by which the management of biological ‘risks’ are framed as individual responsibilities – and by negotiating tensions between different perspectives on suicide. These are; (a) a discourse focusing on psychiatric knowledge and psychopharmaceuticals (b) a discourse focusing on social context and personal relationships, and (c) a critical stance towards the established care system. Negotiations between these condition, and are also conditioned by, power relations in the forum. These dynamics regulate the ways in which participants can use an online forum in order to move away from crisis points by discursively attempting to enter a supporter position.

The Problem of Alienation: An Upanishadic Resolution

The problem of alienation has come to the focus of philosophical discourse in terms of cogito’s loss of immediacy with the body and intimacy with the world, ever since Descartes—the founding father of modern thought—had his famous meditations. Putting the problem of alienation at the focus of philosophy, how should this human situation be reflected upon and the problem be addressed or dissolved at the least? One thing is clear that the method of enquiry cannot be purely intellectual wherein the subject–object dichotomy has to be rigorously maintained. Rather, it has to turn intuitive at some stage, so that human subjective consciousness could be given its due place in the enquiry and the interplay of it with and the embeddedness of it in the material reality be revealed and accounted for as well. Only such an approach would address the problem at hand. But one cannot remain very optimistic about Western philosophy in this endeavor, due to the reasons to be elaborated in present paper. It is in this context that an enquiry into other philosophical systems becomes relevant. In the Eastern philosophical traditions, the issue at hand is addressed more creatively. Particularly in the Advaita Vedanta school of Indian Philosophy, the problem of alienation is tackled in an original way by elevating altogether the ‘being of man’ to a different level by way of an existential blending of his intellectual and intuitive capacities. Precisely in the Taittiriya Upanishad, man’s true nature is formulated in tune with nature, giving it a unique existential thrust. This conception once elaborated seems to be capable of productively addressing the issue at hand. An attempt will be made in the paper, at elucidating this view.

El Programa de Coordinación de los Estudios y la Innovación de la Escuela Rural de Cataluña

Rural schools have been a focus of social debates and pedagogical discourse over time. Educative administrations have expressed their willingness to maximize the qualitative development of rural schools through the promotion of innovative projects and the improvement of classes, fostering research and studies focused on rural schools. For its part, the University of Lleida maintains their interest in the teacher's training, the scientific research and the promotion and diffusion of it. For this purpose, we present the principal goals and actions of the "Programa de coordinación de los Estudios y la Innovación de la Escuela Rural de Catalunya” (CEIER) that started their actions recently.

Sara Burgerhart (1782): female Bildung in a transnational/translational context

De historie van mejuffrouw Sara Burgerhart (1782) enjoyed an early editorial fortune in Europe in its times. The circulation of Wolff and Deken’s masterpiece is tightly connected to its educational aim. The first part of the article outlines the dissemination of this and some other Dutch novels in the context of the general circulation of ideas and works dealing with the education, especially of women and children. The mediators (translator and printers) are mentioned as well. Further considerations are connected to textual hints testifying the presence in Wolff and Deken’s novel of an underlying educational discourse focusing on women, reaching much further than the conventional seduction (or ‘tested woman’) plot.

Frames del discurso público en la arena política del 68

The aim of this paper is to describe and analyze the public discourse utilized by the actors involved in 68 movement´s juncture. I carried out the analysis of the discourse strategies used by the main actors involved: student movement, press and authorities (governors, police and army). In this political scenario, discourse student movement focus on democratic liberties frame, meanwhile press and authorities discourse focus on communist conspiracy frame.

Strengthening the Official National Discourse: The Impact of the First Pahlavi Government Institutions and Organizations

The modern relics of Reza Shah created new organizations, including the National Art Association, Museum of Ancient Iran, Ancient Persia Center, Organization of the development of thoughts, Academy of the national language of Iranians, and National radio based on the discourse of authoritarian nationalism influenced by the German dialectic of Nazism, under the influence of the thinkers of this age. These institutions, in their turn, tried to act in line with the internalization of the discourse of the official nationalism of the modern authoritarian state and the Iranian national identity defined by that discourse focusing on antiquity, authoritarianism, love for Shah, modernization and emphasis on national language. The current paper tries to address the actions of these institutions in constructing the Iranian national identity based on the discourse of authoritarian romantic nationalism.

Let me grow old and senile in peace: Norwegian newspaper accounts of voice and agency with dementia

ABSTRACTThis study analyses the remaking of dementia as a social and cultural phenomenon in the public media discourse in a welfare state Norway. A content analysis was carried out of articles on dementia published in Norwegian paper media from 1995 to 2015. The study combined the tools from quantitative corpus analyses and qualitative critical discourse analyses, making it possible to detect and interpret diachronic changes in the dementia discourse. Although the main focus in Norwegian dementia discourse has changed from the disease to the personhood, the agents defining what it means to live well with dementia continued to be predominantly institutional: non-governmental organisations, municipalities, health-care institutions and politicians. An analysis of the uses of the politically incorrect Norwegian term for dementia, ‘senility’, revealed that this term offered an alternative to the institutionalised dementia discourse and functioned as an unconventional and therapeutic-free space where older people and persons with dementia could use humour to subvert these norms and power relations.

School Psychology and Cultural Competence: Room to Grow?

This study investigated how the concept of cultural competence was represented in three 2010 policy documents on service delivery, ethics, and credentialing by the National Association of School Psychologists. Qualitative analysis identified substantial sections of discourse focusing on cultural competence and, to a lesser extent, social justice, but neither concept was clearly defined with examples from everyday practice. From a policy perspective, a stronger focus on the centrality of cultural competence in school psychology training and practice is needed to improve outcomes for increasingly diverse children and families. Implications for policy development, professional development, and future research are discussed.

Deixis in narrative: a study of Kamaiurá, a TupíGuaraní language of Upper Xingu, Brazil

The current paper describes the deictic system of Kamaiurá, a language of the Tupí-Guaraní family. The Kamaiurá system of deictic demonstratives and adverbials has a high degree of complexity, including at least 17 different forms, of which several have different functions. The system codes four levels of Participant deixis, with proximal, medial, distal and far distal deixis. Forms can also code anaphora and highly specialized locations of the referent, such as ‘moving away’ and ‘located beside something’. A further peculiar and unusual characteristic of the Kamaiurá system is the coding of Modal and Evidential deixis, which is found among the forms marking far distal deixis. Our study has two foci: the first part describes the system in its independent or exophoric use, and this part is based on deep interviews with native speakers and a deixis elicitation study. The second part of the paper represents the core of our study. Here, we investigate the uses of the deictic system in a recorded frog story, looking at anaphoric and cataphoric usages of the forms as well as how they are used to mark topic and focus in the narrative discourse. The text is very rich in deictic forms, and out of the 17 different forms recorded for Kamaiurá, 9 occur in our frog story. We notice a tendency where the hierarchy of increasing distance from the ego in the independent forms is transferred into increasing focus of the narrative. Epistemic modality of the independent forms is used to mark uncertainty in the narrative, i.e., to indicate lack of terms for a specific item, whereas anaphoric deixis of the independent forms marks general reference in the narrative.

Do you have a Plan B?

This study explores adaptive capacities in infrastructure preparedness planning from a resilience approach using the bridge between Denmark and Sweden as a case. First, a theoretical framework anchors adaptive capacity in a more general resilience discourse focusing on flexibility and adaptive capacity with emphasis on citizens' ability to interpret information and adjust their behaviour without prior planning and training or instructions. Then, findings from a small qualitative study (n = 45) of the perception of commuters and travellers of the responsibilities and contingencies involved in potential long‐term disruptions of the Øresund Bridge are discussed. The most important suggested recommendation for authorities and infrastructure owners is simply to remind users that an infrastructure is not a given—in other words, to ask travellers whether “they have a Plan B,” thereby prompting citizens to contemplate their dependency on infrastructure and prepare for a disruption.

Reading in Healthy Aging: Selective Use of Information Structuring Cues

ABSTRACTPrevious research has shown that information referring to a named character or to information in the main clause of a sentence is more accessible and facilitates the processing of anaphoric references. We investigated whether the use of such cues are maintained in healthy aging. We present two experiments investigating whether information contained in the main clause of a sentence is more accessible compared with information contained in the subordinate clause. We present two further experiments that explored whether proper names act as controllers of discourse focus. Experiment 1 showed that information contained in the subordinate clause of a sentence decreased the processing efficiency of anaphoric references (more so for older adults), and Experiment 2 found that main clauses facilitated probe recognition. Experiments 3 and 4 showed that named characters increased the processing efficiency of anaphoric references and facilitated probe recognition (younger adults only), whereas older adults displayed a primacy effect.

The Indifference Disease: The Strenuous Path to Acquired Employee Apathy

Although employee apathy has occasionally surfaced as a focus of discourse in the organizational sciences, there have been few attempts to directly define or clarify the construct. In this article,...