Kind Of Theory Research Articles

Post-Deconstructive?: Negri, Derrida, and the Present State of Theory

Post-Deconstructive? Negri, Derrida, and the Present State of Theory Jeffrey T. Nealon Penn State University Today it seems that we live in discouragingly post-theoretical, or even anti-theoretical, academic times. Venerable interdisciplinary journal Critical Inquiry, whose advertising materials used to hail it as "Theory-Driven," held a kind of high-profile wake for theory after 9/11, with many of theory's luminaries (now somewhat flickering, as they approach retirement age) pronouncing the entire operation dead in the water. Even Terry Eagleton (who, to hear The New York Times tell it, in fact invented theory sometime in the late 1970s) pronounced the enterprise over and done with in his 2004 book, After Theory. The Times story on Eagleton's book ran under the headline, "Cultural Theorists, Start Your Epitaphs." Indeed, an epicedial discourse surrounds theory in North America: from gasbag neocon wordsmythe Christopher Hitchens in the New York Times Book Review, to articles in Slate, Salon.com, and The Chronicle of Higher Education.1 Even the Christian Science Monitor ran a feature-story obit for theory (see Kirby). And, according to their website, "Christian Science . . . speaks to the dumb the words of Truth, and they answer with rejoicing"; so when Christian Scientists speak these words of Truth, you might begin to think there's something to it. However, having already lived through several deaths of theory, I'll have to say that I'm not very impressed with the pitch and tonality of this latest rendition of "Danny Boy," though I think it is undeniably true that a certain kind of theory (let's call it English Department or Comp. Lit. theory circa 1980-something) is in fact over and done with, [End Page 68] and effectively has been for at least a decade. From the vantage point of the present, it's very hard to understand why, if I recall the statistic correctly, a late-80s MLA survey found that more than 10% of English professors surveyed thought their primary job was to show students how binary oppositions in a text cancel themselves out. If that version of "theory" is over, good riddance, one might say. You'd never know theory was dead, though, if you ran a citation index on the big names associated with it. In 2003, the Arts and Humanities and Social Sciences index turns up 913 hits for Michel Foucault, 564 for Jacques Derrida, 317 for Gilles Deleuze, and 245 for Jacques Lacan. And these numbers have remained more or less consistent for the last several years: Foucault consistently leading the pack with 900-some citations, Derrida steadily in the 500-600 range, Deleuze and Lacan holding their own. And, contra the "theory is over" hypothesis, these numbers are up considerably from the supposed heydays of theory: Foucault, always leader of the citation pack, scores only 699 hits for 1986, and 700 for 1993. Of course Derrida's death, still so personally difficult for the many people whose lives he touched, has only intensified this anxiety in the theory world, broadly conceived. As The New York Times put it shortly after Derrida's passing: "with the death . . . of the French philosopher Jacques Derrida, the era of big theory came quietly to a close" (Eakin 2004). In short, Derrida's death also painfully reminds us that all the "master thinkers" are gone, with the most-cited theorist (Foucault) having been dead for more than two decades. Which inevitably brings up these kinds of hand-wringing marketing questions: Who's next on the throne? Rancière? Agamben? Badiou? Can Žižek continue to write five books a year? Or is the age of big theory and big theorists indeed over? Negri and Derrida The latest "big thing" on the North American theory horizon, arguably, has been the work of Antonio Negri. Among all the provocations contained in Negri's recent work (with and without Michael Hardt), perhaps none is more memorable than a series of polemical provocations concerning postmodern thought in...

Linking the Two Ends of Life: What Gerontology Can Learn From Childhood Studies

This paper extends provocative ideas from the emerging interdisciplinary field of childhood studies to the field of gerontology. These ideas constitute a framework for building new kinds of theories and research on old people and old age-gathered around rights and responsibilities of and for old people; focused on their agency and social participation; concerned with the social problems of old people, as well as how old people are constructed to be social problems; anchored in their perspectives and voices; dedicated to describing and explaining both commonness and difference in their experiences and statuses; devoted to understanding old people as beings and becomings; and attentive to the interdependence of generations within families and societies. These commitments will require gerontology to strengthen its treatment of sociocultural phenomena, prompt more genuinely interdisciplinary scholarship, and advocate a wider range of research methods and data. A "new social studies of old people and old age," nurtured around these ideas, will also raise the visibility of old people and old age in science, public policy, and social life.

Once Again: Gregory of Nyssa on Universals

This essay takes up the contentious issue of Gregory of Nyssa's use of a theory of the universal. It is argued that Gregory, in his trinitarian theology and elsewhere in his thought, employs with remarkable coherence a kind of theory of which the universal is essentially the whole of its individuals (collection theory). For Gregory this is a realistic theory in which the concept of the whole is either entirely detached from that of the individuals (as ousia or hupostasis in his trinitarian theory) or related to them as actual to potential nature (for example in his cosmology). It is characteristic for him that he makes the whole collection the object of reference for the substance-sortal. This theory helps him avoid (to some extent) doctrinal ramifications within trinitarian theology as it explains the Trinity as a perfect unity-in-trinity which is both irreducibly one and irreducibly three.

What Difference Has Theory Made? From Freud to Adam Phillips

Theories are the ways we see things, and there seem to be three possible kinds of theories: transparent, opaque, and translucent. Transparent theories assume there is no theory at all or that we need none; opaque theories are those that are so dense or intricate that we cannot see through them to anything beyond; translucent theories (such as Freud's and Phillips's) keep us critically aware of where we are in relation to the things we want to see. In his several recent books, Phillips has developed in a very imaginative and compelling way, a tradition of thinking about children and their theories of difference that reaches back to Anna Freud, Melanie Klein, and D.W. Winnicott. Phillips's ideas provide a fruitful medium between ideas about childhood and about children's literature and culture.

Some Meta-Theoretical Questions for Restorative Justice

. Unquestionably, Restorative Justice (hereafter RJ) has finally gathered some real momentum. It has become a sine qua non topic in many national and international policy and statutory agendas. However, as the restorative practice expands to deal with crimes, ages and situations it has never addressed before (at least in its contemporary version), and as its application starts to make sense not only to national but also to regional and international bodies and fora, new theoretical problems are posed. In the fast-growing literature many theories and Schools have been evoked to support RJ's claims. This paper will take the discussion a step back by looking at questions of meta-theoretical character. In particular, the paper will ask: Does RJ have a place in the “world of theories,” and if it does, then what kind of theory is it, and on what level should it be placed? Second, does RJ theory need a philosophy, and why? Finally, how can restorative practices be morally justified?

Molding Minds That Form Policy: How to Make Research Useful

How can policy-relevant ideas be effectively communicated to practitioners? While the existing literature has focused on what kind of theory and research are policy relevant, it does not say much about how this knowledge can be communicated. If you want to make a difference, you must know how to reach your target. We take note of the important, but in this context often overlooked opportunities for knowledge diffusion that are provided by the education of young minds and the training of mid-career officials and officers. This article first discusses three contending perspectives on the relationship between scholars and practitioners. It then makes a conceptual elaboration of conditions for communicating research to practitioners, drawing on a wide body of literature on the power of ideas. We conclude by summarizing pointers for how scholars may reflect and how we can act, if we wish to enrich foreign policy practice with research-based ideas.

The strange physics of low frequency mirror mode turbulence in the high temperature plasma of the magnetosheath

Abstract. Mirror mode turbulence is the lowest frequency perpendicular magnetic excitation in magnetized plasma proposed already about half a century ago by Rudakov and Sagdeev (1958) and Chandrasekhar et al. (1958) from fluid theory. Its experimental verification required a relatively long time. It was early recognized that mirror modes for being excited require a transverse pressure (or temperature) anisotropy. In principle mirror modes are some version of slow mode waves. Fluid theory, however, does not give a correct physical picture of the mirror mode. The linear infinitesimally small amplitude physics is described correctly only by including the full kinetic theory and is modified by existing spatial gradients of the plasma parameters which attribute a small finite frequency to the mode. In addition, the mode is propagating only very slowly in plasma such that convective transport is the main cause of flow in it. As the lowest frequency mode it can be expected that mirror modes serve as one of the dominant energy inputs into plasma. This is however true only when the mode grows to large amplitude leaving the linear stage. At such low frequencies, on the other hand, quasilinear theory does not apply as a valid saturation mechanism. Probably the dominant processes are related to the generation of gradients in the plasma which serve as the cause of drift modes thus transferring energy to shorter wavelength propagating waves of higher nonzero frequency. This kind of theory has not yet been developed as it has not yet been understood why mirror modes in spite of their slow growth rate usually are of very large amplitudes indeed of the order of |B/B0|2~O(1). It is thus highly reasonable to assume that mirror modes are instrumental for the development of stationary turbulence in high temperature plasma. Moreover, since the magnetic field in mirror turbulence forms extended though slightly oblique magnetic bottles, low parallel energy particles can be trapped in mirror modes and redistribute energy (cf. for instance, Chisham et al. 1998). Such trapped electrons excite banded whistler wave emission known under the name of lion roars and indicating that the mirror modes contain a trapped particle component while leading to the splitting of particle distributions (see Baumjohann et al., 1999) into trapped and passing particles. The most amazing fact about mirror modes is, however, that they evolve in the practically fully collisionless regime of high temperature plasma where it is on thermodynamic reasons entirely impossible to expel any magnetic field from the plasma. The fact that magnetic fields are indeed locally extracted makes mirror modes similar to "superconducting" structures in matter as known only at extremely low temperatures. Of course, microscopic quantum effects do not play a role in mirror modes. However, it seems that all mirror structures have typical scales of the order of the ion inertial length which implies that mirrors evolve in a regime where the transverse ion and electron motions decouple. In this case the Hall kinetics comes into play. We estimate that in the marginally stationary nonlinear state of the evolution of mirror modes the modes become stretched along the magnetic field with k||=0 and that a small number the order of a few percent of the particle density is responsible only for the screening of the field from the interior of the mirror bubbles.

Hamiltonian treatment of collapsing thin shells in Lanczos-Lovelock theories

The Hamiltonian treatment for the collapse of thin shells for a family of Lanczos-Lovelock theories is studied. This formalism allows us to carry out a concise analysis of these theories. It is found that the black holes solution can be created by collapsing a thin shell. Naked singularities cannot be formed by this mechanism. Among the different Lanczos-Lovelock theories, the Chern-Simons theory corresponds to an exceptional case, because naked singularities can emerge from the collapse of a thin shell. This kind of theory does not possess a gravitational self-interaction analogous to the Newtonian case.

In MemoriamFrancis H.C. Crick

In MemoriamFrancis H.C. Crick

A Study on the Large-scale System Decomposition—Coordination Method Used in Optimal Operation of a Hydroelectric System

The optimal operation problem of multiple hydroelectric reservoir systems is very complex because of the large dimensions. Large-scale system decomposition-coordination methods, which can simplify complex problems into several interrelated sub-problems to avoid the “curse of dimensionality” and to obtain the global optimum on the global through coordination among sub-systems, is particularly well suited for optimizing large-scale, multi-reservoir systems. Applying this kind of theory and method, this paper studies and analyzes the problems of optimal operation of multiple hydroelectric reservoir systems in series, and sets up the optimal operation model of hydroelectric reservoir systems in series. On this basis, a practical example of two hydroelectric reservoirs in series on the upper reaches of the Yellow River in China is calculated and analyzed and the results are satisfactory. It is believed that applying this model can cut down the dimensions of the problem notably and that the theory and method are effective for real time operation.

The anti‐social model of disability

Social theories are usually developed to enable a clearer understanding of a situation or problem. The ‘Social Model’ in various forms is currently the dominant model for researching disability, addressing disability from within a socio‐political framework that draws substantially on a ‘social constructionist’ perspective. This article critiques some of the core sociological assumptions of the Social Model, questioning what ‘work’ this kind of theory does in informing a set of practical concerns around the design of assistive technologies, suggesting an alternative framework of analysis, supported by extensive ethnomethodologically informed ethnographic research

Forking and independence in o-minimal theories

In the following we try to answer a simple question, “what does forking look like in an o-minimal theory”, or more generally, “what kinds of notions of independence with what kinds of properties are admissible in an o-minimal theory?” The motivation of these question begin with the study of simple theories and generalizations of simple theories. In [3] Kim and Pillay prove that the class of simple theories may be described exactly as those theories bearing a notion of independence satisfying various axioms. Thus it is natural to ask, if we weaken the assumptions as to which axioms must hold, what kind of theories do we get? Another source of motivation, also stemming from the study of simple theories, comes from the work of Shelah in [8] and [7]. Here Shelah addresses a “classification” type problem for class of models of a theory, showing that a theory will have the appropriate “structure” type property if one can construct a partially ordered set, satisfying various properties, of models of the theory. Using this criterion Shelah shows that the class of simple theories has this “structure” property, yet also that several non-simple examples do as well (though it should be pointed out that o-minimal theories can not be among these since any theory with the strict order property will have the corresponding “non-structure” property [8]). Thus one is lead to ask, what are the non-simple theories meeting this criterion, and one is once again led to study the types of independence relation a theory might bear. Finally, Shelah in [6] provides some possible definitions of what axioms for a notion of independence one should possibly look for in order to hope that theories bearing such a notion of independence should be amenable closer analysis. In studying all of the above mentioned situations it readily becomes clear that dividing and forking play a central role in all of them, even though we are no longer dealing with the simple case where we know that dividing and forking are very well behaved. All of these considerations lead one to look for classes of non-simple theories of which something is known where one can construct interesting notions of independence and consequently also say something about the nature of forking and dividing in these contexts. Given this one is naturally lead to one of the most well behaved classes of non-simple theories, namely the o-minimal theories.

Film's Aesthetic Turn: A Contribution from Jacques Ranciere

The closer we look at the state of film theory in this post-semiological era and the greater our efforts to trace its cartography, the more we recognize its object's extraordinary force. Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet's La mort d'Empédocle (1986), P.P. Pasolini's Oedipus Rex (1967), and Orson Welles's The Trial (1962) confound "theory," at least the kind of theory that has reigned supreme in the field of film studies until recently. Efforts to master such works, from the first film grammar to the first film semiotics, from the code to psychoanalysis, passing through semio-pragmatics, generative semiology, cognitive psychology and, most recently, narratology and textual analysis - all such attempts to organize a "cinematic system" have been powerless to grasp the film object in all its complexity.

Identity-Driven Violence: Reclaiming Civil Society

The increase in identity-based violence both domestically and internationally is focusing attention on the need for proactive approaches to reconciliation. The rise of militia movements, and the associated phenomenon of malicious racial harassment in the Pacific Northwest, demonstrates the dangers arising from identity-driven violence. The broad scale success of an anti-affirmative action initiative illustrates the wider significance of discriminatory attitudes. This article addresses those dangers by illustrating the convergence of two kinds of theories about identity-based violence. We will demonstrate how individual- level explanation taken from empirical work in the field of developmental psychology fits with social movement theory to provide a powerful analysis of the causes, and the cure, for identity-based violence and racial discrimination. Specifically, we focus on the relationship between identity formation and political violence, on the one hand, and residual racism among economically and culturally dispossessed whites on the other.Social movement theory tells us that there are dispossessed whites who are likely to seek status by targeting minorities. Identity theory tells us that it is the disjunction between the certainties of identity socialization for this group, and their present sense of dispossession, that transforms group "interest" into authoritarianism and potential violence. The key empirical link is between identity "foreclosure" and forms of authoritarianism that rationalize violence.In using the analysis as a guide to solutions to racial violence, we highlight the actions that can be taken to pre-empt violent behavior through a political emphasis on developing constructive developmental choices. We examine the requirements for the development of democratic personalities that avoid the pathologies of violence associated with interpersonal domination and authoritarianism. The direction given by social movement theory points toward solutions based on democratic discourse around objectives derived from identity theory: namely, the recognition and validation of community worth, the improvement and affirmation of participatory competence, and practical steps toward sustaining commitments on an interpersonal basis. These kinds of communication have to be worked out at the non-elite level, and in practical steps that build confidence between communities.The article builds on the work reported in Hoover's recent book, The Power of Identity: Politics in a New Key (Chatham House 1997), and on work by Johnson on race and American national identity.

Ontological Innovation and the Role of Theory in Design Experiments

The motivation for this article is our belief that theory is critically important but currently underplayed in design research studies. We seek to characterize and illustrate a genre of theorizing that seems to us strongly synergistic with design-based research. We begin by drawing contrasts with kinds of theory that are relevant but, we contend, by themselves inadequate. A central element of the type of productive design-based theorizing on which we focus is "ontological innovation," hypothesizing and developing explanatory constructs, new categories of things in the world that help explain how it works. A key criterion to which we adhere when discussing ontological innovations is that theory must do real design work in generating, selecting and validating design alternatives at the level at which they are consequential for learning. Developing and refining an ontological innovation is challenging and requires the kind of extensive, iterative work that characterizes design experiments more generally. However, the pay-off in terms of clarity of focus and explanatory power can be great. We present two case studies that illustrate the development, refinement, extension, and instructional application of ontological innovations.

Die spieël as blinde mond: die poësie van Breyten Breytenbach

The mirror as blind mouth: The poetry of Breyten Breytenbach The representation of reality, the word and the relationship between signifier and signified is the main theme of this article. In the poetry of the Afrikaans poet, Breyten Breytenbach, representation and “reality” are concerns constantly reflected on. The poem “drome is ook wonde” (“dreams are wounds as well”) can be read as a central “ars poetica” of Breytenbach’s work. Although it is a love poem it can also be read as literary theory, but not the same kind of theory as in, for example, Horace’s or Alexander Pope’s work. The poem discussed in this article does not deal with poetry as such, and what poetry should attempt to do; it is a presentation, the poetics being its representation. Breytenbach theorises an “epistemology of reading” in which the intuitive faculty of the reader – more than the cognitive – will guide the creation of meaning, and where the signifying value of the metaphor is beyond logical meaning. With the awareness of the impossibility of portraying reality by means of the poetic word, the mirror and mirror image acquire a meaningful function. For Leonardo (see Gombrich, 1986:5) the mirror was the painter’s master; the artist is the maker of mirrors, and then also the maker of dreams. The creation of a second reality, however, has boundaries because of the limitation of the poet’s medium. The creation then becomes more meaningful than the imitation, the presentation than the representation. After the analysis of Breytenbach’s poem one may come to the same conclusion as Lyotard (1984:81) concerning postmodern aesthetics which “ … allows the unpresentable to be put forward only as the missing contents; but the form … continues to offer to the reader … matter for solace and pleasure”.

Ethics and Human Nature

In the debate on the relationship between conceptions of human nature and ethics/politics there are those who view any attempt to ground ethics/politics upon a reasonably thick conception of human nature as illegitimate. On the other side of the argument are those who accept the necessity of a theory of human nature for an adequate grounding of ethics and politics, although there may be deep divisions among supporters of this basic position as to what kind of theory best fulfills this grounding role. In this paper the claim is made that an understanding of the concept of human nature is central to the enterprises of ethics and politics because it indicates the effective limits of political and ethical debate and that, despite its centrality in ethics and politics (or perhaps because of it) the notion of human nature is essentially contentious.

Plasma and field dynamics: some consequences fromin-situobservations in solar wind and magnetospheres

Because matter is most often in its plasma state, a strong coupling generally exists in the universe between flow dynamics and electromagnetic field. This is the reason why magnetic field plays such an important role in many astrophysical contexts, especially in sun and stars. Ideal MagnetoHydroDynamics can, to a certain extent, allow describing the magnetic field effects, but this elementary theory is unfortunately not of infinite validity: the understanding of phenomena as crucial as reconnection, dynamo effect, or plasma heating and acceleration for instance lies out of the scope of ideal MHD. For media sufficiently dense and for phenomena of sufficiently large scale with respect to the collision scales, resistive (and/or viscous) MHD has to be considered, which does not introduce much larger complexity. But for more dilute plasmas, or for shorter scale phenomena, resistive MHD is not valid either, and any interpretation must ground on more refined theories: Hall! -MHD, bi-fluid, multi-fluid, or fully kinetic. When applied, all these different theories do lead to quite different consequences. Because the observations from sun and stars can only rely on remote sensing techniques, it is generally quasi-impossible to discriminate between the different situations and decide which kind of theory is justified for interpreting correctly the phenomena. On the contrary, in the solar wind and the magnetospheres, in-situ measurements, from various experiments onboard many spacecraft, had provided a wealth of experimental results, often ruling out the pre-existing simplest interpretations and shedding some light on the reality of some phenomena like collisionless reconnection. The paper will try to display a few of such examples where solar wind and magnetosphere play a role of plasma laboratory for universal phenomena.

Emancipatory International Relations: Good News, Bad News or No News at All?

Although international relations theory is witnessing a veritable explosion of theoretical works in the general area of what I call, for reasons that will become clearer below, emancipatory international relations (EIR), a full-length critical study of this genre of theorizing has not yet been written, so far as I am aware. My project is to fill the lacuna. This will involve describing, analysing and criticizing a group of theories whose central assumptions and presuppositions have been shaped by continental philosophy, especially those derived from the work of Kant, Marx and Nietzsche. In my study I will examine certain common features of theories or discourses loosely divided into four groups: Kantian cosmopolitan; international critical theory; poststructuralist and postmodernist theories; and feminist international relations theories. My goal in this article is to describe these forms of emancipatory international relations and to examine why they count as emancipatory and how they differ from other kinds of theory. `I see no reason why we should not be business like about the nebulous.' - Anonymous.

Does the SOC theory avoid unconscious rule use?

There are striking similarities between Perruchet & Vinter's SOC theory and the theories that they claim to be in opposition to. First, both kinds of theory lead to the induction of knowledge of complex patterns in the environment that serve the function of rules. Second, both involve unconscious mental processes of induction resulting in at least some conscious knowledge.