I crashed the boat and wept: Localizing the “field” in critical geographic practice

Geographers often practice “fieldwork” for research, physically traveling between field and the academy. While critical scholars have contemplated their positionality in the field, what gets overlooked is how academic constructions of their “field” can discount indigenous peoples’ knowledges of “home.” Because academics’ representations of “the field” affirm the subject/object binary, this ontology allows indigenous peoples’ knowledges to be criticized in their emotional expressions of their homelands. In this paper I describe my practices of “field” work to disrupt this ontology—and in so doing, what emerges is my deeply emotional engagement with this “field,” produced through the network of materialities and beings with whom I worked. Network ontologies allow more space for discussing the emotional and affective experiences of a field site, including researcher uncertainty and responsibility. Attending to both conscious and unconscious motives to action is a more rigorous critical practice, and representing emotions can at once benefit research goals (emotional engagements leading to new insights), and lead to new politics of knowledge production and representation: such as opening a space for indigenous peoples to be recognized as legitimate spokespersons about their own beloved landscapes.     

建立儒家人文主义的学术传统:由文化“复建”到文化“复兴”

本文回顾了作者跟随杨国枢教授推动本土心理学的学术历程,并依据自己的切身体会,提出本土心理学运动必须以科学哲学作为基础。作者身体力行,在最近二三十年间,深入学习科学哲学的理论,逐步建立本土心理学的相关理论。其最终目标,是打算以儒家文化作为基底,吸纳西方近代文明的菁华,“中学为体,西学为用”,摆脱西方学术的宰制,建立“儒家人文主义”的自主学术传统。作者认为,唯有大力发展本土社会科学,建立华人“自主的社会科学传统”,华人学术社群才有可能走出“学术自我殖民”的心态。     

Towards a literary account of mental health from James' Principles of Psychology

The field of mental health tends to treat its literary metaphors as literal realities with the concomitant loss of vague “feelings of tendency” in “unusual experiences”. I develop this argument through the prism of William James’ (1890) “The Principles of Psychology”. In the first part of the paper, I reflect upon the relevance of James' “The Psychologist's Fallacy” to a literary account of mental health. In the second part of the paper, I develop the argument that “connotations” and “feelings of tendency” are central to resolving some of the more difficult challenges of this fallacy. I proceed to do this in James' spirit of generating imaginative metaphors to understand experience. Curiously, however, mental health presents a strange paradox in William James’ (1890) Principles of Psychology. He constructs an elaborate conception of the “empirical self” and “stream of thought” but chooses not to use these to understand unusual experiences – largely relying instead on the concept of a “secondary self.” In this article, I attempt to make more use of James' central division between the “stream of thought” and the “empirical self” to understand unusual experiences. I suggest that they can be usefully understood using the loose metaphor of a “binary star” where the “secondary self” can be seen as an “accretion disk” around one of the stars. Understood as literary rather the literal, this metaphor is quite different to more unitary models of self-breakdown in mental health, particularly in its separation of “self” from “the stream of thought” and I suggest it has the potential to start a re-imagination of the academic discourse around mental health.     

The psychology of practice and the practice of the three psychologies

The keynote speakers at the 2nd Asian Association for Social Psychology Meetings were asked to clarify the relationship among the three scholarly fields known as cultural psychology, indigenous psychology and cross‐cultural psychology. Are they three names for the same thing? If not are they complementary or antagonistic enterprises? Does one approach subsume the other(s) or make the other(s) possible? What follows is my own general view of the “three psychologies” issue. I suggest that cultural psychology and indigenous psychology are kindred approaches, which differ in significant ways from cross‐cultural psychology. A distinction is drawn between the study of “mentalities” (the proper unit of analysis for cultural and indigenous psychology) and the study of “mind” (a non‐cultural phenomenon). Cultural psychology is a type of interpretive analysis of social practice which asks, “what are the `goals, values and pictures of the world' with reference to which this behavior might be seen as rational?” The essay describes the assumption of rationality and the place of cultural critique in interpretive analysis. Is there any significant difference at all between cultural psychology and indigenous psychology? One aim of cultural psychology (“globalizing the local”) is premised on the view that “indigenous psychologies” may have relevance outside their points of origin. How open is the indigenous psychology movement to the idea that (e.g.) a psychology with a “Chinese soul” might illuminate the psychological functioning of members of non‐Chinese populations?     

Reclaiming “Natural Partnership and Communication”

The massive scale of forced displacement across the globe discloses the fractured state of the modern international order. Francisco de Vitoria’s theological approach to the law of nations, in the context of the Spanish conquest of the Americas, had a significant influence on this order’s development. This paper argues that recovering his innovative insights today can help refurbish a collective sense of international responsibility for refugees. Vitoria’s bold assertion of indigenous Americans’ dominion affirmed all human beings as members of a world commonwealth with equal claims to basic rights. The “right to travel” he articulated, by its orientation to “natural partnership and communication,” can promote refugee rights and global fraternity.     

A Narrative Inquiry into a Female Athlete’s Experiences with Protracted Concussion Symptoms

This article explores a female university volleyball student-athlete’s experience with protracted concussion symptoms. Through the methodology of narrative inquiry, four salient themes became apparent related to Daphnée’s experiences: (a) “I felt so alone,” (b) “I had to make one of the hardest decisions of my life,” (c) “I feel like I’m in prison,” and (d) “There’s no light at the end of the tunnel.” Overall, this study offers a rare look into the impact of concussion on an individual’s athletic and academic identities, career progression, and in turn, her imagined stories of who she was and who she was becoming.     

Critique of Sharif’s and Pitt’s Models of Technology

abstract

In this article Pitt’s and Sharif’s models of technology are discussed. These models are based on two different conceptions of technology, which are technology as “instrument” and as “making use of instrument.” Sharif considers technology as a collection of empowering tools, including technoware, humanware, infoware and orgaware. On the other hand, Pitt sees technology as “humanity at work.” Based on his definition, Pitt proposes a model of technology with three components; first-order transformation, second-order transformation, and the assessment of feedback mechanism. In this article this model will be explained and criticized. After that, Sharif’s model is criticized in the light of Pitt’s theory and it will be shown that Pitt’s model provides a better understanding of different aspects of technology. For example, it will be argued how Pitt’s model is efficient in explaining dynamicity, transfer and control of technology along with its soft dimensions, while Sharif’s model is incapable of doing so. In the next part, Pitt’s model is criticized and it is shown that the mechanism of knowledge progress suggested by this model is controversial and Pitt’s framework cannot support the idea of indigenous technology. Furthermore, the ability of Pitt’s model in describing different technological phenomena is called into question, since this model provides a superficial view of the complexity of an assessment of technology’s consequences. Finally, a list is proposed that contains minimal requirements that every model of technology is expected to explain. It is incumbent on technology theoreticians to consider this list.     

论《金人铭》的产生时代

《金人铭》产生的时代应该是战国末年至汉代初年,这有以下几个方面的证据:1.《金人铭》的内容与黄老学派关系密切,应该是黄老思想流行后的产物,不可能产生于孔子时代。2.《金人铭》的内容性质与战国以前的青铜器铭文的特征不符。3.《金人铭》把孔子入周观书和孔子入太庙二事混合在一起,露出了破绽。4.《金人铭》称“三缄其口”,而“缄”字在可靠的先秦文献中无“闭口”义。“缄”的本义为捆箱箧的绳索,“缄”有“闭口”义是西汉才有的现象。     

Social Responsibility in French Engineering Education: A Historical and Sociological Analysis

In France, some institutions seem to call for the engineer’s sense of social responsibility. However, this call is scarcely heard. Still, engineering students have been given the opportunity to gain a general education through courses in literature, law, economics, since the nineteenth century. But, such courses have long been offered only in the top ranked engineering schools. In this paper, we intend to show that the wish to increase engineering students’ social responsibility is an old concern. We also aim at highlighting some macro social factors which shaped the answer to the call for social responsibility in the French engineering “Grandes Ecoles”. In the first part, we provide an overview of the scarce attention given to the engineering curriculum in the scholarly literature in France. In the second part, we analyse one century of discourses about the definition of the “complete engineer” and the consequent role of non technical education. In the third part, we focus on the characteristics of the corpus which has been institutionalized. Our main finding is that despite the many changes which occurred in engineering education during one century, the “other formation” remains grounded on a non academic “way of knowing”, and aims at increasing the reputation of the schools, more than enhancing engineering students’ social awareness.     

Xunzi: A Paradigm of Rationalistic Virtue Ethics in Early Confucianism

Against the background of modern academic study, this article consciously uses Aristotle’s virtue ethics as a tool to theoretically analyze Xunzi’s ethical philosophy. This article tries to briefly analyze the basic structure of Xunzi’s moral philosophy and to reveal its unique rationalist theoretical character by exploring the following three topics: “the understanding of human beings,” “the establishment of a moral foundation,” and “the accomplishment of virtue in practice.” From the perspective of comparative philosophy, this article can also be viewed as a model for bringing about communication and synthesis between two philosophical traditions, namely Confucian ethics and Western virtue ethics.     

African indigenous games: Using Bame Nsamenang’s Africentric thoughts to reflect on our heritage,pedagogy, and practice in a global village

As we go global and begin to make early childhood practices universal, certain aspects of communities remain fixed in deep realms of their everyday living and can only be accessed by those who believe in it. Believing in it requires having faith in a practice that will always be better than what others bring as “best practice”. This is because that aspect is what defines who you are and changing it amounts to removing a piece of you with the intention of replacing it with an “artificial part”. This may be the case with African indigenous games that have been played in various settings to define the Africanness of given communities. The values that these games bring to the Africans as they try to hold on to what belongs to them, is discussed in this paper. Bame Nsamenang used such thoughts to propel the Africentrism philosophy to direct thoughts into values that are African in nature, even when there are no clear boundaries of African in Africa. This article focuses on Nsamenang’s Africentric arguments in line with promotion of African indigenous games as a heritage, pedagogy, and a practice.     

Machenschaft and Seynsgeschichte in the Black Notebooks: Heidegger on Nietzsche’s “Rediscovery” of the Greeks

ABSTRACT

One of the outcomes of the publication of the Black Notebooks has been to invite scholars to rethink their understanding of Heidegger’s thinking, including his “world-historical anti-Semitism,” his relation to war and politics, via Schmitt and Jünger, as well as machination/calculation but not less his Seynsgeschichte. Other questions include education and academic life in addition to Heidegger’s anxieties regarding the reception of Being and Time in the framework of his history of Beyng/Seyn. Refusing Nietzsche on the Greeks, especially Anaximander, Heidegger “plays out” typically bellicose interpretations of Will to Power, consummating the “abandonment of beings by being, the abandonment that gained sovereignty in the history of metaphysics.” If Heidegger’s Nietzsche thus suspiciously resembles the Nazi Nietzsche, reading the proliferation of editions bears out Heidegger’s claims for the backwards-working force of the Nachlaß.     

Conflictual Moralities,Ethical Torture: Revisiting the Problem of “Dirty Hands”

The problem of “dirty hands” has become an important term, indeed one of the most important terms of reference, in contemporary academic scholarship on the issue of torture. The aim of this essay is to offer a better understanding of this problem. Firstly, it is argued that the problem of “dirty hands” can play neither within rule-utilitarianism nor within absolutism. Still, however, the problem of “dirty hands” represents an acute, seemingly irresolvable, conflict within morality, with the moral agent understood, following Nagel, as necessarily holding mixed, absolutist-consequentialist moral intuitions, pulling in opposite directions. Secondly, a distinction is drawn between real situations of “dirty hands,” and other conflictual scenarios, which are commonly, but unjustifiably placed under the metaphorical title of “dirty hands.” Finally, it is suggested - utilizing Nagel’s own ideas, as developed in his later work, and Sen’s notion of evaluator relativity—that the moral “blind alley” manifested in the problem of “dirty hands” may not be totally blind after all, at least from the situated agent’s own internal point of view (as opposed to that of an external observer trying to put herself in the agent’s position by way of moral simulation). Thus, contrary to Walzer’s approach, it is possible for a person (politician) acting in a situation of “dirty hands,” not to believe herself to be guilty, but still be a moral person.     

Discussion of “I’mprovisation–Therapists’ Subjective Experience during Improvisational Moments in the Clinical Encounter”

The first part of this article discusses Romanelli, Tishby, and Moran’s qualitative research on the impact of training clinicians’ “skill-sets” derived from improvisational theater. Categories of experience were discerned from the data, along with findings of the impressive positive effects from the training on the clinicians’ ability to better respond to unpredictable “improvisational moments” in psychotherapy. The second part elaborates on how the authors' research represents a welcome addition to a larger conversation about how drama theory “puts” “flesh and blood” on the “bones” of Relational Metapsychology, which entails theories of process and change, rooted in an information theory based epistemology in contrast to Freud’s archaic and deeply flawed Metapsychology ensconced in a psychic energy theory epistemology. Finally, the authors’ lends to advocacy for clinical training in drama and improvisation being added to clinically based curriculums.     

Documenting the multisensory and ephemeral: Navajo Chantway singers and the troubles of a “science” of ceremonialism

Even as American ethnology in the late‐nineteenth century continued to accumulate data about indigenous groups for comparative study, the surgeon‐turned‐ethnographer Washington Matthews found standardized documentary methods constricting, unable to reflect the complexity of a community's spiritual practices. Through studies of Navajo Indians in the 1880s and 90s, Matthews experimented with documentation techniques to capture the multisensorial and ephemeral elements of Navajo healing ceremonialism, such as the design of sandpaintings that were later destroyed as the rites concluded. Investigating his ethnographic strategies and his relationships with Navajo knowledge stewards, this article charts Matthews’ emerging conviction in social immersion and bonding with indigenous informants, tenets that predated the rise of cultural relativism in anthropology. The article argues that his experience among and tutelage from Navajo medicine “singers” reshaped Matthews’ documentary practices to emphasize the irreducibility of cultural facets to tabular columns, raising doubts about then‐dominant theories of social evolution.     

A Psychology of Indigenous Healing in Southern Africa

Converging lines of evidence from various scientific disciplines consistently point to humanity's African roots. In this context, the term “indigenous healing” is used to refer to universal forms of healing that began in Africa and were developed further both locally and internationally. This article examines the notion of a psychology of indigenous healing and suggests that investigations continually reveal essential structures and practices of a perennial psychology underlying modern scientific, academic and professional forms of this discipline. Examination of such structures and practices illuminates an original psychological theme in Southern African indigenous healing involving recognition of Spirit as Source of Self that extends into transpersonal realms. Related themes include ancestral consciousness, familial and communal spirituality, healers and specializations, illness prevention, health promotion and various forms of empathy. The need for future in depth research into such psychological themes and issues is identified and explicated.     

WISING UP: THE EVOLUTION OF NATURAL THEOLOGY

Abstract This essay is in response to Professor Celia Deane‐Drummond's 2012 Boyle lectures. The first part calls attention to the value and significance of her “sophianic theo‐drama hypothesis” for the contemporary engagement between Christian theology and evolutionary science. In a sense, her proposal itself is a religious “adaptation” to changes within an international, interdisciplinary academic environment. The second part of the essay explores the rapidly shrinking “niche” of Christian natural theology and briefly summarizes an alternative set of hypotheses from the biocultural sciences of religion.     

Effortful Control in “Hot” and “Cool” Tasks Differentially Predicts Children’s Behavior Problems and Academic Performance

Effortful control (EC), the capacity to deliberately suppress a dominant response and perform a subdominant response, rapidly developing in toddler and preschool age, has been shown to be a robust predictor of children’s adjustment. Not settled, however, is whether a view of EC as a heterogeneous rather than unidimensional construct may offer advantages in the context of predicting diverse developmental outcomes. This study focused on the potential distinction between “hot” EC function (delay-of-gratification tasks that called for suppressing an emotionally charged response) and more abstract “cool” EC functions (motor inhibition tasks, suppressing-initiating response or Go-No Go tasks, and effortful attention or Stroop-like tasks). Children (N?=?100) were observed performing EC tasks at 38 and 52 months. Mothers, fathers, and teachers rated children’s behavior problems and academic performance at 67, 80, and 100 months, and children participated in a clinical interview at 100 months. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) analyses with latent variables produced consistent findings across all informants: Children’s scores in “hot” EC tasks, presumably engaging emotion regulation skills, predicted behavior problems but not academic performance, whereas their scores in “cool” EC tasks, specifically those engaging effortful attention, predicted academic performance but not behavior problems. The models of EC as a heterogeneous construct offered some advantages over the unidimensional models. Methodological and clinical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Implicit Science Stereotypes Mediate the Relationship between Gender and Academic Participation

While the gender gap in mathematics and science has narrowed, men pursue these fields at a higher rate than women. In this study, 165 men and women at a university in the northeastern United States completed implicit and explicit measures of science stereotypes (association between male and science, relative to female and humanities), and gender identity (association between the concept “self” and one’s own gender, relative to the concept “other” and the other gender), and reported plans to pursue science-oriented and humanities-oriented academic programs and careers. Although men were more likely than women to plan to pursue science, this gap in students’ intentions was completely accounted for by implicit stereotypes. Moreover, implicit gender identity moderated the relationship between women’s stereotypes and their academic plans, such that implicit stereotypes only predicted plans for women who strongly implicitly identified as female. These findings illustrate how an understanding of implicit cognitions can illuminate between-group disparities as well as within-group variability in science pursuit.