Discursive Exploration Research Articles

Wondering Through Our Outlines

Moving through a series of encounters, some with animals other than humans, some with other philosophers, this paper explores how Earth others can and do call humans to transformative and ethical attention. By creating a flow between creative non-fiction, and more discursive explorations of the process of encounter, it both considers and seeks to evoke the ways in which wonder transforms the outlines between humans and other animals. Whereas the ways of knowing that Val Plumwood called “master rationality” reduce the otherness of other animals to the negative outside of the moral human, they are always there to be apprehended as their own, positive presence. When one attends with what Simone Weil calls “passive activity,” the truth of others as themselves or in their world can appear, and a type of ethical responsibility follows.

Digitizing nursing: A theoretical and holistic exploration to understand the adoption and use of digital technologies by nurses.

With healthcare undergoing rapid digitalization, the effective integration of new technologies is crucial for nursing professionals, who form the largest group in the healthcare workforce. However, barriers within the nursing profession may impede digitalization efforts, leading to under utilization of available technologies and missed opportunities for enhancing healthcare quality and population health. This article aims to investigate the adoption and use of digital technologies by nurses, considering how key demographics, such as gender, age, and voluntariness of technology use, interact to influence their acceptance and utilization of these technologies. Employing the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) as a framework, we conducted a discursive exploration, supplemented by a literature review from diverse academic sources. Keywords related to UTAUT, digitalization, nursing practice and technology adoption were searched on PubMed, CINAHL and Google Scholar. Additionally, UK government and professional regulator reports were examined to understand current recommendations concerning digital technologies in nursing practice and the profession's demography. Searches focused on moderating factor domains, and the last search was conducted on 26 April 2023. The study revealed that the successful implementation of digital technologies in nursing practice requires a nuanced understanding of the nursing workforce's characteristics and preferences. Gender, age and voluntariness of technology use were found to intersect and influence nurses' acceptance and utilization of digital tools. By applying UTAUT in the context of nursing, this study highlights the importance of tailored implementation strategies for digital technologies. A technologically deterministic perspective is insufficient; instead, consideration of social factors specific to nursing is essential for successful adoption. To maximize the benefits of digitalization in healthcare, it is imperative to address the barriers faced by nursing professionals. A comprehensive understanding of how key demographics impact technology adoption will inform targeted strategies, enhancing the engagement of nurses with digital tools and fostering innovation in healthcare practices. Further research and primary data are needed, but this study lays the foundation for future advancements in digital healthcare integration for nursing professionals. The issues highlighted in this article are relevant to nurse leaders and those responsible for implementing technologies within nursing contexts. They are also relevant to technology developers who may benefit from considering the evidence associated with the moderating demographic factors highlighted in this article. Without a holistic approach to the implementation of technology, challenges associated with the use of digital technology by nurses are likely to persist. By considering the moderating demographic factors highlighted within the UTAUT (age, gender, voluntariness of use and experience) nurse leaders and technology developers may have greater success obtaining greater clinical outcomes from digital technology. This work was completed in 2022. Due to the focus of this article being one on professional challenges within the nursing profession, no involvement from patients or the public was sought.

Unveiling problem-solving strategies of pre-service mathematics teachers: A visual and discursive exploration

This study explores how pre-service mathematics teachers (PMTs) in South Africa use visualization and self-discourse to solve mathematical problems. Visualization is known to enhance mathematics learning, while effective communication skills are critical for teaching and learning mathematics, especially in contexts, where the language of instruction may not be the first language of students or teachers. By understanding the visualization techniques and discursive properties employed by PMTs, insights can be gained into how to improve mathematics learning and teaching. The study is informed by the commognitive framework and uses qualitative data from a purposive sample of 10 PMTs who participated in a performance test and semi-structured interviews. The study found that PMTs rely on mental visualization for simpler mathematical problems but use both symbolic and iconic visual mediators for more complicated problems. The use of language to engage in self-discursive activity during problem-solving was found to be key for successful visualization.

A discursive exploration of gender in primary textbooks of English in Pakistan

PurposeThis study intends to unveil the imbalance in gender portrayal, reflected in English textbooks, used at the primary level in the four provinces of Pakistan.Design/methodology/approachWithin the framework of feminist critical discourse analysis (FCDA), this paper aims to explore the ways in which gender stereotypes and ideologies are inculcated through the discursive schemes in the selected textbooks. The methodology adopted is to connect the linguistic features in the texts (the Micro) to the social factors (the Macro). The analysis has been done on two levels: on the first level, the content analysis was employed to quantify the gender representation in the textbook. On the second level, the discourse analysis was carried out to view gender stereotypes in the wide spectrum of social norms.FindingsThe results of this study reveal a significant disproportion and imbalance in gender representation in the four books. They clearly show that the textbooks in Pakistan contribute to the socialization of children in a very traditional and stereotypical way. The findings of the study recommend extensive awareness at societal level in general, and particular reforms in the education sector for a step toward a progressive and prosperous society.Originality/valueThe current paper is innovative as it demystifies how gendered ideologies are ingrained in the curriculum, used for English language teaching in a developing country like Pakistan. It fosters the value addition in existing research since it investigated the gender disparity systematically by employing quantitative content and qualitative FCDA.

Disrupting language of instruction policy at a classroom level: oracy examples from South Africa and Zambia

AbstractEducation policy in the Global South often focuses on two areas: learner‐centred education (LCE) and language of instruction (LoI). For over a decade, LCE has been promoted throughout sub‐Saharan Africa and has been referred to as a ‘policy panacea’. The basic premise of LCE is that it offers learners substantial control over what and how they learn through active engagement. Pair and group work involving talk are key aspects of LCE; however, in contexts where teachers and students are not proficient in the official LoI, the efficacy of this pedagogic approach is brought into question. Drawing on vignettes based on observational data of early years and primary classroom practice in South Africa and Zambia, this paper offers a discursive exploration of how valuing oracy and legitimising multilingualism alter classroom dynamics and interactions between teachers and children. Encouraging translanguaging as a pedagogical approach enables more effective meaning‐making through talk and supports pedagogic shifts to more learner‐centred classrooms. Exploring the potential of professional development to inspire change, we critically draw out some of the observable shifts in practice, alongside the challenges, for practitioners moving to a more multilingual classroom whilst simultaneously operating within the LoI policy.

RETRACTED: Totalitarian approaches to risk and the banality of harm in secure and forensic psychiatric settings in England and Wales

The secure and forensic mental health system sustains its legitimacy predominantly by acting to assuage public fear of the perceived risk posed by people with mental disorders. In this paper we aim to consider the totalising nature of the policies and practices which govern the care and treatment of mentally disordered offenders. A discursive exploration of the restrictive nature of policies and practices which govern the care and treatment of mentally disordered offenders. We further draw parallels between the potential for harm due to disproportionately risk averse ways of working with patients in secure settings and Arendt's conceptualisations of the nature of totalitarian regimes and the harms they incur. Although secure and forensic psychiatric settings are ostensibly hospitals and not prisons, given the potential for harm associated with involuntary psychiatric treatment within closed institutions, it is crucial that risk related practices are scrutinised and challenged.

The prioritization and development of key social and structural indicators to address gaps in a framework for monitoring the Strategies toward Ending Preventable Maternal Mortality (EPMM): Results of an iterative expert technical consultation.

BackgroundSince 2014, iterative technical work has captured stakeholder demand and channeled it toward improving maternal health measurement, to support SDG 3.1. Strategies toward Ending Preventable Maternal Mortality (EPMM) (2015) turned a broad lens on upstream systemic determinants of maternal health and survival highlighted in 11 Key Themes. A monitoring framework was developed to help countries track progress across these domains. This process yielded requests for additional indicators where stakeholders identified gaps for tracking EPMM Key Themes. In response, two technical consultations aimed at affirming the measurement gaps, specifying the constructs for measurement, and fully elaborating the metadata to allow them to be monitored.MethodsMeasures for development were prioritized based on multi-stakeholder dialogues in five countries, and data collected from government officials and UN partners in twenty countries on perceived need for proposed additional indicators. Sixty-one participants representing expertise in measure development and the topical areas covered took part across both consultations. Measures were developed through two simultaneous participatory online consultations stratified by focus area, comprising videos, discussion forums, polls, and live Zoom meetings.ResultsEight candidate indicators relevant to priority recommendations in the EPMM Strategies are presented. Each includes a definition, numerator and denominator (if applicable), method of estimation, disaggregation factors, preferred data source(s), and expected periodicity. Four address gaps in measures of fundamental rights-related determinants of maternal health at national and subnational level, including women’s reproductive autonomy; participative accountability for maternal health outcomes; and Respectful Maternity Care. Four strengthen the ability to count, track, and link births and maternal deaths and causes of death.ConclusionsThe proposed indicators correspond to specific EPMM Key Themes, filling gaps identified by multiple stakeholders, and respond to calls for a broadened approach to measurement and for indicators that track the social and health-systems determinants of maternal health. They reflect inputs and aspirations of numerous stakeholders, gathered over time and across various platforms. The iterative, discursive exploration of the concepts for measurement and the need for metrics to track them responds to recent calls for measure development to be carried out in more inclusive ways, and to be primarily concept- and user-driven.

Should We Rethink Supervision?

Supervision as such has been the subject of great interest, and there were many arguments to support it; most of that talk being conducted in the strict frames of psychology and psychotherapy. Considering this and the fact that, as other fields of science, psychology has its own limitations (due to some self-imposed boundaries), we believe that a brief discursive exploration must be undertaken, at least from an anthropological perspective. It is also to envisage that the problem of supervising psychology or psychotherapy should also be considered from an ethical point of view to enhance a general epistemological perspective. Additionally, one cannot forget that the psychologist, the psychotherapist, and the supervisor are and live, as well as other people, in that mainstream of humanity that encompasses all of us. Such a living and existence certainly occurs with some indelible idiosyncrasies that we will attempt to unravel these in our article. Moreover, we could have – even at the level of psychologists or psychotherapists – some unresolved psychological issues, most of them due to the closed academic environment they live and work in.

Gedichte zwischen lyrischer Poesie und diskursiver Prosa? Zum Beispiel Monika Rinck

This contribution examines the question of how contemporary lyric poetry expands upon established generic concepts by considering the work of Monika Rinck, one of the most striking voices among a generation of exceedingly talented poets who made their debut in the 2000s. In her poetry, we find numerous examples of how the expectations of lyric are deliberately undermined: among them, formal features reminiscent of prose, such as her tendency to use extremely long lines and prose-typical abbreviations, as well as her explicit interest in the discursive exploration of ‘concepts.’ As her essays suggest, this interest manifests itself most readily in Rinck’s efforts to avoid the totalizing economization of society (as well as art and language) and has, as a result, motivated the development of her own style within experimental language poetry. However, while Rinck has played a leading role in expanding the contemporary concept of poetry, the poetic principles to which she refers in her theoretical writings and poems are by no means new. In this article, her poem „Augenfuhlerfisch“ (“eye-tentacle fish”) serves not only to illustrate her tendency to expand poetry into discursive prose but demonstrates how it is rooted in a long-standing philosophical tradition. The terminology used in the poem can be traced back to early modern epistemology and particularly to the foundation of scientific aesthetics by Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten. In referring to Baumgarten’s definition of poetry as “fully sensuous speech [vollkommen sinnliche Rede]” (as well as the specific deployment of this definition by Johann Adolf Schlegel), it becomes clear that Rinck reactivates an epistemological potential in lyric that had been hidden by the paradigm of Erlebnislyrik [experiential lyric]. Moreover, Rinck is able to relax the Erlebnislyrik’s pretense to sincerity in part thanks to the same prose features, such as the multiplication of voices, already mentioned above.

Traces of empire: travel and Jean-Paul Kauffmann's allegories of confinement

ABSTRACT Jean-Paul Kauffmann is a travel writer whose work obliquely interrogates his long and difficult confinement as a hostage in Beirut from May 1985 to 4 May 1988. His work engages, in part, with sites and traces of French imperialism that sponsor a reflection upon confinement and freedom and on a self that is ruptured from the past and in search of the reparative. This article examines traces of French colonialism within Kauffmann's work, tracking them, in particular, in La Maison du retour (2007). It is argued that his engagement with the colonial is a self-limiting, if paradoxically doubling, discursive exploration that explicitly rejects the horizontal expansion of the rhizome towards an oppressed other in favour of the root's verticality that might offer a connection across the void of his crushing experience, and gravitational pull, of confinement. His work offers a restricted form of microspection that, understandably, shores up the self.

Rojak: An Ethnographic Exploration of Pluralism and Music Therapy in Post-British-Colonial Malaysia

Abstract The purpose of this discursive exploration that is influenced by ethnography and autoethnography is to present how Western-based music therapy intersects with the pluralistic healthcare culture in Malaysia. We will first be situating music therapy as a Eurocentric-based healthcare practice. We will then introduce the history of Malaysia and healthcare culture through a pluralistic lens, drawing inspiration from a popular Malaysian street food—rojak, a form of salad. We use rojak as an analogy to honor Malaysia’s food culture while drawing similarities between the diverse flavors and textures between the distinct components of rojak, with the unique pluralism that exists throughout Malaysian culture and healthcare practices. Through this rojak pluralist lens, we will share several unique Malaysian vignettes to explore the different ways we consider Eurocentric music therapy as a potentially colonial practice, ranging from postcolonial theory perspective to a pragmatic, inclusive perspective. As Malaysia has maintained its pluralistic culture as a uniquely multiracial Asian country despite the lengthy history of colonization, we offer these Malaysian, post-British-colonial music therapy vignettes in this article.

Beyond Recovery: Introduction

This special issue asks about archival absences, about the missing and that which has been silenced or ignored, and the critical responses possible in face of these sites of numbing, censorship or erasure. Featuring essays that cross institutional as well as disciplinary boundaries, “Beyond Recovery” brings into conversation a range of interlocutors across and beyond early American studies. In so doing, they consider pressing epistemological questions about how we might respond to critical reorientations to “the archive” and archives for early American literature writ large. The essays gathered give shape to absence not as something beyond discursive exploration, but as a structuring condition for new forms of knowledge production.

Discursive Exploration of Historicity of Ancient Punjab in Heer by Waris Shah

This study argues that the critical analysis of the discourse of a given time and place determines the identity, the social life as well as the social roles of people in that social order. With the help of the theorization of Fairclough and Wodak (1997), it explains how Waris Shah in his renowned discourse 'Heer' uncovers the historicity or social and cultural embedments during the 18thcentury Punjab. For Fairclough and Wodak the supremacy/ inferiority of social elements is being exercised via discourse. Waris Shah skillfully portrays in his epic poetry Heer how supremacy/ inferiority is interlocked with every incident of the individual(s) and society. His discourse exhibits that whosoever holds authority misuses it to subjugate others.

Редкая и малоупотребительная лексика как прагматический инструмент современного французского политического дискурса

The article deals with the rare and uncommon vocabulary used in contemporary French political discourse. Nowadays discourse studies are becoming increasingly complex and multidimensional. Political discourse is an essential component of everyday political life. The choice of research question is determined by its contribution to cross-cultural communication, as well as by the lack of discursive explorations regarding the rare and uncommon vocabulary. Our hypothesis is that this type of lexis would have some pragmatic motivation and may serve to realize a certain number of communication tasks. Thus, our research aims to describe the collected samples and reveal their pragmatic potential. Discursive analysis coupled with frequency evaluation shapes a methodological framework for our study. The total number of lexical samples is 32 units coming from public speeches, debates and interviews of contemporary French politicians. We have checked the frequency profile of all collected observations on the Google Books French Corpus Ngram Viewer. In order to test the relevance of the corpus and optimize the interpretation of results, we have also introduced a «control group», which contain 31 lexical units expectedly present in political lexicon. Our analysis shows that the rare and uncommon vocabulary serves various pragmatic goals, such as demonstrating the speaker’s performance, capture the audience's attention, achieving a euphemistic effect and some others. Our research gives us ground to affirm that the pragmatic effects of this type of lexical phenomena are due to its ability to break the functional isomorphism of discourse space. The arising disharmony may be caused by temporary disparity (obsolete words), topical mismatch (special vocabulary) or cultural variance (book words with complex semantics, little-known words or constructions, regional and foreign language borrowings). In general, our research leads us to conclude that the rare and uncommon vocabulary possess diverse pragmatic functions, which present an undoubted interest in further research.

A discursive exploration of public perspectives on placebos and their effects.

There is increasing evidence that placebos could be effective in clinical practice. However, knowledge of public perspectives on placebos is underdeveloped. We conducted a discourse analysis of internet comments on news articles related to placebos, aiming to improve this knowledge for clinicians and researchers. We developed two discursive constructs of the placebo. The dominant construct of the ‘placebo pill’ informs a paradoxical understanding of placebos that closes down treatment. The less-prevalent counter-discursive construct of the ‘treatment process’ frames placebos as potentially viable within modern evidence-based medicine. We discuss the opportunities and challenges of this alternative understanding of placebos.

The Worlds That Are Watching: Media, Politics, Diplomacy, and the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics

This article explores selected English-language media representation of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. These Games were remarkable in suddenly becoming a key subject for global media when North Korea unexpectedly announced its intention to participate barely a month before the opening ceremony. There followed an extraordinary turn of events, including revived talks between the Koreas and a meeting between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un, the last-minute formation of a unified women’s ice hockey team, Korean athletes marching under a unification flag, and an unprecedented summit in Singapore involving U.S. President Donald Trump and Kim Jong-Un. These developments raise critical questions regarding sport, diplomacy, media, and geopolitics. A discursive exploration is conducted of the main thematic mediated currents as the Games passed from being in prospect to taking place to being appraised in rapid retrospect. It is argued that each sport event of this kind has much in common with others but also displays unique characteristics that can never be replicated in space or time. It seeks to derive lessons for communication and sport analysis from PyeongChang 2018 alongside sporting and other cultural events that have already happened and are yet to be conceived.

Contesting the Representation of Muslim Women: A Discursive Exploration of Relig..

Important as religion is to behave socially, its complex nature has remained the staple concern of literary narratives. The enigma of religion is particularly evident in the life narratives of Malala Yousafzai (I Am Malala, 2013) and Ziauddin Yousafzai (Let Her Fly 2018). The selected texts have been studied using the Theory of Representation (1997) to investigate there presentation of Islam by applying the legitimation strategies proposed by Theo Van Leeuwen in his book Discourse and Practice (2008). Islam and its practices have been exploited by detailing specific practices related to Muslim women with lesser consideration of Islamic injunctions that benefits its adherents. This study concludes that in there presentation of religion, the selected authors have misrepresented the ideologies, belief systems, and values of Islam by reinforcing negative stereotypes of Muslim women as subject to religious practices that use the body as a site of patriarchal domination and religious constraints.

Young Australian women explain their contraceptive choices

New developments in female contraceptives allow women increased options for preventing pregnancy, while men’s options for reversible contraception have not advanced beyond the condom. There has been little discursive exploration of how neoliberal and postfeminist discourses shape women’s accounts of choosing whether or not to use contraception. Our thematic discourse analysis of 760 free-text responses to a question about contraceptive choice considers the social and political climate that promotes the self-governed woman who freely chooses contraception. We examine the ways in which women formulated and defended their accounts of choice, focusing on the theme of free contraceptive choice that constructed women’s choices as unconstrained by material, social and political forces. We identify two discursive strategies that underpinned this theme: a woman’s body, a woman’s choice and planning parenthood, and explore the ways in which choice was understood as a gendered entitlement and how contraceptive choices were shaped (and constrained) by women’s plans for parenthood. We discuss the implications of these discursive strategies, and neoliberal and postfeminist discourses, in terms of the disallowance of any contextual, social and structural factors, including the absence of men in the ‘contraceptive economy’.

A Part But Apart: Discursive Explorations of the University as Contested Space in Kenya

Despite increasing interest in education and conflict in sub-Saharan Africa, little is known about how universities and their constituents experience and make meaning of violence. This paper sought to capture university participants’ sense of belongingness and attachment to the university space resulting from experiences with ethnic conflict in Western Kenya. This paper uses discourse analysis to elicit linguistic constructions of context, contestation, and identity. Three discourses emerged from interview transcripts when treated as text: the regulation of identities, being a part but apart, and campus as contested space. These discourses are characterized by descriptions of perceptions and symbolic norms, belongingness and non-belongingness, and place-work strategies employed by community constituents, both within and without the university. The findings have important implications for understanding the politicization of identity and place in times of conflict.

Natura 2000 Within Discursive Space: The case of the Ria de Aveiro

AbstractThe Ria de Aveiro, a Portuguese estuary protected under Natura 2000, has suffered strong development pressures in recent decades which, in combination with the decline of traditional activities, have caused severe environmental problems. To produce a description of the context's discursive dimension and identify obstacles for collaborative and coherent management of this complex socio‐ecological system, we have analysed the consultations related to the environmental assessment of five development projects and a programme for ‘integrated redevelopment and enhancement operations’ in priority coastal areas. The exact meaning of sustainability regarding the estuary is far from consensual among the different participants, and is often in conflict with the vision behind the planned interventions. In this paper, we identify and discuss key themes in local discourses that dialectically interrelate in ways that need to be considered by this territory's environmental governance and argue for the importance of discursive explorations on a case‐by‐case basis. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment