Responsibility and Rhetoric

In this paper I offer a retrospective rereading of my work on epistemic responsibility in order to see why this inquiry has found only an uneasy location within the discourse of Anglo-American epistemology. I trace the history of the work's production, circulation and reception, and examine the feminist implications of the discussions it has occasioned.     

Narratives of Responsibility and Agency: Reading Margaret Walker's Moral Understandings

Naturalized moral epistemology eschews practices of assuming to know a priori the nature of situations and experiences that require moral deliberation. Thus it promises to close a gap between formal ethical theories and circumstances where people need guidelines for action. Yet according experience so central a place in inquiry risks “naturalizing” it, treating it as incontestable, separating its moral and political dimensions. This essay discusses these issues with reference to Margaret Walker's Moral understandings.     

Factors Predicting Success in Training and Employment for WIN Clients in Southern Nevada

In this study we sought to assess WIN clients with the USES General Aptitude Test Battery, the Basic Occupational Literacy Test, and the Jackson Vocational Interest Survey. The available data are analyzed for indications of success in training and eventual employment.     

A Return to Reciprocity

Feminist affiliation has long been suspect among Native American women whose memories survive the dishonor of colonialism. The idea of common struggles is simultaneously repugnant and alluring. Sadly, this has led to much confusion and rejection between Aboriginal women. I suggest “a return to reciprocity” to understand and come to terms with feminist rejection or affiliation. If we cannot come together, the fracturing that began with European ideology will continue to fragment and destroy the fabric of Native cultures.     

THE PRACTICE OF COMPETENCY MODELING

The purpose of this article is to define and explain a trend that has caused a great deal of confusion among HR researchers, practitioners, and consumers of HR-related services: competency modeling. The Job Analysis and Competency Modeling Task Force, a work group jointly sponsored by the Professional Practice Committee and the Scientific Affairs Committee of the Society For Industrial and Organizational Psychology, has recently concluded a 2-year investigation into the antecedents of competency modeling and an examination of the current range of practice. Competency modeling is compared and contrasted to job analysis using a conceptual framework (reflected in a 10-dimension Level of Rigor Scale) that practitioners and researchers may use to guide future work efforts, and which could be used as a basis for developing standards for practice. The strengths and weaknesses of both competency modeling and job analysis are identified and, where appropriate, recommendations are made for leveraging strengths in one camp to shore-up weaknesses in the other.     

Eliminating barriers to career development of women

Women, the largest group of “minority” workers, are actively seeking to reduce inequities in opportunities for career development. Counselors and clinicians, who as a group have been found to hold sex-role stereotypes, probably restrict the career opportunities of women. Vocational counselors of women need to consider key questions such as the number of children women would like to have. Researchers, in studying the job performance of highly educated women, need to investigate the amount of financial, clerical, and student assistance received by men and women scholars. Such research might in part explain sex differences in research productivity.     

Kierkegaard's Philosophy: Implications for Counseling

This article discusses how the philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard can provide useful guidelines for the study of the counseling process. Kierkegaard's philosophy is also compared with selected contributions of Freud, Skinner, Rogers, and May and with four common themes of counseling and psychotherapy.     

Social Psychology,Moral Character,and Moral Fallibility*

In recent years, there has been considerable debate in the literature concerning the existence of moral character. One lesson we should take away from these debates is that the concept of character, and the role it plays in guiding our actions, is far more complex than most of us initially took it to be. Just as Gilbert Harman, for example, makes a serious mistake in insisting, plain and simply, that there is no such thing as character, defenders of character also make a mistake to the extent that they imply there is no problem raised by the psychological literature for either the concept of character or the nature of character‐based ethics. My hope for this paper is to avoid both of these mistakes by first, exploring exactly what is the concept of character that is so firmly rooted in our philosophical and everyday thinking; and second, exploring the implications of the psychological literature for this appropriately understood concept of character. In so doing, I will come to a resolution that vindicates the existence of character, while at the same time calls attention to the real and serious problem suggested by the psychological evidence. This, we will see, is a problem of moral motivation.