Discursive constructions of otherness in populist radical right political blogs

This article provides a comparative study of the discursive construction and use of Otherness among anti‐immigration populist radical right politicians in Sweden and Finland. Based on rhetorical and critical discursive psychology, our analyses of discourse within nine political blogs identified three distinct representations of Otherness. These representations of a deviant group of people, of a threatening ideology and of inner enemies are highly familiar from previous research on radical right discourse. However, what seems to characterize populist radical right discourse in the Nordic context is the strong reliance on the rhetorical juxtaposition between the welfare system and immigration. Our study furthermore highlights how populist radical right politicians exploit the digital discursive tools provided by political blogging. These tools, first, create a sense of connectedness and mutual understanding between blogger and reader and, second, allow the blogger to convey messages that are hostile towards immigrants and ethnic minorities without expressing an explicit personal opinion. In combination, the features provided by political blogging and the discursive and rhetorical strategies that deny racism make discourse within a populist radical right political blog especially powerful and convincing. We conclude that research must be sensitive to this ‘digital discourse’, as it reaches a public far beyond the sphere of a political blog through its potential to spread and influence mainstream media.     

In their words: Connecting on‐line weblogs to developmental processes

This paper seeks to connect adolescents' communication within on‐line weblogs or blogs to developmental processes. A total of 195 English language blogs written by self‐identified 14‐ to 18‐year‐olds were selected; three entries from each blog were analysed, resulting in a sample of 585 entries. Blogger demographics, self‐presentation, and blog entries (format, style, content, and tone) were coded. The blog authors in our sample were overwhelmingly female and lived within the US; the majority were between 15‐ and 16‐years of age. Bloggers utilized usernames and userpictures for self‐presentation and in addition to gender, frequently presented information about their age and location. The majority of the entries used text, were narrative and reflective in style, and contained themes related to their authors' peers and everyday life. Emotional tone was present and entries with romantic, identity, and future‐related themes often contained emotional tone. Blog authors seemed to be using blogs to create narratives and to reflect about the people and events in their lives. Our results show that adolescent bloggers project off‐line themes to their blogs, suggesting that their on‐line and off‐line contexts are psychologically connected.     

Self-Talk: Conversation With Oneself? On the Types of Internal Interlocutors

The two studies presented in the article aimed to empirically verify the tentative typology of internal interlocutors in self-talk proposed in a previous research project. The typology comprised four emotional types: Faithful Friend, Ambivalent Parent, Proud Rival, and Helpless Child. Study 1 involved 98 participants (49 women) and Study 2 involved 114 (55 women), mostly students. In both studies, the names of internal interlocutors were generated by participants as qualitative data, quantified by reference to the standard set of affect terms, and, as affective patterns, subjected to clustering. Study 2 fully confirmed the recent results, whereas Study 1 revealed a new interlocutor type instead of Helpless Child – Calm Optimist. The conducted studies confirm the existence of four main types of inner interlocutors and provide a reason to verify the existence of Calm Optimist.     

Behavior Matching in Multimodal Communication Is Synchronized

A variety of theoretical frameworks predict the resemblance of behaviors between two people engaged in communication, in the form of coordination, mimicry, or alignment. However, little is known about the time course of the behavior matching, even though there is evidence that dyads synchronize oscillatory motions (e.g., postural sway). This study examined the temporal structure of nonoscillatory actions—language, facial, and gestural behaviors—produced during a route communication task. The focus was the temporal relationship between matching behaviors in the interlocutors (e.g., facial behavior in one interlocutor vs. the same facial behavior in the other interlocutor). Cross‐recurrence analysis revealed that within each category tested (language, facial, gestural), interlocutors synchronized matching behaviors, at temporal lags short enough to provide imitation of one interlocutor by the other, from one conversational turn to the next. Both social and cognitive variables predicted the degree of temporal organization. These findings suggest that the temporal structure of matching behaviors provides low‐level and low‐cost resources for human interaction.     

“<Emphasis Type="Italic">Chalepa Ta Kala</Emphasis>,” “Fine Things are Difficult”: Socrates’ Insights into the Psychology of Teaching and Learning

The proverb “chalepa ta kala” (“fine things are difficult”) is invoked in three dialogues in the Platonic corpus: Hippias Major, Cratylus and Republic. In this paper, I argue that the context in which the proverb arises reveals Socrates’ considerable pedagogical dexterity as he uses the proverb to rebuke his interlocutor in one dialogue but to encourage his interlocutors in another. In the third, he gauges his interlocutors’ mention of the proverb to be indicative of their preparedness for a more difficult philosophical trial. What emerges in the study of these three Platonic dialogues is that Socrates believes that how he and others describe learning makes a tangible difference in philosophical investigation.     

Junzi living in liberal democracy: What role could Confucianism play in political liberalism?

It has been widely argued that East Asian governments should be permitted to promote Confucian values. Recently, Zhuoyao Li rejected this view and advocates that East Asian governments should be neutral to all cultures and religions, including Confucianism. Nevertheless, Li believes that Confucianism does not loses its significance in a political liberal state because Confucians can still propose laws and policies, so long as their proposals are justified by public reason. In this paper, I argue that Li misunderstands the true significance of Confucianism in his model. Under the constraint of public reason, Confucians can hardly give any novel input in public deliberation. Rather, I believe that the contribution of Confucianism is to educate citizens to become fully just in the private sphere. Citizens may learn to be unjust if injustices are common in the private sphere. However, a political liberal state would be criticized as being overly invasive if it directly regulates the private sphere. Hence, I propose a division of educational labour between political liberalism and Confucianism in the public and private sphere. Finally, I use the Confucian workplace as an example to show how rituals in the workplace can enhance citizens’ sense of justice in the private sphere.     

In defense of the rationality of traditions

Alasdair MacIntyre has developed a theory of the rationality of traditions that is designed to show how we can maintain both the tradition-bound nature of rationality, on the one hand, and non-relativism, on the other. However, his theory has been widely criticized. A number of recent commentators have argued that the theory is either inconsistent with his own conception of rationality or else is dependent on the standards of his particular tradition and therefore fails to defuse the threat of relativism. In the present essay, I argue that this objection is mistaken.     

‘The Zone of the Carcass and the Knacker'—On Adorno's Concern with the Suffering Body

Adorno's moral philosophy is famously problematic. One of the main reasons for this is that it revolves around the moral addendum: a physical impulse of solidarity with suffering beings that, he argues, cannot and should not be rationalized. I show that, since this moral addendum remains vague and since Adorno's radical negativity forces him to dismiss as uncritical all other approaches to morality, he deliberately places his thought in danger of relapsing into irrationality. Most commentators therefore disagree about the manner in which Adorno's references to the moral addendum can be translated into a moral theory. In this paper, I bring in some often overlooked material to form a more complete overview of the issues at hand and to adjudicate this contested area. I do this by briefly discussing Schopenhauer's moral observations on Mitleid and by focusing on Adorno's references to animal cruelty and corporeality. Although this interpretation stays close to Adorno's observations on the moral addendum, it forces us to accept that his moral philosophy is rather weak. I conclude, however, that this weakness reflects a disturbing aspect of reality and in that sense has critical value.     

Commentary on Robin Wooffitt’s Paper “Poetic Confluence: A Sociological Analysis of an Enigmatic Moment”

The author, who is a sociologist and psychoanalyst, comments upon Wooffitt’s analysis of poetic confluence. Using conversation analysis of moments of interaction where one interlocutor says something that bears a strong resemblance to what has just been in the mind of the other interlocutor, Wooffitt suggests that this form of communication has its function in the neutralization of the mental contents of this other interlocutor. In light of material presented by Schegloff in his earlier work, this appears to be a partial function of poetic confluence but not something that is there in all instances. On a conceptual level, psychoanalysis and sociology have had several moments of rapprochement in history. Wooffitt’s plea for dialogue is different: rather than focusing on conceptual linkages between the two disciplines, he proposes meeting through empirical studies of the intersubjective and interactional basis of mental phenomena.     

Politics on the Couch? Psychotherapy and Society—Some Possibilities and Some Limitations

The ideas and practices of psychotherapy, together with fresh thinking from many other sources, can help to revitalize Western politics which seem broken and moribund. The author describes various professional experiences of his own at the interface of politics and psychotherapy. These include consulting with mainstream and activist politicians and groupings. He discusses how politics in the West is changing in the general direction of what he calls “transformative politics.” He also asks if psychotherapists can make a difference in the political world today, explaining that, though enthusiastic about the prospect, he is also skeptical about it because the record of psychotherapists' involvement in politics is not very good. The paper includes an experiential and personally oriented section (“The Inner Politician”) that looks at how the political self is formed in culture, family, and the inner world. The notion of differing political styles as a source of conflict is explained and explored. The author concludes with some reflections on the relations between psychotherapy, politics, and spirituality.     

Willingness to Communicate Orally: The Case of Iranian EFL Learners

This study sets out to develop a questionnaire on willingness to communicate (WTC) orally specific to English as a Foreign Language setting. It also aims to investigate the effect of three independent variables of interlocutor, age and gender on the same construct of WTC orally. Exploratory factor analysis resulted in three dimensions to WTC, namely WTC with teacher, with classmate, and stranger. Also Cronbach’s alpha of .86 indicated a high internal consistency. Mixed between–within subjects analysis of variance was used to assess the impact of interlocutors, age and gender on participants’ WTC across the three WTC subscale scores. The results showed no interaction effect between any of pairs of variables but the main effect of interlocutor on WTC orally. The results are discussed in the context of language teaching and some pedagogical implications are suggested.     

Gandhi and the Virtue of Care

The film Gandhi expands our understanding of how the virtue of care can function in the public sphere by portraying Gandhi dealing with Indian independence from Britain, the subjugation of women and Untouchables, and strife between Hindus and Muslims. Gandhi illustrates in his social and political activism how the virtue of care is animated by benevolence and structured by the building blocks of the care perspective: responsibility and need, relationship and mutual dependency, context and narrative.     

Revisionist practical theology and the meaning of public discourse

The author asks how practical theology can help a pluralist public by encouraging a public discussion of value issues. The aim of practical theology is to allow practice to inform theory; he seeks to allow the pastoral and religious praxis of the Christian life and the social, cultural, and political praxis of the wider society to inform each other, and thus practical theology. He begins by stating his assumptions, i.e., his way of understanding the issue of human responsibility in American society, and goes on to suggest religious and theological resources for responding to his questions. He distinguishes three realms comprising our society and suggests that there are value questions demanding discussion that may be differentiated in each as well as appropriate ways of discussing these questions.He is a Roman Catholic priest and has publishedBlessed Rage for Order: The New Pluralism in Theology.     

Development and Validation of the Personal Values Dictionary: A Theory-Driven Tool for Investigating References to Basic Human Values in Text

Estimating psychological constructs from natural language has the potential to expand the reach and applicability of personality science. Research on the Big Five has produced methods to reliably assess personality traits from text, but the development of comparable tools for personal values is still in the early stages. Based on the Schwartz theory of basic human values, we developed a dictionary for the automatic assessment of references to personal values in text. To refine and validate the dictionary, we used Facebook updates, blog posts, essays, and book chapters authored by over 180 000 individuals. The results show high reliability for the dictionary and a pattern of correlations between the value types in line with the circumplex structure. We found small to moderate (r_s = .1–.4) but consistent correlations between dictionary scores and self-reported scores for 7 out of 10 values. Correlations between the dictionary scores and age, gender, and political orientation of the author and scores for other established dictionaries mostly followed theoretical predictions. The Personal Values Dictionary can be used to assess references to value orientations in textual data, such as tweets, blog posts, or status updates, and will stimulate further research in methods to assess human basic values from text.     

Psychoanalysis and politics

Abstract

Following the trauma of Nazi persecution, mainstream psychoanalysis abandoned its concern for the unconscious elements in social and political processes. The self-restriction was given a theoretical justification by H. Hartmann in his psychology of the self. The present author here sketches the periphery movement of an alternative “political psychoanalysis” with reference to M. Langer, A. Mitscherlich, P. Parin and his own work. His thesis is that if psychoanalysts do not consider their own entanglement in the social structures and conflicts that characterize their own time, they are in danger of themselves becoming, within their institutes, unconscious victims of irrational social influences, and in addition miss the opportunity to enlighten society by critical involvement.     

Religion and Civic Purpose in Sophocles's Philoctetes

Why should citizens participate in civic endeavors they oppose? In the Philoctetes , Sophocles dramatizes the actions of three interlocutors who struggle for answers to an intractable personal and political conflict amid an existential civic crisis. The characters try several methods to resolve the impasse, specifically deceit, sympathy and appeals to duty. Ultimately, civic religion succeeds in creating unity where other methods of resolution fail. The civic religion framework in the Philoctetes can be seen as Sophocles's statement that resolution of the most extreme political conflicts can be obtained through a combination of piety and reason that respects foundational civic doctrines transcending politics. In this way, civic religion serves to unify political communities divided by self‐interest, intolerance, and desire for revenge while preserving self‐determination and the dignity of free will.     

Political theology in a Nordic post-secular setting

The current return of religion into the public sphere in Europe calls for a rethinking of traditional standpoints in political theology. The present article discusses the Lutheran idea of “two kingdoms,” which has been important in a Nordic setting. The author shows how the theological idea of two kingdoms has changed in the time after Luther. Originally, in pre-modernity, church and state were both seen from a religious point of view. God the creator was presupposed by all citizens. In modernity a secular view-point became the one taken for granted, defining also the way the spiritual realm was comprehended. In a post-secular context neither of these positions can be taken for granted. Current political theology must search for a post-secular solution that goes beyond the dichotomy of politics belonging to a secular sphere and Christian life belonging to a religious one. The article analyses some examples of how the idea of the post-secular has been discussed. Taking its starting-point in ideas by thinkers informed by Ludwig Wittgenstein, the article stresses the importance of taking concrete contexts into account in every discussion of political ethics. The position presented points in the direction of “radical democracy” newly discussed by several theologians.     

Philosophies of Life and Painful Experiences

The article discusses whether the philosophy of the modern era may be traced back to the thought of Martin Luther. This position has been advocated by French political philosopher Reiner Schürmann in his book Broken Hegemonies, on the history of Western thought from a phenomenological point of view. The author finds Schürmann's position remarkable in three respects: (i) It suggests a philosophical influence from Luther which is in accordance with his own criticism of Aristotelian metaphysics; (ii) it makes plausible that there is a transcendental turn at the heart of Luther's approach; but (iii) it nevertheless points out important differences between Kant's autonomy and Luther's heteronomy which have substantial consequences for their anthropology, epistemology, and theory of interpretation. The author finds that Schürmann argues convincingly for his point of view, in spite of some critical objections, and he concludes with a discussion of how such a genealogy may influence the present discussion on self and other in the philosophical debate.     

Off the stage,on the page: on the relationship between advocacy and scholarship

When and how should scholars of religion draw a line between advocacy and research activities? In what ways does advocacy contribute to or cut against scholarly credibility? Addressing these questions from the intersection of the academic study of religion and Indigenous Studies, this article opens by asserting that both fields are frequently hampered by deferential treatments of their subject matter, a problem that is potentially exacerbated when scholars in these fields engage in forms of political advocacy. Problematizing this narrative, the author turns to his ethnographic experiences in Hawai'i with regard to burial-protection struggles in order to describe ways his theoretical commitments and advocacy activities stand in tension and how he has attempted to navigate these competing but sometimes complementary elements of his scholarly life. In this context, a heuristic definition of advocacy is advanced in order to sketch a spectrum of forms, ranging from direct advocacy (e.g., physical action, legal testimony, or publication) to indirect advocacy (e.g., sharing documents, brainstorming about pending issues, or providing transportation to a meeting). The article concludes with reflections on advocacy and changing institutional demands upon scholars in the humanities and social sciences with reference to perceived public relevance.