Sense Of Confinement Research Articles

Niecodzienność szkolna uczniów klas I-III w czasie pandemii COVID-19. Dziecięce tworzenie społecznego życia w sytuacji kryzysowej

Introduction: The crisis brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic has induced numerous changes in the living and developmental environment of children. They have had to recognize and interpret these changes and engage in various new activities to cope with the extraordinary challenges. Purpose of the study: The aim of this study was to describe and understand how early primary school students experienced changes in the crisis situation within their home environment and remote education, as well as how they adapted to these unusual conditions. Methodology: The research employed a qualitative approach rooted in the paradigms of social constructivism and symbolic interactionism. The primary research method used was focused group interviews (focus groups) conducted with groups of students from both first and third grades in schools in Warsaw. Results: The results indicate that children experienced social isolation as a strong, multidimensional pressure that triggered negative emotions, a sense of confinement, inaction, and emptiness. In response to remote learning at home, they developed new routines, constructed workspaces, asserted their privacy, and valued the nurturing functions of their homes. They perceived remote learning as lacking in personal relationships, agency, a sense of learning, tiring, and dull, which led to their passive participation. Consequently, they expressed resistance and creatively sought ways to endure the school time with their peers in the "virtual courtyard." Conclusions: Analysis of children's discourse unequivocally reflects a negative assessment of emergency online education. It led to the depersonalization of the child, a sense of invisibility, voicelessness, and passivity during lessons, as well as a lack of personal learning experiences. Children's reflections and needs should be taken into account in ensuring the effectiveness of digital learning strategies.

Paradise lost: Cognitive grammar, nature, and the self in Diane Seuss’s ekphrastic poetry

Abstract Diane Seuss’s ekphrastic poetry collection Still Life with Two Dead Peacocks and a Girl is a celebration of life and death, imagination and reality, stillness and movement. This paper focuses on the first poem of the collection to investigate the relationship between the poetic persona and the landscape surrounding her. I employ central principles of cognitive linguistics as applied in the field of stylistics to discuss the manifestation of her mind style and examine how she constructs and situates herself in the environment. Drawing on Langacker’s notion of construal, I analyze the perspective and the degree of specificity of the descriptions. I also trace the extensive use of the container image schema that underlies the semantics of the poem. The paper demonstrates that despite her assumed idyllic existence, the poetic voice’s ornate descriptions of nature conceal a sense of uneasiness and confinement and the highly granular lexical choices and figurative expressions reveal her anthropocentric view of the environment. This gives rise to her feelings of alienation while the presence of the container image schema reinforces her sense of confinement. From an ecostylistic perspective, the analysis demonstrates how an anthropocentric view may manifest itself linguistically, highlighting textual features of anthropocentric narratives.

High-fidelity consumption and the claustropolitan structure of feeling

This paper invokes Redhead’s concept of claustropolitanism to critically explore the affective reality for consumers in today’s digital age. In the context of surveillance capitalism, we argue that consumer subjectivity revolves around the experience of fidelity rather than agency. Instead of experiencing genuine autonomy in their digital lives, consumers are confronted with a sense of confinement that reflects their tacit conformity to the behavioural predictions of surveillant market actors. By exploring how that confinement is lived and felt, we theorise the collective affects that constitute a claustropolitan structure of feeling: incompletion, saturation and alienation. These affective contours trace an oppressive atmosphere that infuses consumers’ lives as they attempt to seek fulfilment through digital market-located behaviours that are largely anticipated and coordinated by surveillant actors. Rather than motivate resistance, these affects ironically work to perpetuate consumers’ commitment to the digital world and their ongoing participation in the surveillant marketplace. Our theorisation continues the critical project of re-assessing the consumer subject by showing how subjectivity is produced at the point of intersection between ideological imperatives and affective consequences.

Exploring perceptions and attitudes of black Sub-Sahara African (BSSA) migrants towards residential care in England

PurposeSince the early 19th century, the UK has seen a decrease in mortality rates and increase in life expectancy. This has increased the number of elderly people being put into residential care. Change in British population demography with the arrival of many Africans from the black Sub-Sahara African (BSSA) countries has increased the need of these services. The purpose of this paper is to explore perceptions and attitude of BSSA towards residential care from potential user perspective.Design/methodology/approachThis study was explorative qualitative in nature, using focus group discussions and one-on-one follow up semi-structured interviews. The focus group discussions and interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. The Silences Framework was used to guide this study, and the collection of data was done using the thematic analysis approach.FindingsThis study found out that the sense of confinement, lack of ownership, non-provision of culturally friendly food, non-provision of culturally friendly personal care, non-provisional of culturally orientated death and dying care, stigma for being neglected and perceived poor inclusivity leading to loneliness were found to discourage BSSA research participants from taking up residential care in the UK.Research limitations/implicationsIn future, there is need for cross-cultural comparisons of BSSA communities living in the UK and BSSA communities living in Africa or other parts of the world. This may enhance understanding the differences and similarities based on contextual social, political and economic factors.Practical implicationsThere is a need to understand the needs and concerns of new communities in relation to residential care and make necessary changes to enhance diversity and inclusivity. More importantly, the curriculum and professional development courses for staff in health and social care need to factor in the concepts of cultural competency and inclusivity to prepare them for the increasingly changing terrain of social care.Originality/valueOwing to the changing demography and diversity in the UK population, there is a need to re-orient and re-design residential care services provision to make it diverse and inclusive of new communities from other cultures.

Angifi Dladla and the Bleakness of Freedom

Angifi Dladla is a Poet of No Sure Place. His poetry speaks for the marginalized and explores the otherwise unmentioned dynamics of South Africa's political and social landscape. In this article I explore how this label is demonstrated within his two collections of poetry, The Girl Who Then Feared to Sleep and Lament for KofifiMachu. More specifically, my argument engages with the evolving meanings of freedom evoked by Dladla, first in his apartheid-era poetry and, second, in that of today's post-apartheid situation. I demonstrate how the black-on-black violence of the 1980s townships caused a sense of confinement that forced Dladla within himself. Only then was he able to understand freedom and chart a way forward. Following this, the article turns toward those poems that depict contemporary South Africa. My analysis suggests that when freedom, not oppression, is the official political environment of the day, the reality for many is only continued violence and despair. To chart a way out of this bleak malaise, Dladla exhorts others to write in the style of his own poetry.

Encerrado a oscuras: significado de vivir con esquizofrenia para diagnosticados y sus cuidadores, Medellín-Colombia

Vivir con esquizofrenia representa un enigma para todas aquellas personas que no presentan la enfermedad o conviven con alguien que la padece. Objetivo: comprender el significado de vivir con esquizofrenia para personas que presentan la enfermedad y sus familiares, quienes acudieron a una institución estatal para la atención de problemas de salud mental de alta complejidad en Colombia durante el 2014 y 2015. Materiales y método: se utilizó un enfoque cualitativo y la información fue analizada por medio del método de la teoría fundamentada. Las técnicas de recolección de información fueron ocho entrevistas a profundidad y dos grupos focales, con una participación de 21 personas diagnosticadas y sus cuidadores. Resultados: por medio de la codificación, el muestreo teórico, la comparación constante y los memos analíticos, se llegó a la categoría “Vivir con esquizofrenia es vivir encerrado, a oscuras y con los sueños truncados”. Conclusiones: para los pacientes, la familia y para los cuidadores, vivir con esquizofrenia conlleva una sensación de encerramiento que afecta el proyecto de vida de unos y otros.

The implications of punishment. An ethnographic study in a women's prison in Argentina

Starting from an ethnographic perspective, the data that support the development of the article are part of a research project that had as a general objective, to account for the complexity and sense of confinement in a women’s prison belonging to the Argentine Federal Penitentiary Service (SPF). From this perspective, the jail is understood as a particular type of social system, where punishment and penalty are administered, but also constantly redefined itself from the complex social relationships that constitute it. This article is intended to account for such complexity by showing how affectivities are part of punishment administration, redefining not only their senses but also the own experience of prison.

To Russia with love

Among young unemployed or underemployed men in the port city of Batumi, the regional center of the Autonomous Republic of Ajara in Georgia, the Black Sea is a social and imaginary horizon that signifies both geographical mobility and confinement. Since Georgia gained independence, Batumi went from being a Soviet borderland to being an opening to the West. However, due to visa regulations, “the West”—and the opportunities associated with it—has long been limited to the other Black Sea countries of Turkey and Ukraine. Following the August 2008 war, Russia, although being a much more desirable destination, became out of reach for the majority of these men. Through the notions of social and geographical horizons, this article argues that the young men, despite their sense of confinement, manage to forge alternative connections to Russia via Internet sites, where the online dating of Russian women was used as a means to gain access to Russia via marriage.

“We Get to Decide”: The Role of Collective Engagement in Counteracting Feelings of Confinement and Lack of Autonomy in Residential Care

Maintenance of well-being is recognized as important for well-being in residential care, but the particular contribution that social groups and group activities make in this context is rarely considered. To understand how we can foster well-being in care, this study explores (a) older adults’ general experiences of life in long-term residential care and (b) their particular experiences of participation in this group intervention. Ten semi-structured interviews were conducted with long-term care home residents and interview transcripts were analyzed thematically. Thematic analysis revealed two overriding themes that illustrated participants’ general experiences of life in care. The first theme, “care home as home,” suggests that adjustment and positive social relations with carers play a role in enhancing well-being. The second theme, “being stuck,” describes a general sense of confinement and a lack of control associated with living in long-term care. The significance of collective engagement became evident in relation to this second theme. Specifically, participants’ involvement in the group activity considered here was experienced as making a positive contribution to building social relations with other residents and, in doing so, as reducing residents’ sense of confinement and lack of control. Engagement in the group intervention and the resulting positive social relationships were thus experienced as a means of counteracting participants’ sense of being stuck. Overall, the findings point to the importance of group activities in fostering older adults’ autonomy and control—and thus well-being—in care.

Against the Limits of our History

While women have made great strides professionally we also continue to contend with the invisible boundaries that exist in time and space to restrict our movements. And since as subjects women are located within particular discursive and material practices of power, resistance and subjectivity, color can exacerbate the sense of confinement. In the absence of well-charted paths to professional mobility, I suggest that geographers of color turn to experiences beyond our disciplinary boundaries. This paper looks at how women negotiated dangerous spaces during the Malayan Emergency (1948–1960) using precisely those rules and cultural codes that marked women's spaces and activities as inferior or unworthy of the attentions of power. I offer this example to open up a discussion on how quotidian activities can be used to transcend limitations placed on our professional mobility. I do so by drawing contextual parallels, albeit with strict limitations, to exploring tactics for creating supportive spaces and communicating information. This is not an attempt to equate our modest hurdles with the violence and misery of wartime experiences, but rather a preliminary exploration of how we can build activism into our daily practices. Innovating and compromising, the latter, hardly an alien experience anyway, can contribute incrementally to opening new spaces in our professional lives. Contra los limites de nuestra historia Mientras las mujeres han progresado a grandes pasos profesionalmente, continuamos a pelear con los limites invisibles que existan en el tiempo y el espacio y que restringir nuestras movimientos. Las mujeres, como sujetos, están ubicado dentro de discursivos particulares y prácticas materiales de poder, resistencia y subjetividad. Como consecuencia el color (la raza) puede exagerar el sentido de confinamiento. En la falta de una ruta bien trazado para la movilidad profesional, sugiero que geógrafas de color recurren a las experiencias fuera de las fronteras de nuestras disciplina. Este artículo examina como las mujeres negociaron espacios peligrosos durante la Emergencia Malayan (1948–1960), utilizando las reglas y códigos culturales que definieron los espacios y actividades de mujeres como inferior o no digno de las atenciones de poder. Ofrezco este ejemplo para empezar una discusión de cómo las actividades cotidianas pueden estar utilizadas para transcender las limitaciones de nuestras movilidad profesional. Exploro las tácticas para construir espacios sustentador y para comunicar información, dibujando paralelos contextual, aunque con limites estrictos. No es mi intento que comparar nuestras barreras modestas y la violencia y miseria de experiencias de guerra, sino que una exploración preeliminaría de cómo podemos hacer activismo dentro de nuestras prácticas cotidianas.

THE STONE AT THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN: THE FILMS OF RASHID MASHARAWI

The films of Rashid Masharawi, one of the leading Palestinian ““exilic”” directors of the younger generation, are set almost entirely in the occupied territories, especially in refugee camps, and unfold in a seemingly timeless present shaped by a past catastrophe (1948) never explicitlyevoked. The author examines Masharawi's some dozen films, both documentary and feature, thematically and technically, showing how the films' structure and camera work emphasize the sense of confinement, narrowing horizons, and psychological siege depicted. The author concludes that though almost relentlessly bleak and stripped of any hint of romanticism, the films also convey a stubborn will to survive and endure, and together presenta powerful allegory of life in the occupied territories.

Contradictions Between Metaphors: A Means of Expressing an Attitude

We examine a corpus of metaphors used in an autobiography of childhood for contradictions Childhood is described in terms of containment, but the rule of transitivity is violated across the metaphors by the implicit statement: Childhood is in childhood. This contradiction serves to express an attitude of alienation, as it renders the childhood an omnipresent phenomenon leaving no room for the subject of the story. This reification of childhood is emphasized by the usage of containment primarily in the sense of confinement. An ironical relation between style and content is found, likewise serving an attitude of alienation. The autobiographic metaphors are a reconstruction of the childhood experiences from the present viewpoint of their author. It is suggested that they may reflect a condensation of a schema of autobiographic memories, similarly governed by an attitude of alienation.

Farrell's Ethnic Neighborhood and Wright's Urban Ghetto: Two Visions of Chicago's South Side

Although often described as naturalistic urban writers, James T. Farrell and Richard Wright portray the with strikingly non-naturalistic styles, rejecting the documentary methods of naturalism in favor of more expressive techniques. Wright, in order to suggest the extremity of his hero's radically alienated consciousness, describes the in Native Son as gothic mindscape reflecting the fear and horror that dominate his protagonist's life. Surrealistic techniques are extensively used to dramatize the fundamental lack of connection between Bigger Thomas and the world in which he is placed. Because his external life offers him so little, Bigger perceives the as process of fragmentation and dislocation, strange nether world that threatens to destroy him. Farrell's South Side in Studs Lonigan, although geographically few blocks away from Wright's city, is in fact different universe, and Farrell uses very different literary techniques to describe it. Whereas Bigger Thomas's Chicago is racial ghetto, massive trap that dehumanizes the people who are forced to live in it, Studs Lonigan's South Side is an ethnic neighborhood presented in complexly ambivalent way. While it can indeed be dead end to those who succumb to what Farrell in The League of Frightened Philistines called spiritual poverty (86), it can also be the setting for human fiberation for those like Danny O'Neill who use it as foundation for human development. To suggest the powerful duality of the urban setting, Farrell subtly combines standard realistic techniques that present the as densely reified environment with wide range of poetic techniques that lyrically suggest the surprisingly rich human possibilities contained in such world. The first principal difference that strikes readers of the two novels is the fact that Native Son describes so little of the actual urban environment that Studs Lonigan details so fully. Because Wright was intent on filtering external experience through Bigger's radically alienated consciousness, he describes Chicago with very few coordinates in time and place.(1) We are never given precise idea of the year in which the novel takes place and we do not see much of the actual physical characteristics of the in which Bigger lives. Washington Park is used for important scene but is never clearly described. Full, coherent descriptions of streets, houses, stores, schools and other important landmarks are never given. The novel's second scene, which describes Bigger leaving his family's apartment and walking the street, provides vivid example of Wright's highly selective method of depicting life. The few details mentioned are designed more to suggest what Bigger is thinking and feeling than to establish the setting in any minetic way. Frustrated that his environment does not present him with a wider course of action, Bigger's attention is drawn to streetcar rattling over steel track (16). This sense of confinement is intensified when he looks up at an election poster for District Attorney, which reminds blacks that If you break the law you can't win (16). When Gus and Bigger meet on street comer, their sense of entrapment is further underscored by the wall (21) they lean up against. Observing the high-flying planes and fast-moving automobiles, which painfully remind them of the mobility and possibility extended to whites in American society, they realize that black people have been placed in one comer of the city that amounts to little more than jail (32). Studs Lonigan, however, provides densely rendered, fully reified urban world. Throughout the trilogy Farrell stresses the temporal setting in precise way, usually connecting the seasons, months and years to the development of his central character.(2) More importantly, though, Farrell physically describes the urban setting in copious detail, providing complete sense of external reality and of how it naturally interacts with the consciousness of the central character. …