Everyday Understanding Research Articles

Everyday understandings of drone incidents and misuse in the Mass Observation Archive

Everyday understandings of drone incidents and misuse in the Mass Observation Archive

Reworking Nursing Expertise:Directors of Nursing's Tactics to (Re)Connect Knowledge and Power in Hospital Governance.

Shared governance in hospitals promotes the inclusion of nurses' expertise, knowledge and skills in organisational processes, and nurses increasingly fulfil positions in organisational hierarchies. However, incorporating nursing expertise in strategic governance structures might be complicated, as these structures are primarily linked to managerial and biomedical expertise. Drawing on a Foucauldian perspective on knowledge and power, intertwined and embedded in everyday (inter)actions, we study how newly appointed directors of nursing challenge these dominant 'modes of knowing'. By focusing on a (Dutch) healthcare organisation, a large academic medical centre, we gained insight into how the history of director of nursing roles relates to how nursing expertise is valued. We gathered qualitative data (from multiple sources) to get close to the daily practices of these directors. In this way, we were able to highlight three tactics that enable directors to relate to new 'knowledge-power knots': (1) positioning, by creating more unity; (2) profiling, by showing significance and (3) powering, by being alert and intervening. With these tactics, the directors of nursing try to embed themselves and their expertise in hospital governance. This study contributes to an everyday understanding of power and the tactics that directors of nursing employ as an ongoing practice. This provides practical starting points for embedding nursing in governance and decision-making.

How people connect fairness and equity when they talk about data uses

As a mechanism for addressing data-related harms, fairness has been subjected to considerable criticism, seen as failing to acknowledge the power relationships that produce said harms, or as a ‘floating signifier’ devoid of specific meaning. In contrast to fairness, it is argued that equity does a better job of recognising data-related harms. Criticisms such as these emerge in specific cultural contexts and rarely acknowledge everyday understandings of terms and concepts. This paper engages with these criticisms, drawing on research exploring how 112 UK residents perceive data uses in specific public service organisations. We found that participants perceive fairness and equity to be interwoven with each other, a finding which shows that who gets to define what is fair matters and which challenges assumptions about what does and does not constitute thinking and talking data politics. We conclude by proposing that linking fairness with equity can be seen as a kind of everyday data solidarity.

Experimental literature and post-critique: reflections on Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities

Abstract In this article, I begin with Felski and Sedgwick’s diagnosis of the overabundance of critique in education, connecting this to Hodgson, Vlieghe, and Zamojski’s calls for a ‘post-critical pedagogy’. Rather than offering a critique of critique, I aim to think differently about the ‘uses’ of reading, taking my cue from post-critical scholarship as well as from Calvino’s experimental novel, Invisible Cities. First, I discuss how critique and post-critique differ in their orientations when engaging with a text. I argue that, instead of ‘shutting down’ a text to point to its latent assumptions, post-critique opens the text up to the world by cultivating new perceptual and imaginative dimensions in our experience. This partly involves the reader being oriented towards what is worth preserving in a text—an approach that is also central to post-critical pedagogy. Second, I reflect on my own failures with respect to putting a post-critical analysis into words, since it seems that in the context of academic writing, it is difficult to avoid critique. Given this, I argue that it is more fruitful to explore three post-critical pedagogical gestures in Invisible Cities: namely, its tensions (which encourage and resist linear explanations), its fundamental but playful ambiguity (which invites both puzzlement and curiosity), and its transformative potential in relation to the everyday understandings of the cities we inhabit. These gestures encourage readers to surrender themselves to the text in a mood characterized by enchantment rather than suspicion and demonstrate to the educative potential of literature beyond critique.

Contested categories in the context of international migration: introduction to the special issue

ABSTRACT In this introduction to the special issue Contested Categories in the Context of International Migration, we argue for the importance of critically engaging with state-created categories and classification systems. We advocate doing so in the particularly convoluted context of international migration, where states use categories to manage migrants’ entry, reception, and residence, making categorisation extremely consequential for individual migrants, even though bureaucratic documentation and everyday understandings of categories often differ greatly between migrants’ home countries and receiving states. We outline some of the scholarship on categorisation that has inspired our thinking, discuss why migration is such an important and generative site for examining categories and processes of categorisation, and finally consider how the contributions in this special issue attest to this.

Counter-Extremism and ‘Critical Thinking’ as a Measure of the Human

Educational approaches to counter-extremism are proliferating globally, claiming to foster ‘critical thinking’ amongst those deemed vulnerable to extremism. These projects ‘make sense’ through two mutually-reinforcing discourses: a psychological discourse that adjudicates the moral value of different ways of thinking through scientific measures; and an ethical discourse of liberal education that idealizes critical thinking as essential to human development – becoming more human and humane. Counter-extremism mobilizes both to over-represent a ‘dominant genre of being’, to take Sylvia Wynter’s phrase, as if it were the only way of being human. Such projects show how expert and everyday understandings of ‘critical thinking’ have been shaped by psychology’s history as a race science and liberal understandings of education that have legitimated hierarchies of being human. I argue that these conditions of possibility that shape critical thinking must be grappled with in any critical pursuit against hierarchies of being human.

Urban Crime in the Lagos Traffic: An Ethnography at the Crossroads of Multiple Codes of Ethics

ABSTRACT This article is an ethnographic investigation into hawking, pickpocketing, and other crimes perpetrated during traffic situations in contemporary Lagos. Scholarship on street hawking in Nigeria – Lagos in particular – has overlooked certain issues associated with street hawking within Lagos traffic and has failed to counter the everyday understanding that itinerant traders are major actors in the recurring crimes that occur in traffic hold-ups. Through immersive fieldwork and based on my personal experience as a street hawker, I challenge some of these beliefs that urban crimes such as pickpocketing and armed robbery during hold-ups are predominantly perpetrated by street hawkers. I argue that street hawkers are distinguishable from the real criminals, despite police discourse and common beliefs. The criminalization of hawkers in the public mind and in administrative practices is due to categorical stereotypes unfairly produced by the government about itinerant traders during the city's feared traffic hold-ups. I show how the unfair criminalization of itinerant traders has been used to justify curbing street hawking within the traffic in Lagos.

INDIAN ART AND RELIGION

Art has long been interwoven with myth, magic, and religion, maintaining its profound influence through a sense of sacred allure. Just as revered religious artifacts captivate our attention, artworks enchant with their mesmerizing presence. Unlike ordinary objects, art offers an intensified perception of reality and suggests deeper truths that transcend everyday understanding and scientific knowledge.India’s rich and diverse traditions reveal a deep connection between religion and art. The country’s cultural heritage mirrors its spiritual beliefs, with artistic expressions—from majestic tabernacle puppets to intricate delve oils—shaped by evolving religious traditions. This paper explores the profound impact of spirituality on India’s artistic creations. Religion is pivotal in Indian society, profoundly shaping cultural expressions. For centuries, it has offered artists themes, symbols, and narratives to express their faith. To understand the link between religion and art in India, we must explore ancient times. Early civilizations like the Indus Valley, Maurya, Gupta, and Chola dynasties were deeply rooted in religious practices, giving rise to Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, which profoundly influenced Indian art. Hinduism, the oldest religion, inspired intricate sculptures, vibrant paintings, and stunning temple architecture, as seen in Khajuraho, Konark, and Varanasi. Buddhism, originating in India, focused on the teachings of Gautama Buddha and is exemplified by the Ajanta and Ellora caves' detailed murals and rock-cut sculptures. Jainism, emphasizing non-violence and compassion, is reflected in the ornate marble carvings of Jain temples in Rajasthan and Gujarat.

Understanding Positivism: A Qualitative Exploration of Its Principles and Relevance Today

This paper embarks on a journey to illuminate the philosophy of positivism, a perspective that has profoundly shaped our understanding of knowledge, truth, and reality. Positivism, with its unwavering focus on observable facts and empirical evidence, offers a framework for navigating the complexities of the modern world. Yet, despite its foundational influence on scientific inquiry and societal development, it remains a concept shrouded in confusion for many. Through a qualitative exploration, this paper seeks to bridge the gap between academic discourse and everyday understanding, unravelling the essence of positivism in a way that resonates with the general population. By tracing its historical roots, dissecting its core principles, and reflecting on its relevance in contemporary society, this work invites readers to reconsider how they perceive and interact with the world around them. In a time when the line between fact and belief is increasingly blurred, this paper argues for the enduring importance of positivism as a guiding philosophy. It challenges readers to engage with positivist though not as an abstract academic exercise, but as a practical approach to making sense of their lived experiences and the broader social landscape.

Prayer for Family and Friends: The Body and Religion in Eighteenth-Century Britain

AbstractThis article explores how writers, predominantly adhering to a variety of different Christian denominations but also including Jewish writers, discussed religion and the body in letters throughout the long eighteenth century. It draws on a corpus of over 2,500 familiar letters written by men and women of different denominations between 1675 and 1820. That these letters were not chosen because of their religious content makes them a good ‘test’ of the role of faith in everyday understandings of the body. This article underscores the continued centrality of religious discourse and devotional practice in eighteenth-century everyday life. Our research finds that religion was a commonplace register deployed when discussing bodily matters throughout the long eighteenth century. Significantly, this was the case for individuals who otherwise made scant reference to their faith. Discussion of the physical body encouraged recourse to providence, a public discussion of doctrine, and the shared expression of devotion. The ongoing force of religion in people’s lives was thus intimately tied to their embodied experiences. Letters not only expressed but actively maintained this widely shared religious framework for understanding the body.

Language matters for biodiversity

Abstract Language is central to the way people learn about the natural world. A salient concern of the biodiversity conservation arena has been to understand how language can be employed by scientists to communicate knowledge to nonexpert audiences and build ecological literacy. The use of analogy and narrative by scientists are prominent techniques. In this article, we consider how these two modes of language-based reasoning extend into ordinary conversational language use by the public, specifically when articulating everyday understanding and experiences of biodiversity. Drawing on a process of public engagement in a UK woodland environment, a typological framework based on principles of analogical and narrative reasoning is developed to characterize the precise character of processes of everyday biodiversity sense making. The implications of the framework are discussed in the context of future biodiversity research, particularly its participatory and educational dimensions.

Emotions in Positum

The article aims to develop a definition of emotions that would be both theoretically and practically applicable in psychotherapy (prescriptive), while also aligning with the everyday (descriptive) understanding of the term. The arguments are grounded on sound review of relevant theories that help to grasp the somatic and psychological mechanisms that enable the experience and utilization of emotions. Emotions are differentiated from feelings and stress. The intratheoretical consistency of the newly formulated understanding of emotions with the model of conflictogenesis of positive psychotherapy has been demonstrated.

“What Is an Opportunity?”: From Theoretical Mystification to Everyday Understanding

Expressions about opportunities are used unproblematically in everyday contexts. Yet, the question “What is an opportunity?” has posed a difficult riddle in the academic study of entrepreneurship. Drawing on the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, we explain that such perplexities are common when words are removed from ordinary language and intellectuals try to grasp what they name. Approaching the opportunity riddle differently, we ask, “How do entrepreneurs use the word opportunity?” and elucidate an actualization theory of entrepreneurship attuned to the everyday understandings that underlie the meaningful use of the word. Bringing implicit understandings to the foreground contributes to (1) the dissolution of the mystification over the nature of “opportunity”, (2) the clarification of the conceptual foundations of entrepreneurship theory, and (3) the reorientation of the field toward more conceptually precise ways of thinking about Knightian uncertainty, entrepreneurial success, and the entrepreneurial process. This paper also contributes to the methodology of management studies, by demonstrating how attention to the logic of ordinary language can alert us to theoretical dead-ends and enable the development of theory that bridges academic and everyday understandings.

Where Craft Starts

This essay illustrates my pedagogical approach on the MA in Critical Craft Studies (MACR) and explains some of the philosophical commitments that underpinned my teaching there. Working as Core Faculty on the program for three years, I regularly led students through embodied ethnographic trials as a way to help them tune their attention to the kind of everyday understanding so often overlooked in academic research. In addition to being the kind of understanding usually expressed in craftwork, this bodily perceptual engagement is – I argue here – our most basic and fundamental way of knowing. With the closing of the MACR program, we lose one of the few spaces with a dedicated focus on this kind of learning.

‘Man can make great natatorial progress’: swimming as a white sporting racial project

ABSTRACT This article examines the sport of swimming to demonstrate how systems of racial privilege and inequality are built. I use Ben Carrington’s (2010) sporting racial project as a tool to understand how race is constructed through sporting practices by examining early-twentieth century texts produced by swimming coaches, physical educators, and sports scientists. Such texts rationalized and standardized swimming techniques and practices within the racialized (and gendered and colonizing) discourses of modern sport science. Early elite practitioners shaped (and continue to shape) swimming and its meanings that inform our everyday understandings of sport and ‘race’ while constructing Whiteness.

Into the Hills: Challenges of Writing Postemancipation Agency in the Caribbean

Abstract As Caribbean postemancipation scholarship has deepened so richly in recent decades, writers have been able to shake major distortions such as the progressive teleologies of freedom that lurk as the very scaffolding of congratulatory imperial records. The full dynamism of repression directed at postslavery generations still demands attention, as does the difficult task of reconstructing communities’ and individuals’ responses to these serious restraints, efforts that sometimes yielded nothing. Especially given archival difficulties, Johnson’s exhortation to seek everyday understandings and actions, ineffable registers like love and fear, and internal community politics, including discord, continue to present high aims for scholars seeking to conceive and describe agency in such an archivally and politically difficult era.

Dementia caregiving in Nigeria: is stigma a motivator for care, a barrier to care, or both?

AbstractBackgroundSome Nigerians struggle to make sense of symptoms resulting from Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD). This may not be surprising as there is no word for dementia in its over 500 local languages. Thus, some Nigerians use words to explain ADRD symptoms that may stigmatize people living with dementia and their families.MethodOur qualitative descriptive study while focusing on the everyday understanding of dementia, aims to highlight the influence of stigma on the caregiving experiences of informal female Nigerian dementia caregivers. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 12 adult informal female caregivers in Nigeria. We analyzed the interview transcripts for themes. Then, the findings were shared with focus groups of 21 adult Nigerians residing in the United States to gain more contextual insight on the initial findings.ResultThe three major themes identified in the study include: 1) misconceptions about ADRD symptoms, 2) stigma as a negative motivator, and 3) stigma weakens family support.ConclusionOverall, we argue that a combination of limited ADRD knowledge and awareness, and traditional beliefs drive ADRD‐related stigmatization. This consequently affects access to caregiving and family support. Strategies such as culturally appropriate ADRD awareness campaigns and formal long‐term care policies are urgently needed. These would help reduce the risk of ADRD‐stigmatization and strengthen informal dementia caregiving in Nigeria.

Diversity in Lay Perceptions of Social Class Among Finnish Youth

This study explores young Finnish people’s lay perceptions of social class with a focus on the class terms used to form hierarchies based on their everyday understanding. Our approach is based on cultural class research, which focuses on diversity and subtle nuances of class. The participants were 519 young people ages 15 to 25. The data were collected using the word association method and analyzed by quantitative and qualitative content analyses. While 254 participants perceived Finland as having social classes, their perceptions differed from each other. Half of them formed class hierarchies with more explicit logic, and the other half used more implicit ways of forming hierarchies with diverse class terms based on themes of economy, employment, power, majority/minority, and education. Our findings show ample diversity in both the vertical and horizontal perceptions of social class among young lay people.

Streets, Suites, and States: John Hagan’s Contributions to the Study of Law, Power, and Inequality

We start this special issue with two perspectives. First, that the sociological study of crime and law often intersects with the study of inequality, power, the state, and life chances. Second, that the study of crime and law are deeply interconnected—institutionally, politically, and culturally. Legal institutions build on normative ideas, organizations, careers, and power to govern, to criminalize, and to punish (and, conversely, to ignore or absolve), and everyday understandings of crime are deeply tied to cultural understandings of legality, perceptions of justice and injustice, and hopes for everyday life. Law and crime are thus dynamically tied to social aspirations, fears, and divisions, and are political and social contests over what unites and what divides societies.

Community as a category of empire: ‘The work of community’ among Burmese Indians in Myanmar

ABSTRACT In this article I argue that ‘community' is a category that is inextricably bound up with the historical development of the British empire. It was in this context that modern social theory took root, including, eventually, publications on community in anthropology and sociology that profoundly influenced nineteenth- and twentieth-century thought and that continue to shape everyday understandings of the category within and beyond academia. I first elaborate what type of work the category ‘community' was intended to do in the British empire. I then introduce two key figures who were responsible for designing, distributing and implementing two contrasting imperial theories of community. Subsequently, I sketch the migratory history of the category following the ancestors of today's so-called ‘Burmese Indians' across the Bay of Bengal from India to Burma. The final part of the article presents the repercussions ‘community' has in contemporary Myanmar, drawing on recent legislation around ‘race and religion’ as well as my own ethnographic data from religious processions of ethno-religious minorities who find themselves in a subaltern position vis-à-vis the Buddhist majority population and an ethnonationalist state.