Compass Journals

Ancient Greek Accentuation in Generative Phonology and Optimality Theory

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:23:00 -0800

Ancient Greek had a complex accentuation system in which phonological factors interacted with the morphology and lexicon. This system has become important in the debate over whether a phonological theory should operate with derivations or constraints, or a combination of the two. This study surveys recent analyses of the Ancient Greek accentuation system in Generative Phonology and Optimality Theory, and challenges these analyses with some additional data.

Mothering Mexico: The Historiography of Mothers and Motherhood in 20th-Century Mexico

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 02:10:00 -0700

This essay explores how both scholars have understood the category of motherhood in 20th-century Mexican history. From the self-sacrificing, long-suffering icon of 'traditional' motherhood to the 'modern' mother who used up-to-date child-rearing techniques, mothers and mothering has had a tremendous symbolic value to various parts of Mexican society. The discourse of motherhood was deployed in multiple ways, by multiple actors since Porfirian times and throughout the postrevolutionary era. A robust scholarship has developed around the concept of mothers, motherhood and maternity.

The Roman de la rose and Middle English Poetry

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 22:52:00 -0700

The late medieval French allegory, Le Roman de la rose [The Romance of the rose], the conjoined production of Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun, has long been recognized as an important literary influence on Middle English poetry. The majority of recent studies focus on Geoffrey Chaucer's translation, citation, and adaptation of the Rose. Directions in scholarly study include increasing attention to the formal complexity and polyvalence the model of the Rose provides, on-going interest in constructions of sexuality and gender, and a greater emphasis on the inter-relation of Chaucer's response to the Rose with the responses of French and Italian poets, including Guillaume de Machaut, Eustache Deschamps, Guillaume de Deguileville (or Digulleville), Christine de Pizan, and Giovanni Boccaccio. The discovery of a new manuscript fragment of the Middle English Romaunt of the Rose and the re-assessment of earlier linguistic exchange also set forth interesting possibilities for future exploration. Beyond the field of Chaucer studies, scholars of late medieval England's alliterative poems, notably Cleanness but also Piers Plowman, have re-examined the ways the Rose may have shaped the construction of devotional, sexual, and social ideologies within this poetic tradition. The growing interest in Chaucer's contemporary John Gower and in the English poetry of the fifteenth century, especially the works of Thomas Hoccleve and John Lydgate, has brought further recognition of the Rose's widespread influence, as well as the continued influence of Rose-inspired intermediaries, including not only Guillaume de Deguileville and Christine de Pizan but also Evrart de Conty, Alain Chartier, and Charles d'Orléans. Recalling the attribution of the Rose's authorship to an English 'John Moon' in early literary histories demonstrates one curious later misreading of Hoccleve's Middle English response to the Rose and may also provoke a deeper appreciation for the strong continuity of interest in the Rose shared by French and English readers during the turbulent era of the Hundred Years War.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Political Elites and the Culture of Social Movements

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:52:00 -0700

While sociologists have paid a great deal of attention to how political elites matter for the emergence and development of social movements, they have focused less explicitly on how political elites matter for the culture of social movements. Considering the amount of attention paid to culture in the field of social movements, this issue is an important one to address. This essay reviews work that directly and indirectly addresses this relationship, showing how political elites matter for various aspects of movement culture, like collective identity and framing. It also reviews literature that suggests how movement culture comes to impact political elites. The essay concludes by drawing from very recent scholarship to argue that to best understand political elites and the culture of social movements, we need to think about culture and structure as intertwined and to understand how relations matters in the construction of meaning. Armstrong, Elizabeth, and Mary Bernstein 2008. 'Culture, Power and Institutions: A Multi-Institutional Politics Approach to Social Movements.'Sociological Theory 26(1): 74[ndash]99. This is a very recently published article that advances a fairly complex understanding of the relationship between culture, power, and institutions. The authors conceptualize social movements as phenomena that emerge in a society where power is distributed, enacted, and challenged across multiple institutional contexts. While they review a range of empirical cases to illustrate their concerns about the power of the political process model, they largely focus on gay and lesbian activism to illustrate the application of their 'multi-institutional politics approach'. Davenport, Christian 2005. 'Understanding Covert Repressive Action: The Case of the U.S. Government against the Republic of New Africa.'Journal of Conflict Resolution. 49(1):120[ndash]40. Davenport's article is a good place to think about how cultural aspects of social movements impact repression. He examines how covert intelligence-gathering activities were directed against the Republic of New Africa, a Black Nationalist organization, in Detroit, Michigan and finds that the racial identity of the challengers was a significant factor in determining who was targeted. Importantly, he shows how the identity of groups, along with their strategy and goals, affect the way they are perceived and treated by political elites. Johnston, Hank and Bert Klandermans 1995. Social Movements and Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. This volume remains one of the best edited collections of readings on the relationship of social movements and culture. Top scholars in the field of social movements review the conceptualization of culture in movement studies, cultural processes in movements, and methods for studying culture and collective action. Laraňa Enrique, Hank Johnston, and Joseph R. Gusfield, eds. 1994. New Social Movements: From Ideology to Identity. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. This is an important edited volume in which leading scholars in the field present both case study of movements (for example, of the women's movement and student movements) and theoretical and conceptual assessments of the role of culture and identity in movements. McCammon Holly J., Karen E. Campbell, Ellen M. Granberg, and Christine Mowery. 2007. 'Movement Framing and Discursive Opportunity Structures: The Political Successes of the U.S. Women's Jury Movements.'American Sociological Review 72: 725[ndash]49. McCammon and her co-authors examine factors that explain activists' state-level success in winning women the legal right to serve on juries. One of their key findings is that activists' use of particular frames was more successful when those frames resonated with the current state of legal discourse. In other words, to win, activists must advance claims that resonate with discourse established by political elites. Meyer David S., Nancy Whittier, and Belinda Robnett, eds. 2002. Social Movements: Identity, Culture and the State. New York: Oxford University Press. This is another excellent edited volume that offers essays by leading scholars on the relationship between identity, culture, and the state. Meyer's introduction is particularly useful for the topic at hand, as he points out the ways that state action and polities often create the basis for a challenging group's collective identity. Polletta, Francesca. 1998. 'Legacies and Liabilities of an Insurgent Past.'Social Science History 22(4): 479[ndash]512. In this article, Polletta examines the different ways in which members of the United States Congress commemorate Martin Luther King, Jr., and finds that they most often emphasize King's legacy of community service and institutional politics over disruptive insurgency. For black legislators, however, the story is more complicated, as they must also carefully caution that King's legacy has not been fully realized. Polletta shows that how the culture of movements gets integrated into the discourse of elites is shaped by how elites are situated in a network of relationships[mdash]with other elites, with their own social groups, and with challengers. Social Movementsand Culture http://www.wsu.edu/~amerstu/smc/smcframe.html Sponsored by the American Studies program at Washington State University, this site provides great links to bibliographies, movement websites, and other resources. Speech Prepared for March on Washington, 1963 http://www.crmvet.org/info/mowjl.htm Read the text of Congressman John Lewis' speech at the March on Washington, referred to at the beginning of the article. Sociology Eye http://sociologycompass.wordpress.com/ This website, associated with Sociology Compass, is a great site for thinking about how a range of contemporary issues are sociologically important. Check it out to look for posts related to social movements, culture, and political elites. Though a post may not directly seem to address the issue, oftentimes you can think about the ways in which a discussed subject implicitly tells you something about how the three things relate. Below I provide suggestions for topics and readings that might be assigned in a range of courses, including: a general social movements course, a course focused on social movement culture, or a sociology of culture course with a unit on social movements. McAdam, Doug 1994. 'Culture and Social Movements.' Pp. 36[ndash]57 in New Social Movements: From Ideology to Identity, edited by Enrique Laraňa, Hank Johnston, and Joseph R. Gusfield. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. Swidler, Ann. 1995. 'Cultural Power and Social Movements.' Pp. 25[ndash]40 in Social Movements and Culture, edited by Hank Johnston and Bert Klandermans. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Snow, David A., E. Burke Rochford, Jr., Steven K. Worden, and Robert D. Benford 1986. 'Frame Alignment Processes, Micromobilization, and Movement Participation.'American Sociological Review 51: 464[ndash]81. Williams, Rhys H. 2004. 'The Cultural Contexts of Collective Action: Constraints, Opportunities, and the Symbolic Life of Social Movements.' Pp. 91[ndash]115 in The Blackwell Companion to Social Movements, edited by David A. Snow, Sarah A. Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. Gamson, William 1988. 'Political Discourse and Collective Action.' Pp. 219[ndash]144 in International Social Movement Research, vol. 1, edited by Bert Klandermans, Hanspeter Kreisi, and Sidney Tarrow. Greenwich, CT: JAI. Kriesi, Hanspeter 2004. 'Political Context and Opportunity.' Pp. 67[ndash]90 in The Blackwell Companion to Social Movements, edited by David A. Snow, Sarah A. Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. McCarthy, John D. and Mayer N. Zald 1977. 'Resource Mobilization and Social Movements: A Partial Theory.'American Journal of Sociology 82:1212[ndash]1241. Meyer, David S. 2002. 'Opportunities and Identities: Bridge-Building in the Study of Social Movements.' Pp. 3[ndash]21 in Social Movements: Identity, Culture and the State, edited by David S. Meyer, Nancy Whittier, and Belinda Robnett. New York: Oxford University Press. Rucht, Dieter 2005. 'Movement Allies, Adversaries, and Third Parties.' Pp. 197[ndash]261 in The Blackwell Companion to Social Movements, edited by David A. Snow, Sarah A. Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. Armstrong, Elizabeth, and Mary Bernstein 2008. 'Culture, Power and Institutions: A Multi-Institutional Politics Approach to Social Movements.'Sociological Theory 26(1): 74[ndash]99. Fantasia, Rick and Eric L. Hirsch 1995. 'Culture in Rebellion: The Appropriation and Transformation of the Veil in the Algerian Revolution.' Pp. 144- 159 in Social Movements and Culture, edited by Hank Johnston and Bert Klandermans. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press. Irons, Jenny 2009. 'Political Elites and the Culture of Social Movements.'Sociology Compass 3/3: 459[ndash]74. McCammon, Holly J., Karen E. Campbell, Ellen M. Granberg, and Christine Mowery 2007. 'Movement Framing and Discursive Opportunity Structures: The Political Successes of the U.S. Women's Jury Movements.'American Sociological Review 72: 725[ndash]49. Polletta, Francesca 1998. 'Legacies and Liabilities of an Insurgent Past.'Social Science History 22(4): 479[ndash]512. Skrentny, John 2006. 'Policy-Elite Perceptions and Social Movement Success: Understanding Variations in Group Inclusion in Affirmative Action.'American Journal of Sociology 111(6):1762[ndash]1815. Boudreau, Vincent 2002. 'State Repression and Democracy Protest in Three Southeast Asian Countries.' Pp. 28[ndash]46 in Social Movements: Identity, Culture and the State, edited by David S. Meyer, Nancy Whittier, and Belinda Robnett. New York: Oxford University Press. Cunningham, David 2004. There's Something Happening Here: The New Left, The Klan, and FBI Counterintelligence. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Cunningham, David and Barb Browing 2004. 'The Emergence of Worthy Targets: Official Frames and Deviance Narratives Within the FBI.'Sociological Forum 19(3):347[ndash]369. Davenport, Christian 2005. 'Understanding Covert Repressive Action: The Case of the U.S. Government against the Republic of New Africa.'Journal of Conflict Resolution 49 (1):120[ndash]140. Noonan, Rita K. 1995. 'Women Against the State: Political Opportunities and Collective Action Frames in Chile's Transition to Democracy.'Sociological Forum 10: 81[ndash]111. In what ways do political elites matter for the development of a social movement's culture[mdash]in terms of the development of movement frames, discourse, and collective identity? (You might focus on a particular movement to address this question) How do those same aspects of a movement's culture impact political elites? Can you think of examples in which we can see elites reflecting meaning produced by social movements? What do you think are the most effective ways that social movements can impact political elites on a cultural level? What factors shape the relationship between movement cultures and political elites? What do you think are the best ways to conceptualize "political elites" and "social movement culture"?

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Cultural Approaches to Understanding School Violence

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:52:00 -0700

Although criminologists have long dominated the field of school violence research, there has been a growing body of research by cultural sociologists in this area as well. In many ways, a cultural approach to understanding school violence has taken school violence beyond the realm of just criminal and physical acts of violence. These scholars have begun to examine verbal, emotional, sexual, and racial expressions violence, as well as violence that is perpetuated by institutions, what Bourdieu has called symbolic violence. Courses that take this perspective explore how cultural concepts, or what Swidler calls a 'cultural toolkit', can be used as a lens for analyzing the experiences and practices of school violence. This can include, for example, an examination of how the dominant American ideology of meritocracy and competition can foster fights between middle school students, or how a feminine identity might push girls to be relationally aggressive towards each other rather than physically aggressive. In this regard, cultural sociology broadens our understanding of what constitutes school violence to uncover a wide spectrum of behaviors, attitudes and beliefs that may indeed lead to more overt expressions of violence. In doing so, a cultural approach can also help educators rethink discipline policies that have been created to resolve this social problem. Swidler, Ann 1986. 'Culture in Action: Symbols and Strategies.'American Sociological Review51: 273[ndash]86. Swidler's concept of a cultural toolkit provides a strong foundation for any cultural sociology course. Swidler defines a cultural toolkit as the symbols, stories, rituals, beliefs, ideologies and practices of daily life through which people use to shape their behavior. This paper presents a broad understanding of culture, which Swidler argues is not a unified system, but rather a set of complex and changing concepts from which we select different pieces from in order to construct different strategies of actions. When considering cultural approaches to school violence, it is useful to consider this broad definition of culture. Henry, Stuart 2000. 'What is School Violence? An Integrated Definition.'Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science567: 16[ndash]30. Henry provides a definition of school violence that transcends physical violence and interpersonal violence between students to include psychological, emotional, ethical and moral violence that occurs not only between students, but also includes harm committed by teachers and organizations against students. This latter form of harm can include tracking, school security, sexual harassment, or essentially anything that hinders the creativity, learning and academic success of a student. Henry argues that school violence must include symbolic violence, which he defines as the use of authority, power, and coercion to dominate an individual or group of people. Ferguson, Ann Arnett 2000. Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. Ferguson builds on Bourdieu's concept of symbolic violence and Foucault's theory of disciplinary power to examine an intervention program for 'at-risk' students, which was comprised of mainly 5th and 6th grade African-American males. Her ethnography provides a great example of the benefit of using a cultural approach to studying violence, discipline and punishment in schools. For example, Ferguson argues that fighting among boys should be seen as a symbolic expression of masculinity and a space for boys to do emotional work, as well as a site for the production of power and a form of resistance to authority. Her work also explores how teachers and administrators can enact a form of symbolic violence onto students. She observed how the cultural behaviors of African-American boys, for example, their use of Black English, was often translated by the teachers as 'problem behavior' and resulted in their label of 'Troublemaker'. Such labels often condemned the boys to the bottom rung of the social order and negatively impacted their academic success. Spina, Stephanie Urso, ed. 2000. Smoke and Mirrors: The Hidden Context of Violence in Schools and Society. New York, NY: Rowan and Littlefield. This edited collection examines school violence as a complicated and multi-faceted phenomenon, exploring how political, economic, ideological and discursive practices contribute to school violence. This interdisciplinary book includes chapters from Donna Gaines, Henry Giroux, Peter McLaren, Stanley Aronowitz, and Paulo Freire and Donald Macedo. The authors expand the definition of violence by arguing that youth violence, adult violence and societal violence are all intricately connected, and therefore prevention of school violence would requires educators to move beyond reform that only takes place in the school system. Instead, violence prevention needs to implore a broader strategy for change that includes schools, families, communities, and beyond. Brown, Lyn Mikel 2003. Girlfighting: Betrayal and Rejection among Girls. New York, NY: New York University Press. Mikel Brown conducted qualitative interviews with more than 400 girls from first grade through high school who were from different economic, racial and geographic backgrounds. She begins the book by analyzing the cultural messages that girls receive in the media; messages and images that she argues provide girls with a context for fighting among their peers. She draws on Paulo Freire's notion of horizontal violence to look at how girls' meanness to other girls is a result of their struggle to make sense of gender-saturated images of beauty and heterosexuality that often reinforce their subordinate status in the world. Girlfighting then becomes an avenue to power for young girls in a culture that is rife with sexism. Unlike many other recent books on relational aggression among girls, Mikel Brown interrogates the complicated intersections of race, ethnicity, and class as it relates to girlfighting. Casella, Ronnie 2001. 'Being Down': Challenging Violence in Urban Schools. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Casella's ethnography of Brandon High School, a small city school in a diverse neighborhood in upstate New York, takes a cultural-ecological approach to school violence, capturing systemic, interpersonal and hidden forms of violence. He provides a thoughtful critique of intervention strategies that have been created to deal with school violence, such as peer mediation programs, the use of police officers in the hallways, and D.A.R.E. programs, because these programs only address individual acts of violence and do not account for the realities of urban environments, prejudice, economic injustice and poverty that underlie and contribute to school violence. Merten, Don E. 1994. 'The Cultural Context of Aggression: The Transition to Junior High School.'Anthropology and Education Quarterly25(1): 29[ndash]43. Don Merten has published several articles that provide a useful framework for examining aggressive behavior from a cultural standpoint. The data from this article come from a larger ethnographic project of predominantly middle class students in a suburban area who recently transitioned from elementary to junior high school. Merten argues that middle class culture promotes and celebrates individualism, success and hierarchy, which in turn creates a culture that promotes aggressive behavior among students, because students learn that meanness can be an easy avenue for gaining power and status in the hierarchy of cliques in schools. Morris, Edward 2005. '"Tuck in that Shirt!" Race, Class, Gender and Discipline in an Urban School.'Sociological Perspectives48(1): 25[ndash]48. Morris draws on Bourdieu's classic reproduction theory to look at the relationship between cultural capital and bodily discipline as it relates specifically to clothing styles and manners. This article is based on an ethnographic study of an urban middle school in Texas that recently enlisted a 'Standard Mode of Dress' uniform policy. The regulation of dress became a constant source of conflict between the students and staff at the school, but had the most punitive effect on poor and racially ethnic minority students, whose cultural styles tended to be negatively stereotyped by the teachers. These students were more likely to punished for violating the policy, even though all social class and racial groups, to some degree, violated the policy. This harsher punishment engendered resistance and alienation among the minority students, which Morris argues had the potential of pushing these students away from school, further reproducing the very inequalities that the school was trying to change. http://nces.ed.gov/programs/crimeindicators/crimeindicators2008/ The National Center for Education Statistics puts out an annual report on indicators of School Crime and Safety. The indicators in this report are based on information drawn from a variety of data sources, including national surveys of students, teachers, and principals. The report covers not just overt forms of school violence, such as bringing a weapon to school, fighting, and teacher injuries, but also covers bullying, victimization, student perceptions of school safety, and availability and use of drugs and alcohol. http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/yrbs/index.htm The Youth Risk Behavioral Surveillance System is a school-based survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The survey is conducted every 2 years and provides a representative sample of 9th through 12th graders in public and private schools in the United States. The YRBSS asks a wide variety of questions, but most relevant to school violence include self-reported responses about behaviors that might lead to unintentional injuries and violence, such as carrying a weapon to school, being threatened by a weapon or being in a fight on school grounds. These data serve a useful comparison between student self-reporting of violent behavior and school reporting of incidents of school violence. http://www.sshs.samhsa.gov/default.aspx The Safe Schools/Healthy Students website is a federal initiative by the U.S. Departments of Education, Justice, and Health and Human Services. It provides many useful resources, including links federal reports on school safety, a list of related websites, and video podcast discussions of school violence that can be used in the classroom. http://www.hrw.org/legacy/reports/2001/uslgbt/toc.htm 'Hatred in the Hallways: Violence and Discrimination against Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Students in U.S. Schools' is a report conducted by the Human Rights Watch. Data consists of interviews with 140 students, ages 12[ndash]21, and 130 parents, teachers, administrators and counselors across seven states, in every region of the U.S. The findings discuss a broad spectrum of violent behavior, including verbal harassment, homophobia, and physical violence. It can be useful for classroom discussion because each finding section of the report includes a 'case study' of one of the participants with direct quotes from their interview. http://www.aauw.org/research/hostile.cfm 'Hostile Hallways: Bullying, Teasing and Sexual Harassment in School' is a national report conducted by American Association of University Women on 8th to 11th grade students. The study found that 8 in 10 students experienced some form of harassment during their time in school. Both the executive summary and entire report are available to download on the website. Defining Culture Swidler, Ann 1986. 'Culture in Action: Symbols and Strategies.'American Sociological Review 51: 273[ndash]86. Jepperson, Ronald and Ann Swidler 1994. 'What Properties of Culture Should We Measure?'Poetics 22: 359[ndash]71. Cultural Capital and Symbolic Violence Bourdieu, Pierre and Jean-Claude Passeron 1977. Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. London: Sage. Lareau, Annette, and Elliott B. Weininger 2003. 'Cultural Capital in Educational Research: A Critical Assessment.'Theory and Society 32: 567[ndash]606. Reproduction Theory MacLeod, Jay 1987. Ain't No Makin' It: Aspirations and Attainment in a Low Income Neighborhood. Oxford: Westview Press. Read Chapter 2, 'Social Reproduction in Theoretical Perspective.' Pp. 11[ndash]24 and Chapter 8, 'Reproduction Theory Reconsidered,' pp. 135[ndash]54. Cultural Pedagogy Giroux, Henry 2000. 'Representations of Violence, Popular Culture and Demonization of Youth.' Pp. 93[ndash]105 in Smoke and Mirrors: The Hidden Context of Violence in Schools and Society. Edited by Stephanie Urso Spina. New York, NY: Rowan and Littlefield. Henry, Stuart 2000. 'What is School Violence? An Integrated Definition.' Annals of the American Academy of Political and social Science 567: 16[ndash]30. Watkinson, Ailsa 1997. 'Administrative Complicity and Systemic Violence in Education.' Pp. 3[ndash]24 in Systemic Violence in Education: Promise Broken. Edited by Juanita Ross Epp and Ailsa M. Watkinson. Albany, NY: State University of NY Press. Urso Spina, Stephanie 2000. 'Violence in Schools: Expanding the Dialogue.' Pp. 1[ndash]40 in Smoke and Mirrors: The Hidden Context of Violence in Schools and Society. New York, NY: Rowan and Littlefield Casella, Ronnie 2001. 'What is Violent about School Violence? The Nature of Violence in a City School.' Pp. 15[ndash]46 in Preventing Violence in Schools: A Challenge to American Democracy. Edited by Joan Burstyn. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Elliott, Delbert S., Beatrix Hamburg, and Kirk R. Williams 1998. 'Violence in American Schools: An Overview.' Pp. 3[ndash]30 in Violence in American Schools. Edited by Delbert S. Elliott, Beatrix A. Hamburg, and Kirk R. Williams. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Newman, Katherine 2004. Rampage: The Social Roots of School Shootings. NY: Basic Books. Read Part I, Chapters 1[ndash]3, pp. 3[ndash]76. Merten, Don 1994. 'The Cultural Context of Aggression: The Transition to Junior High School.'Anthropology and Education Quarterly, v. 25 (1): 29[ndash]43. Willis, Paul 1977. Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. Farnborough, England: Saxon House. Newman, Katherine 2004. Rampage: The Social Roots of School Shootings. NY: Basic Books. Read Part II, Chapters 4[ndash]7, pp. 77[ndash]178. MacLeod, Jay 1987. Ain't No Makin' It: Aspirations and Attainment in a Low Income Neighborhood. Oxford: Westview Press. Read Chapter 6, 'School: Preparing for Competition,' pp. 83[ndash]111. Devine, John 1997. Maximum Security: The Culture of Violence in Inner-City Schools. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Read Chapter 1, 'Schools or 'Schools'? Competing Discourses on Violence,' pp. 19[ndash]46. Kimmel, Michael S. and Matthew Mahler 2003. 'Adolescent Masculinity, Homophobia, and Violence.'The American Behavioral Scientist 46(10): 1439[ndash]58. Ferguson, Ann Arnett 2000. Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Read Chapter 4, 'Naughty by Nature,' pp. 77[ndash]99 and Chapter 6, 'Getting into Trouble,' pp. 163[ndash]96. Bender, Geoff 2001. 'Resisting Dominance? The Study of a Marginalized Masculinity and its Construction within High School Walls.' Pp. 61[ndash]78 in Preventing Violence in Schools: A Challenge to American Democracy. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Klein, Jessi and Lynn S. Chancer 2000. 'Masculinity Matters: The Omission of Gender from High-Profile School Violence Cases.' Pp. 129[ndash]62 in Smoke and Mirrors: The Hidden Context of Violence in Schools and Society. New York, NY: Rowan and Littlefield. Eder, Donna 1985. 'The Cycle of Popularity: Interpersonal Relations among Female Adolescents.'Sociology of Education 58(3): 154[ndash]65. Merten, Don 1997. 'The Meaning of Meanness: Popularity, Competition, and Conflict Among Junior High School Girls.'Sociology of Education 70(3): 175[ndash]91. Merten, Don 2005. 'Transitions and 'Trouble': Rites of Passage for Suburban Girls.'Anthropology and Education Quarterly 36(2): 132[ndash]48. Artz, Sibylle 2004. 'Violence in the Schoolyard: School Girls' Use of Violence.' Pp. 167[ndash]90 in Girls' Violence: Myths and Realities, edited by Christine Alder and Anne Worrall. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Morris, Edward W. 2007. ''Ladies' or 'Loudies'? Perceptions and Experiences of Black Girls in Classrooms.'Youth & Society 38: 490[ndash]515. Mikel Brown, Lyn 2003. Girlfighting: Betrayal and Rejection among Girls. NY: New York University Press. Language and Symbolic Violence Ferguson, Ann Arnett 2000. Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Read Chapter 7, 'Unreasonable Circumstances,' pp. 197[ndash]226. Youth Talk about Violence Diket, Read M. and Linda G. Mucha 2002. 'Talking about Violent Images.'Art Education March: 11[ndash]7. Morrill, Calvin, Christine Yalds, Madelaine Adelman, Michael Musheno, and Cindy Bejarano 2000. 'Telling Tales in School: Youth Culture and Conflict Narratives.'Law & Society Review 34(3): 521[ndash]65. Burman, Michele 2004. 'Turbulent Talk: Girls Making Sense of Violence.' Pp. 81[ndash]103 in Girls' Violence: Myths and Realities. Edited by Christine Alder and Anne Worrall. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Obidah, Jennifer 2000. 'On Living (and Dying) with Violence: Entering Young Voices in the Discourse.' Pp. 49[ndash]66 in Smoke and Mirrors: The Hidden Context of Violence in Schools and Society. New York, NY: Rowan and Littlefield. Clothing and School Safety Debates Holloman, Lillian and Velma LaPoint, Sylvan I. Alleyne, Ruth J. Palmer, and Kathy Sanders-Phillips 1996. 'Dress-Related Behavioral Problems and Violence in Public School Settings: Prevention, Intervention, and Policy[mdash]A Holistic Approach.'The Journal of Negro Education 65(3): 267[ndash]281. Stanley, M. Sue 1996. 'School Uniforms and Safety.'Education and Urban Society 28(4): 424[ndash]35. Gereluk, Dianne 2008. 'Limiting Free Speech in the United States.' Pp. 41[ndash]64 in Symbolic Clothing in Schools: What Should Be Worn and Why. New York, NY: Continuum. Brunsma, David L., ed. 2006. Uniforms in Public Schools: A Decade of Research and Debate. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Education. Clothing, School Policies and Symbolic Violence Horvat, Erin McNamara 1999. '"Hey, Those Shoes are Out of Uniform": African American Girls in an Elite High School and the Importance of Habitus.'Anthropology and Education Quarterly 30(3): 317[ndash]42. Morris, Edward 2005. '"Tuck in that Shirt!" Race, Class, Gender and Discipline in an Urban School.'Sociological Perspectives 48(1): 25[ndash]48. Ferguson, Ann Arnett 2000. Bad Boys: Public Schools in the Making of Black Masculinity. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Read Chapter 3, 'School Rules,' pp. 49[ndash]73. This Media Education Foundation film explores the relationship between popular culture and the construction of violent masculinity. Of particular relevance to this class, the film examines how the construction of masculinity relates to school shootings. The film is directed by Sut Jhally and narrated by Jackson Katz. This film could be used in the section Cultural Scripts [ndash] Masculinity. This Media Education Foundation film, written and directed by Sut Jhally, examines the relationship between professional wrestling and the construction of masculinity. The film looks at how wrestling contributes to homophobia, violence against women and bullying in school. This film could be used in the section Cultural Scripts [ndash] Masculinity. This film originally aired on PBS''In the Mix,' a television series created by and for teens. The film examines stereotyping and conflict in schools through the eyes and voices of teenagers attending a diverse suburban high school. This film could be used in the section Cultural Resources [ndash] Language. This PBS Frontline film focuses on Kip Kinkel, who in 1998, at the age of 15, shot his mother and father, and then opened fire at his school in Springfield, Oregon, killing two and injuring 25. He is currently serving 111 years in prison. The film provides an understanding of the tragedy through multiple viewpoints, including interviews with Kip's sister, teachers and psychiatrists. This film could be used in the section Broadening the Definition of School Violence. Written by Tina Fey and based on Rosalind Wiseman's book, Queen Bees and Wannabes: Helping Your Daughter Survive Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and Other Realities of Adolescence, this fictional account of 'mean girls' is a film that most college students will be familiar with. Clips from the film can be used in the section Cultural Scripts[mdash]Femininity to begin a discussion about relational aggression between girls in schools. It can also be used to examine the role that racism and classism play in our public perception of violent behavior, particularly since 'mean girls' in this film tend to be constructed as white and upper class, whereas in contrast, 'violent girls' in film have historically been constructed as poor, young women of color. 1. Social Policy and Intervention. This assignment is intended to get students critically thinking about how educators approach school violence. Have students pick either a national intervention program, such as D.A.R.E., or a local school policy created to deal with school violence. Begin by analyzing how school violence is defined and what type of intervention/prevention is being proposed. Require students to use a cultural approach to understand and critique the policy. In writing the paper, students should consider the following questions. How would a cultural sociologist define violence? What types of violence are missing from this policy? How would this policy be different if it took into account a cultural approach? The book, 'Being Down': Challenging Violence in Urban Schools (2001) by Ronnie Casella provides a good background resource for completing this assignment. 2. Observation Project: Clothing and School Safety. Students will begin by gaining permission to observe at a local middle school or high school. Begin by analyzing the school policy towards clothing. Some schools might have an official uniform policy, whereas others might have policies regarding certain types of clothing (i.e. gang clothing, clothing with profanity, etc.) Next, spend several days observing students in non-classroom settings, like the hallways, cafeteria, bus or playground. Take detailed fieldnotes. Pay particular attention to the clothing that students wear, any discussion made about clothing by either students or teachers, the relationship between clothing and identity, how clothes are used as a site of resistance, and how clothes might cause conflict between students, or between students and teachers. (You may also want to informally interview students about their perception of the school's policy on clothing, how they negotiate rules about clothing, and how they see clothing policies as contributing to conflict and violence, as well as school safety.) As a class, develop a coding scheme for the fieldnotes. Each student will then individually write an analysis paper on the relationship between clothing, conflict, discipline policies, and school violence. 3. Mean Girls: Examining Relational Aggression in Schools. There has been much public attention in recent years to 'mean girls.' As a class, view the film Mean Girls during the course section, Cultural Scripts [ndash] Femininity. As a class, develop an interview guide with about six open-ended questions (i.e. What were your experiences with 'mean girls' in high school? How did you or a close friend deal with being the victim of relational aggression? To what extent did you ever participate in being a 'mean girl'? How did teachers at your school respond to relational aggression between girls?) Next, have students interview six female students using the class interview guide. Students can work individually or in groups to write a paper that compares and contrasts the social construction of mean girls in the film with the actual perceptions of mean girls from their research participants. The analysis should be grounded in the social science research that students are reading on relational aggression.

The Janus-Face of Whiteness: Toward a Cultural Sociology of White Nationalism and White Antiracism

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:51:00 -0700

While the sociological study of white identity has traversed many stages, its most recent turn emphasizes the contextual heterogeneity of whiteness. Because of this increased attention to context and locality, the study of whiteness has never been more amenable to cultural analysis than it is today. Hence, an emphasis on different white racial formations that span a political spectrum from conservative to liberal and racist to antiracist is now dominant. In this vein, white nationalists and white antiracists represent the distinct polarities of contemporary inquisitions into white identity formation. Motivated by this academic milieu, this article first reviews the common perception that whiteness is in 'crisis' and polarizing into antagonistic political projects. Second, the article scans the literature on white nationalist and white antiracist groups, making explicit the relation to cultural theory. Third, the article questions why these two groups are consistently juxtaposed against one another and how such a conceptualization hinders, rather than advances, cultural analysis. Fourth and last, the article advanced a cultural sociological framework for understanding white racial identity formation that neither collapses white identities into a monolithic collective nor reifies white formations as a static typology. Such an approach considers the general processes and contexts which produce 'whiteness' and give it meaning, as well as illuminates the social relationships and practices in which white racial identity formations become embedded.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Transnational Crime and Transnational Policing

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:51:00 -0700

Issues surrounding what has variously been defined as 'global', 'international' or 'transnational' forms of 'organized crime' are a frequent staple of globalization crisis talk and are frequently used to justify the emergence and elaboration of transnational policing capacities. How well does this functional explanation account for these related sets of phenomena? What are the particular organizational and institutional characteristics of transnational policing institutions? What counts as transnational organised crime? How does the apparent dialectic between transnational organised crime and transnational policing relate to broader issues of global governance? How do the practices of transnational policing relate to the structure of global society more generally? Sociological questions about global crime and policing turn out to be fundamental questions about the nature of the world system. Sheptycki, J. (ed.) 2000. Issues in Transnational Policing. London: Routledge, ISBN 0-415-19260-9. This pioneering book opened up the sociology of transnational policing. The book contains chapters by leading scholars in the sociology of policing and is the first to consider the consequences of globalization specific to the institutions of policing. Chapters consider a number of important emerging issues in relation to transnational policing. The introduction attends to the definitions of the book's central terms: 'policing' and 'transnational'. It also provides a typology relating to the field of policing that has had major implications for the understanding of policing accountability under transnational conditions. The first chapter, by Les Johnston, considers the emergence of transnational private security, by mapping the global security market. Chapter two, by Jean-Paul Brodeur, provides empirical insights into the workings of legal due process in complex transnational criminal enquiries raising questions about the accountability structures in the coming 'age of transnational high policing'. Chapter three, by Didier Bigo, traces the emergence of liaison officer networks across the European policing field. Frank Gregory charts the historical rise of private criminality as a matter of international concern in chapter four, while James Sheptycki undertakes a descriptive analysis of the global system for policing money in chapter five. In chapter six, Peter Manning considers various aspects of policing and technology under conditions of transnationalisation, paying some considerable attention to the policing of 'new social spaces'[ndash] that is the rise of so-called 'cyberspace'. Chapter seven, by James Sheptycki, is a concluding chapter which considers the historical case of the 'international war on drugs' held to be the 'paradigm example of transnational policing'. Sheptycki, J. and A. Wardak (eds) 2004. Transnational and Comparative Criminology. London: Routledge, ISBN 978-1-904385-05-9. This book advocates that contemporary criminology be both transnational and comparative. The introduction describes the field of criminology by placing it in a global context. One key question is how academic criminologists can cope with the difficulties of cultural relativism in fostering a comparative and transnational view of the field. The book is broken into four sections. In the first, a variety of comparative studies are considered. Difficulties in measuring trends in comparative crime statistics across national jurisdictions, techniques for doing so and the interpretation of such data are all considered. The use of qualitative data in comparative studies is also considered. The authors advocate the combination of different types of data in a 'second best' approach to the interpretation of transnational and other types of crime. In the second section, a variety of 'area studies' are considered. These are: West Africa, Southern Africa, Singapore, China and Saudi Arabia. These chapters each offer extended transnational and comparative treatment of issues of crime, crime definition and crime control in their respective regions. Section 3 deals with specific transnational crime control issues that have been identified. Four separate chapters consider transnational organized crime, transnational white collar crime, transnational corruption in the EU and international sex-trafficking in the EU. The final section considers transnational control responses to transnational crime and the book concludes with a chapter on reflexivity in the academic study of crime, crime definition and crime control. Goldsmith, A. and J. Sheptycki (eds) 2007. Crafting Transnational Policing. Oxford: Hart Publishing, ISBN-10: 1841137766. The notion that police around the world share a distinctive outlook has been established, as has the assumption that police must co-operate internationally if they are to respond effectively to the crime and insecurity associated with the transnational condition. Yet the possibility of developing a genuinely transnational policecraft seems negligible. It is possible to discuss in ideal terms such notions as transnational ethics, global social justice and the like but what, practically speaking, could be meant by a transnational constabulary ethic? Arguably, the situated nature of policing means that there is no such thing as a common transnational policecraft and hence no possibility of an overarching ethic for the constabulary. Liberal democratic theories of policing are also ill-adapted to the global conditions that are the consequence of prevailing neo-liberal governmental logics. This book presents a collection of essays that are the results of a workshop at the Onati Institute for the Sociology of Law entitled: Transnational Policing and the Constabulary Ethic. It provides descriptive accounts of transnational policing in a variety of regional settings around the world but grounds the analysis in debates about what would constitute good policing under transnational conditions. Sheptycki, J. 2008. 'Transnationalism, Orientalism and Crime.'Asian Journal of Criminology, 3: 13[ndash]35. DOI: 10.1007/s11417-008-9049-0 The article asks the question: how applicable are European and North American criminological theories to the situation in Asia? It takes a transnational and comparative perspective in relating contemporary and historical trends in crime, crime definition and crime control in a variety of Asian countries that comprise the so-called Confucian sphere. It provides a criminological critique of the 'Asian values debate' and, through an analysis of trends in crime, crime definition and crime control in China and Japan, of organised crime across the region, as well as selected examples of state-organised crime, seeks to provide a perspective on the developing criminological discourses of 'the Orient'. The paper argues that, although cultural aspects are important and interesting in understanding the crime situation in the region, ultimately it is changes in politics and governance, economy and society that are most efficacious in explaining current criminological trends and developments. Sheptycki, J. 2007. 'High Policing in the Security Control Society.'Policing 1(1): 70[ndash]9, Oxford University Press. This article considers the nature and practice of high policing in the security control society. It looks at the effects of the new information technologies on the organization of policing[ndash]intelligence and argues that a number of 'organizational pathologies' have arisen that make the functioning of security intelligence processes in high policing deeply problematic. The article also looks at the changing context of policing and argues that the circuits of the security[ndash]intelligence apparatus are woven into, and help to compose, the panic scenes of the security control society. Seen this way, the habits of high policing are not the governance of crisis, but rather governance through crisis. An alternative paradigm is suggested, viz. the human security paradigm, and the paper concludes that, unless senior ranking policing officers [ndash] the police intelligentsia'[ndash] adopt new ways of thinking, the already existing organizational pathologies of the security[ndash]intelligence system are likely to continue undermining efforts at fostering security. Sheptycki, J. 2007. 'Criminology and the Transnational Condition: A Contribution to International Political Sociology.'International Political Sociology 1: 391[ndash]405. This article contributes to international political sociology and the further enhancement of the interdisciplinary study of the global system by introducing the vocabulary of critical criminology into the discourse. It suggests that the contemporary global system is ripe with existential anxieties that are symptoms of momentous historical change and it argues that, for good or for ill, issues of crime definition and control have become central to the transnational condition. As a consequence, criminological theories should be introduced into theoretical discussions about the nature of the contemporary global scene. Such conceptual thinking is vital, given the centrality of the language of criminal threats in the language of global governance and the language of governance globally. The Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces http://www.dcaf.ch/ Small Arms Survey http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/ One World Trust http://www.oneworldtrust.org/ Open Society Institute http://www.soros.org/ The Jack and Mae Nathanson Centre on transnational human rights, crime and security http://nathanson.osgoode.yorku.ca/ The drug policy alliance network http://www.drugpolicy.org/homepage.cfm The European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/html.cfm/index190EN.html The Environmental Investigation Agency http://www.eia-international.org/ Corporate Watch http://www.corporatewatch.org.uk/ I Introduction and overview Definitions, problems and issues: What is policing? What is crime? What do the terms internationalisation, globalisation and transnationalisation refer to? What consequences follow from a world-system without world policing? Outside reading: Castells, M. The Rise of the Network Society, Cambridge, MA: Blackwell (1996). Held, D., A. McGrew, D. Goldblatt and J. Perraon 1999. The Global Transformations Reader. Cambridge: Polity Press. Held, D. 2003. Cosmopolitanism, a Defence. Cambridge: Polity. Sklair, L. 2001. The Transnational Capitalist Class. Oxford: Blackwell. II Issues in comparative criminology What is crime and how to academic criminologists study in comparative perspective? The use and abuse of statistics in understanding crime cross-nationally, cross-culturally and cross-jurisdictionally. The uses of qualitative data in interpreting problems in comparative criminology. The comparative study of crime and the emerging world system. Outside reading: Hofstede, Geert 2001. Culture's Consequences, Comparing Values, Behaviours, Institutions and Organizations Across Nations. Beverly Hills: Sage. Reichel, P. 2007. Comparative Criminal Justice Systems, a Topic Approach. Harlow: Pearson Education. III Issues in transnational criminology What is transnational about transnational crime? How are transnational crime problems defined and prioritized? How are transnational crime problems measured and evaluated? What do we know about the various types of transnational crime? Outside reading: Beare, M. 2004. Critical Reflections on Transnational Organized Crime, Money Laundering and Corruption. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Edwards, A. and P. Gill 2004. Transnational Organised Crime; Perspectives on Global Security. London: Routledge. Reichel, P. 2005. Handbook of Transnational Crime and Justice. London: Sage. IV Issues in transnational policing Who are the transnational police? What is Interpol? What do transnational police agents do? How are transnational policing priorities set? Under conditions of transnationalisation, what is the relationship between law and policing? Outside reading: Anderson, M. et al. 1995. Policing the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Andreas, P. and T. Snyder. Wall Around the West. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Andreas, P. and E. Nadelmann 2006. Policing the Globe; Criminalization and Crime Control in International Relations. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ratcliffe, J. 2004. Strategic Thinking in Criminal Intelligence. NSW: Federation Press. What challenges do researchers interested in comparative criminology face and why? What are comparative and transnational criminology and how are they different? With reference to the contemporary period, can you think of practical elements, themes or questions that are common to both? What is transnational policing and how can it be made accountable to the global commonwealth? What are the practices that feature most prominently in transnational discourses about contemporary policing and how are these understood from a human rights, civil liberties or human security point of view? What does the study of transnational crime and policing reveal about the nature and character of the world system? Based on knowledge acquired from this course, choose a topic in transnational or comparative criminology and create a briefing portfolio. The portfolio will consist of four items: (i) three page statement of purpose; (ii) annotated bibliography; (iii) poster and presentation; and (iv) written essay. As part of the project, students should prepare a poster presentation (approx. 18"× 24") detailing the chosen topic through the display of quantitative and qualitative types of data together with key concepts, case-study vignettes, maps and pictures. Students will give an oral presentation based on their poster and create an annotated bibliography and write a short essay on their chosen topic based on the feedback they receive. Some suggested topics: comparative study of gun-homicide in two or more countries/cultures; comparative study of rape and sexual assault in two or more countries/cultures; comparative student of family violence in two or more countries/cultures; environmental organized crime; policing the global money system; policing and the global drug prohibition regime; controlling piracy on the high seas [ndash] then and now; transnational crimes of the powerful and the powerless; policing, tourism and crime; corporate crime and state crime [ndash] spot the difference.

Social Aspects of Genetic Testing Technologies

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:51:00 -0700

Since the early days of the Human Genome Project, there has been increasing social scientific research that promises to elucidate the social implications, aspects or dimensions of research on human, animal and plant genetics. This paper discusses the literature on the social aspects of different types of genetic testing technologies and their applications in the contexts of clinical medicine, biomedical research, personal and family genealogy, and criminal justice. Although there are many differences in the practices, purposes and organization of these technologies across such contexts, this paper shows that social scientists' understandings of their social aspects centers on individual and collective experiences of how genetic testing technologies operate in practice.

Art Markets, Sociology and the Emotional Art Object

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:50:00 -0700

In its current state the sociology of art markets is characterized by an externalist approach to the analysis of art value in which the art object is the repository of beliefs, judgements given to it by art market actors. However, a review of the literature on art museums poses a challenge to this externalist approach by focusing on the mutually constitutive relationship between the art object, its exhibition and museum context, and viewers. The article reviews this literature exploring the advantages of this line of research for a meaningful sociology of art markets. It will argue for the need to overcome its current externalist focus with studies of the emotional dimension of art market objects as well as of the practices of art market actors.

Documentary at a Crossroads: Reality TV and the Hybridization of Small-Screen Documentary

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:50:00 -0700

Today, as tendencies of popularization and hybridization have fundamentally redefined conventional notions of (small) screen documentary, the genre (re-)emerges as a particularly appealing topic of scholarly research. This article elaborates some of the main strands of the multifaceted debate about these ongoing developments, thereby focusing on the 'reality TV' phenomenon, which is probably the most notable, yet also most controversial embodiment of the shifting that takes place. Discussing key positions regarding the problem of labeling and definition, questions of documentary values, and ethical issues, it is argued that a comprehensive, nuanced approach based on profound conceptualizations as well as empirical research into production and reception contexts are invaluable in making an astute assessment of the popular hybrid documentary.

Teaching & Learning Guide for 'Beauty Work: Individual and Institutional Rewards, the Reproduction of Gender, and Questions of Agency'

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:50:00 -0700

Similar to race, class, and gender, the body is an important signifier that shapes identity, social processes, and life outcomes. In our article, we examine the individual and institutional rewards conferred upon physically attractive individuals and the social stigma and discrimination experienced by the less physically attractive. This body hierarchy is tied in part to the performance of beauty work, including attempts to transform and/or manipulate one's hair, make-up, and body shape or size. We explore these beauty work practices, highlight the gendered nature of this body hierarchy, and situate these practices in debates about agency and cultural structure. Are beauty conformists 'cultural dopes' who buy into an oppressive patriarchal beauty culture that creates docile bodies? Or, are these individuals 'savvy cultural negotiators' who participate in beauty work practices to reap material and psychological rewards? Bordo, Susan. 2003. Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture & the Body. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. A series of essays that examine Western body culture, including media images, weight loss practices, reproduction, psychology, medicine, and eating disorders. In her analysis, Bordo adopts a postmodern feminist interpretation, problematizing the female body as a cultural construct. Davis, Kathy. 1991. 'Remaking the She-Devil: A Critical Look at Feminist Approaches to Beauty'. Hypatia, 6, 21[ndash]43. Drawing on interviews with Dutch cosmetic surgery patients, Davis examines how women account for their decisions to participate in cosmetic surgery and how they view it in light of surgery outcomes. She argues that women actively pursue cosmetic surgery for instrumental reasons including regaining control of their lives, feeling normal, and/or righting the wrong of an ongoing suffering. Dellinger, Kirsten and Christine L. Williams. 1997. 'Makeup at Work: Negotiating Appearance Rules in the Workplace'. Gender & Society, 11, 151[ndash]77. Dellinger and Williams analyze in-depth interviews to understand the reasons why women do [ndash] or do not [ndash] wear makeup in the workplace. Women are negatively sanctioned when they do not wear makeup (e.g. they are questioned about their health or heterosexuality) and are positively rewarded when they do wear makeup (e.g. they are seen as more credible, feel more confident, etc.). The authors argue that such practices ultimately reinforce inequality between women and men, but that individual resistance strategies are unlikely to be successful given the institutional and structural constraints faced by women. Gagné, Patricia and Deanna McGaughey. 2002. 'Designing Women: Cultural Hegemony and the Exercise of Power Among Women Who have Undergone Elective Mammoplasty'. Gender & Society, 16, 814[ndash]438. The authors address two feminist perspectives on cosmetic surgery using interviews with women who have undergone elective mammoplasty. One perspective suggests that women who elect cosmetic surgery are victims of false consciousness whose bodies are disciplined by a male gaze. A second perspective centralizes women's agency; surgery enables women to achieve greater power and control over their lives. They propose a grounded theoretical synthesis, maintaining that surgery can be empowering at an individual level, but can also reinforce hegemonic ideals that oppress women as a group. Gimlin, Debra L. 2002. Body Work: Beauty and Self-Image in American Culture. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Gimlin examines four sites of body work [ndash] the beauty salon, aerobics classes, a plastic surgery clinic, and a fat acceptance organization. Relying on ethnographic and interview data, she discusses women's body transformation efforts and how they negotiate the relationship between body and self. Lovejoy, Meg. 2001. 'Disturbances in the Social Body: Differences in Body Image and Eating Problems among African American and White Women'. Gender & Society, 15, 239[ndash]61. Lovejoy reviews several perspectives on racial/ethnic differences in body image and eating disorders including: (1) a psychometric perspective that focuses on attitudinal and perceptual body image; (2) white feminist perspectives that focus on social control and changing gender roles; and (3) black feminist perspectives that claim obesity is a problem for black women, see eating as a mechanism to cope with oppression, and acknowledge black women's susceptibility to eating disorders. According to Lovejoy, black women's positive body satisfaction can be explained through an alternative beauty aesthetic and the cultural construction of femininity in black communities. Pope, Harrison G., Jr., Katharine A. Phillips and Roberto Olivardia. 2000. The Adonis Complex: The Secret Crisis of Male Body Obsession. New York: The Free Press. In contrast to the many works that focus on women, these authors discuss appearance stereotypes and appearance work related to men and masculinity. While more journalistic than academic in tone (and quality of research design), the authors draw on surveys, interviews, and archival documents to argue that women's entrance into previously masculine arenas (e.g. male-dominated occupations) has led to a sort of 'threatened masculinity.' As a result, men use their bodies to demonstrate masculinity (e.g. increased musculature) [ndash] often through unhealthy behaviors and practices, including steroid use and eating disorders. Weitz, Rose. 2001. 'Women and Their Hair: Seeking Power through Resistance and Accommodation'. Gender & Society, 15, 667[ndash]86. Based on in-depth interviews with women, Weitz shows how women use their hair (style, length, color, etc.) to conform to, resist, and negotiate hegemonic beauty norms, thereby gaining [ndash] or losing [ndash] personal and professional power and other advantages. Weitz's article is particularly useful for illuminating how personal advantages can belie group advantages as well as the limitations of the agency versus docile bodies argument. West, Candace and Don H. Zimmerman. 1987. 'Doing Gender'. Gender & Society, 1, 125[ndash]51. This article introduces the idea of gender as an accomplishment or a performance. Femininity and masculinity, the authors argue, do not automatically follow from biological sex. Rather, males and females perform gender in their daily routines and interactions with others. We 'do gender,' for example, through our appearance, behaviors, speech patterns, etc. Wolf, Naomi. 1991. The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty are Used Against Women. New York: Harper Collins. This book explores the relationship between unattainable beauty ideals and women's social advancement. Examining issues including work, culture, religion, sex, and hunger, Wolf argues that despite increased advancement in the public sphere, women's self-esteem and equality are stymied by the beauty myth and an obsession with body perfection. About Face! http://www.about-face.org/ About Face is an organization whose mission is to equip women and girls with tools to understand and resist harmful media messages that affect their self-esteem and body image. Website contains images of positive and negative advertisements (along with discussion questions and company contact information), further reading suggestions, and links to other organizations dealing with either body image or media literacy. Adios Barbie http://www.adiosbarbie.com/ A website devoted to creating awareness about disempowering cultural messages about bodies, encouraging positive body image, and taking an active role in creating unique versions of beauty and identity. Jean Kilbourne http://www.jeankilbourne.com/lectures.html Jean Kilbourne is an author and lecturer whose works focuses extensively on the depiction of women in advertising. Her website includes recourses for change and postings from organizations with opportunities for individuals to get involved in activities/events that challenge destructive media images. The 'Film & Video' link also includes films on advertising and western beauty culture. Lauren Greenfield http://www.laurengreenfield.com/ Lauren Greenfield is a photographer whose images capture, among other things, the toll of beauty stereotypes and beauty work on women of all ages. Particularly relevant are Greenfield's collections titled Girl Culture and Thin. The website includes photographic images, short films, links to Greenfield's books and films, and further resources, including readings for teens, activists, and educators (including an extensive discussion/exercise guide for Girl Culture). Love Your Body Day Campaign (National Organization of Women) http://loveyourbody.nowfoundation.org/ Website for NOW's annual body-image campaign that began in 1998. Includes activism resources (primarily for college campuses), including a Powerpoint presentation with images and text about how commercial images (with a focus on advertising) affect both women and men ('Sex, Stereotypes and Beauty: The ABCs and Ds of Commercial Images of Women'). Newsweek, Lifetime Spending on Beauty http://www.newsweek.com/id/187758 Interactive graphic, 'The Beauty Breakdown', shows the average cost that women in various age groups spend on beauty products and services. Graphic also includes links on the right-side menu to other Newsweek articles and photo essays related to beauty work. We encourage use of this article in various Sociology, Gender and Women's Studies, and Cultural Studies courses including Introduction to Sociology, Sociology of Gender, and the Sociology of Body. In what ways does your level of physical attractiveness affect how others treat you? How does your race and gender shape your response? Consider various contexts including school, work, gym, church, etc., and how social context might affect social treatment. What are some individual and institutional rewards conferred upon physically attractive individuals? How are physically unattractive individuals stigmatized and treated differently? Why do you think individuals make assumptions and treat people differently based on physical attractiveness? What are some common forms of beauty work practices? Do you engage in any of these practices? Why? Why do you think others engage in these practices? How do practices and consequences differ by gender? By race? By sexual orientation? How is beauty work a gendered double standard? That is, how do beauty work 'obligations' differ for women and men? Also, what are some contradictions women face when they perform beauty work? In other words, what are some of the costs to performing [ndash] as well as not performing [ndash] beauty work? What, if any, forms of resistance are an effective means of social change? Do 'alternative' appearances, i.e., body piercings, scarring, or tattoos, or advertising campaigns such as the Dove Real Body campaign constitute resistance to beauty ideals that promote social change? How might different strands of feminist thought envision social change? Reading Assignment: Beauty Assumptions Select photos of both conventionally attractive and unattractive men and women from various racial and ethnic backgrounds. Select these photos in pairs, varying preferably all but the level of physical beauty, e.g. attractive white woman versus unattractive white woman, attractive black man versus unattractive black man. If possible, use 'before and after' makeover photos. Before students read the assigned article, ask them to rate the person depicted in each photo on various personality characteristics. Use semantic differential scales and pairs such as happy-sad, beautiful-ugly, intelligent-unintelligent, healthy-unhealthy, honest-dishonest, friendly-unfriendly, etc. After students have read the article, revisit their responses. Are there any patterns of assumed characteristics based on level of physical attractiveness? How does race and/or gender affect responses? Use this exercise to transition into a discussion of the article. Journal Assignment: Media and Our Beauty Culture Ask students to examine critically and document observations about the beauty culture that surrounds them. In a week, students should pay special attention to what they see on television. In terms of physical attractiveness, who is depicted on television? Moreover, how do depictions vary by physical attractiveness? What roles do physically attractive individuals play? How are they depicted? Conversely, what roles and portrayals are associated with less physically attractive individuals? Would they see similar depictions in other media such as film, magazines, and the internet? In their write-up, students should also discuss the social meanings and significance of these television depictions. For example, do they think these portrayals affect their views of beauty, their assumptions about others, and how they treat others?

Gender and the Civil Rights Movement

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:49:00 -0700

This study outlines how gender relations and gender differences come into play in the civil rights movement [ndash] the national movement to transform American race relations in the 1950s and 1960s. Social movement scholarship on the civil rights movement emphasizes dramatic mass mobilizations and charismatic leadership, both distinctively masculine enterprises. This emphasis overlooks the subtle and underappreciated dynamics of gender in shaping cultures of protest and resistance. Consideration of gender and gender roles in the private and public spheres provides a more nuanced understanding of protest strategies and the formulation of resistance in direct action. Gendered patterns related to movement participation, mobilization, leadership, strategies and ideologies also bring into focus how local issues shaped regional variations in civil rights initiatives. Finally, gender symbolism and culture deepen our understanding of non-violent direct action as a moral, emancipatory performance, serving to blur the physical boundaries enacted by civil restraint.

Stereotypical Relations and Utterance Understanding: An Introduction to Xu Sheng-Huan's Stereotypical Relation-Based Approach to Pragmatics

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:31:00 -0700

An utterance hardly provides adequate information for its understanding, but the stereotypical relations (SRs) suggested by its linguistic components and mode of expression help to complement the explicitly expressed content, thus making the utterance serve its communicative function. Stereotypical relations are a speaker/hearer's perception and memory of the relations between things in the experiential world. Such relations, once entrenched, are the cognitive device by which humans understand, represent, and express the world. Things in SRs are interdependent; the presence of one entails that of another. Therefore, an utterance implicates the necessary information by SRs to 'fill up' the information gap in the context of communication. Stereotypical relations can be characterized in terms of similarity and proximity, both of which are categories of degree.

Quantified Conditionals and Compositionality

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:31:00 -0700

The interpretation of conditionals in the scope of a quantifier (as in 'No student will succeed if he goofs off') presents a troubling puzzle. Either we are forced to abandon the thesis that natural language obeys the compositionality principle, or we must commit to a semantics for conditionals that involves an uncomfortably high degree of stipulation. This article surveys the recent literature on quantified conditionals and aims to pinpoint the issues that stand in the way of a compositional analysis.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Parallelism and Competition in Syntactic Ambiguity Resolution

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:31:00 -0700

Two metaphors have dominated cognitive psychology throughout its history: 'activation' and 'computation'. Activation (itself metaphorically based on neural firing rate) assumes that representations (mental symbols or patterns of non-symbolic 'nodes') exist at varying degrees of activation, and high activation of a representation amounts to something like perception or recall. Computation assumes that representations are instead constructed from more elementary components, and that a representation does not exist prior to its construction. We examine the differential implications of these metaphors in the domain of sentence comprehension. Most theories that claim the representation of a sentence is something that is activated by input which proposes that multiple representations are at least temporarily activated, and in order for one representation to be selected, it must de-activate the others in a time-consuming process of competition. Theories that claim that the representation of a sentence is constructed, in contrast, have to posit rules for how the input guides construction, but by and large, these theories do not claim that alternative possible representations compete with each other. We review evidence indicating that time-consuming competition does exist in the process of recognizing individual words, but propose that nearly all existing evidence denies competition in the case of sentence comprehension. Clifton, C., Jr., A. Staub, and K. Rayner. 2007. Eye movements in reading words and sentences. Eye movement research: insights into mind and brain, ed. by. R. van Gompel, M. Fisher, W. Murray and R. L. Hill, 341[ndash]71. New York: Elsevier. doi:10.1016/B978-008044980-7/50017-3 This chapter contains an extensive review of experiments on eye movements made while reading sentences, examining a number of questions in addition to the one addressed here, namely, whether the eyes slow down while reading a syntactically ambiguous phrase. Duffy, S., G. Kambe, and K. Rayner. 2001. The effect of prior disambiguating context on the comprehension of ambiguous words: evidence from eye movements. On the consequences of meaning selection: perspectives on resolving lexical ambiguity, ed. by D. S. Gorfein, 27[ndash]43. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. doi:10.1037/10459-002 An accessible review of eyetracking research supporting the existence of competition between alternative meanings of ambiguous words. Elman, J. L., M. Hare, and K. McRae. 2004. Cues, constraints, and competition in sentence processing. Beyond nature-nurture: essays in honor of Elizabeth Bates, ed. by M. Tomasello and D. Slobin, 111[ndash]138. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. This chapter presents an implemented constraint-based model of sentence comprehension, making a clear prediction that time-consuming competition exists during the reading and the resolution of a syntactic ambiguity, and presenting data that indicate that reading is slowed only during the resolution. Frazier, L. 1987. Sentence processing: a tutorial review. Attention and performance XII, ed. by M. Coltheart, 559[ndash]86. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. This is probably the most-cited presentation of the 'garden-path' model discussed in the paper. It predates the full development of constraint-based competition models. Frazier, L. (1995). Constraint satisfaction as a theory of sentence processing. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research 24.437[ndash]68. doi:10.1007/BF02143161 This article presents a variety of criticisms of constraint-based models of sentence processing in addition to the current claim that competition in the region of a syntactic ambiguity is not observed. Green, M. J., and D. C. Mitchell. 2006. Absence of real evidence against competition during syntactic ambiguity resolution. Journal of Memory and Language 55.1[ndash]17. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2006.03.003 Green and Mitchell present an interesting claim that local ambiguity does not necessarily result in competition. The claim seems to be correct, but we argue that it does not plausibly apply to most instances of sentence comprehension. MacDonald, M. C., N. J. Pearlmutter, and M. S. Seidenberg. 1994. The lexical nature of syntactic ambiguity resolution. Psychological Review 101.676[ndash]703. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.101.4.676 This is an important article, advocating the claim that sentence comprehension is much the same as word recognition, and that both are characterized by competition between multiple possible representations. van Gompel, R. P. G., M. J. Pickering, and M. J. Traxler, M. 2001. Reanalysis in sentence processing: evidence against current constraint-based and two-stage models. Journal of Memory and Language 45.225[ndash]258. doi:10.1006/jmla.2001.2773 One of a series of studies indicating that syntactic ambiguity can speed reading rather than slowing it. 1. Assuming the authors' perspective that there is parallel activation of, and competition between, multiple meanings of a word, but not between multiple syntactic analyses, why might this be the case? Are there considerations of efficiency or resource constraints that would give rise to this difference? 2. In what other areas of cognition is there evidence of competition for selection between activated representations, or between response options? 3. The authors suggest that the argument by Green and Mitchell (2006) is implausible because it assumes pre-activation of all possible sentence continuations. Do you agree that this is implausible? Why or why not? 4. In discussing Levy's (2008) proposals, the authors raise the issue of whether processing behavior at the point of syntactic disambiguation is bimodal or unimodal. Why is this important? How could you tell if there is bimodality? 5. Can you think of predictions made by an account of syntactic processing that assumes parallel activation of multiple alternatives, other than the ones discussed in the article? 6. One possibility that is alluded to briefly in the article is that the reading time advantage obtained by van Gompel and colleagues for globally ambiguous sentences may be because of a failure to fully resolve the ambiguity. Do you know of any specific evidence suggestive of this? Can you think of critical experiments that might address this issue? Early Models: Heuristics, Delay The Garden Path (GP) Model Focuses on ambiguity resolution Proposes structural simplicity as primary principle Assumes a separate reanalysis stage when first-pass parsing fails Constraint-Based Models Simultaneous (optimal) use of many information types Parallel activation of multiple analyses Reanalysis as re-weighting or re-ranking The State of the Art Problems for the GP model Evidence for rapid use of non-syntactic information Cases in which parsing preferences do not conform to simplicity metrics Problems for constraint-based models Failure to show reversals of GP-predicted preferences Failure to show evidence of competition during ambiguity (PRESENT REVIEW GOES HERE) Emergence of new perspectives Frequency-based accounts Importance of structural prediction.

The Hydrology of Mediterranean Mountain Areas

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 00:20:00 -0700

The study of the hydrology of Mediterranean mountain areas is especially important, as Mediterranean regions are characterized by unevenly distributed water resources that mainly depend on runoff generated in mountain areas. The objective of this article is to review some characteristic features of the hydrology of Mediterranean mountain areas, mainly based on results from small research catchments (less than 10 km2) mostly in Europe and in the United States of America. In addition, data obtained over the last 20 years from the Vallcebre research catchments (Eastern Pyrenees, Spain) are used to illustrate some of the characteristic features. Investigations show that the seasonal temperature evolution in Mediterranean regions has a direct effect on evapotranspiration dynamics, which, in combination with the seasonal dynamics of rainfall, cause the succession of wet and dry or very dry periods during the year. This seasonality of the Mediterranean mountain climate has a strong influence on the spatio-temporal dynamics of both soil moisture and the water table. The succession of dry and wet periods and the characteristic occurrence of wetting-up transitions between the two increase the complexity of the rainfall[ndash]runoff relationship in Mediterranean mountain areas by triggering a different combination of hydrological processes that depend on catchment wetness conditions. Research that is more process-orientated is needed, using complementary approaches to further update a perceptual model of the hydrological functioning of Mediterranean mountain catchments. Its objective should be to work out more flexible process-based modeling structures, which include the strong seasonality of Mediterranean catchments' hydrology.

Thinking Outside the Box: Engaging Critical Geographic Information Systems Theory, Practice and Politics in Human Geography

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 00:20:00 -0700

Over the past decade or more, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) have been re-imagined and reconfigured through critical GIS research and practice, as scholars and activist have sought new ways of engaging GIS beyond its characterization in the 1990s as a rationalist and rationalizing tool. Where many existing discussions of the contributions of critical GIS have focused on its position and impacts in GIScience, here I review recent work in critical GIS with an eye toward highlighting its contributions and possibilities in critical human geography. This study examines the theorizations, epistemological frameworks, and methodological innovations are enabling human geographers to engage with GIS, cartography, and geovisual methods in their work in creative ways. I begin by unpacking the 'critical' in critical GIS, illustrating how it has drawn upon theory and politics from critical theory to offer a series of key reconceptualizations of GIS and its knowledge-making repertoire. Then, I illustrate the ever-diversifying ways in which critical GIS theory and practice are being woven into geographers' research and activism.

Global Dickens

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 00:20:00 -0700

Intended as a case study in the globalization of literary studies and as part of an effort to help launch the Global Circulation Project under the auspices of Literature Compass, the present essay takes the writings of Charles Dickens as its focus. The essay has three primary goals. First, it recounts the story of Professor Ada B. Nisbet's attempt between the mid-1960s and 1984 to compile and publish an international bibliography of Dickens, one that would examine and analyze the circulation of Dickens's writings not only within Anglo-American literary culture but also in the rest of the world. The essay traces the history of this ambitious project, analyzes the reasons it was never completed, and describes the archive that Professor Nisbet left behind. Second, the essay provides a report, necessarily incomplete, of work published since 1984 and work-in-progress that deals with the global circulation of Dickens's writings. Finally, "Global Dickens" issues an invitation to scholars from around the world to contribute to an ongoing dialogue about the reception and significance of Dickens outside Britain, Europe, and North America.

Sustainable Use of Water from Natural and Social Science Perspectives

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 00:19:00 -0700

Several seemingly incompatible meanings of water coexist today and are implicated in the organisation of sustainable water usage by humans. We review the conceptual basis of the dominating natural science approach to water as a finite resource. This physical approach shows limits relevant for the notion of sustainability. Valuation and interpretation of human[ndash]water relationships as meaningful, which are still widespread in practice and are studied by humanities, appear as irrational under this approach. The natural science perspective is complemented by a second, novel modelling paradigm which is based on a refined notion of behaviour and has been developed in computer science. No single model is superior along the whole water cycle, but the varying influences of living systems along the cycle may require different model abstractions and concepts. The novel extended modelling approach can be formally used to accommodate hermeneutic approaches to the meaning of water typical of social sciences. It organises a systematic 'fact-value-integration' rather than the separation typical of natural science. Hence, traditional and modern approaches to the organisation of sustainable water utilisation can be compared from a consistent and systematic conceptual basis linking natural and social sciences.

From 'Sale to Accession Deed'– Scanning the Historiography of Kashmir 1846–1947

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:43:00 -0700

This article revisits the historiographical context of Kashmir from its sale by British in 1846 to accession to India in 1947. Taking a holistic approach it explores the views of international, Indian, Pakistani and Kashmiri scholarships on crucial aspects of the history of Kashmir in this era. The endeavour would be to expound the paradigm shift in the historiographical writings and explore the major debates and dominant trends that arose in the history of Kashmir during the epoch 1846[ndash]1947.

Pseudo History/Weird History: Nationalism and the Internet

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:43:00 -0700

One of the most important developments in the production of history in the early twenty-first century has been the capacity of 'weird history' or 'pseudo history' to have a large impact on the public sphere. Pseudo history mimics professional history in the way that it presents itself to the public but its arguments defy any reasonable assessment of the evidence. In this paper, we examine the phenomenon of pseudo history through a consideration of its origins in travellers' tales and its current manifestation with particular reference to two practitioners: Anatolii Fomenko and Gavin Menzies. One can attribute much of their popular success to their capacity to appeal to both democratic principles and nationalism, and to make effective use of new media, especially the internet.

Antichrist in the Middle Ages: Plus ça change…

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:42:00 -0700

Throughout the entirety of the European Middle Ages (ca. 500[ndash]1500 C. E.), Christianity functioned as a dominant force in political, social, and cultural matters, replete with figures both natural and supernatural. One of the most fascinating, and widely studied, individuals within the Christian worldview was the Antichrist. An entirely human, yet utterly evil, foil to Jesus Christ within Christian understanding, the Antichrist was the central figure whose advent would begin the various traumas of the Apocalypse and usher in the End Times. Although a terrible and traumatic figure, the Antichrist's humanity is key to understanding him, as the name 'Antichrist' as applied to various individuals appears repeatedly throughout the Middle Ages in response to historic moments of crisis. Modern scholars in the fields of history, art history, and literature have recognized that the Antichrist's mutability is crucial for comprehending him within the medieval context, as he served as a way to call for ecclesiastical reform or to criticize one's political enemies. Scholars recently have begun to take note of medieval approaches to resisting the Antichrist. One of the most important tools at medieval people's disposal was in the form of the occult sciences, such as astrology or alchemy. The Antichrist was thus more than just a shadowy and fearsome figure lurking in the darkness, but proved to be a central figure that drove intellectual, cultural, and religious matters alike during the Middle Ages.

Revisiting the Micro and Small Enterprise Sector in Kenya

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:42:00 -0700

The purpose of this article is to review the state of the literature on the Micro and Small Enterprise (MSE) sector in Kenya to examine how entrepreneurs affect economic growth and development. First, it provides a brief assessment of Kenya's development prospects in the 21st century. Second, it interrogates the literature with regard to some of the theoretical and empirical studies performed on the microenterprise sector in the global south on a general level, and in Kenya, from 1970[ndash]2009. Third, it discusses the important role of women in economic development and entrepreneurship.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Modern Syrian Politics

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:39:00 -0700

This guide accompanies the following article: Raymond Hinnebusch, 'Modern Syrian Politics', History Compass 6/1 (2008). DOI: 10.1111/j.1478-0542.2007.00487.x The study of Syrian politics allows us to engage in multiple debates current in contemporary political science. Syria exemplifies the problematic of nation-building as few states have been afflicted with such a radical disjuncture between territory and identity. As the Syrian state started out as notoriously unstable, its history allows us to understand the techniques and conditions in which stable authoritarian states have been constructed in the third world and Middle East. Syria fits well with the literature on authoritarian persistence and the failure of democratization in the Middle East. In this respect, Syria provides material relevant to topics such as neo-patrimonialism, the role of the military in politics and also single party systems. Syria also provides material for studies of political economy, including such debates as the failure of populist roads to development, agrarian reform, of the role and character of state-bourgeoisies and the difficulties of transition from statist-centred to market economies. Finally, at the level of foreign policies, Syria's role is quite distinctive, considered by some to be a rogue state and by others exemplifying rare defiance of US hegemony and resistance to globalization. While there is a considerable body of literature available in articles, the following are the classic book length studies in modern Syrian studies. R. Hinnebusch, Syria: Revolution from Above (London and New York: Routledge, 2001). An accessible, concentrated and comprehensive overview of modern Syrian history, politics, economy and foreign policy until the death of Hafiz al-Asad. Should be read as a prelude and background to the following more indepth work on particular aspects or periods of the Syrian story. Philip Khoury's two volumes are the classics on the pre-independence period: Urban Notables and Arab Nationalism: the Politics of Damascus, 1860[ndash]1920 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983) and Syria and the French Mandate: the Politics of Nationalism 1920[ndash]1936 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987). Patrick Seale's two volumes, The Struggle for Syria (London and Oxford: RIIA, Oxford University Press, 1965) and Asad: The Struggle for the Middle East (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1988) are highly readable, exhaustively researched and unmatched as histories, the first of the pivotal period of pre-Ba'th political mobilization and the second of the shaping of Hafiz al-Asad and his impact on modern Syria. S. Heydemann's Authoritarianism in Syria: Institutions and Social conflict (Ithaca & London: Cornell University Press, 1999) examines the political economy and class struggle in pre-Ba'th Syria as a way of understanding Syria's path under the Ba'th. I. Rabinovich's Syria Under the Ba`th, 1963[ndash]1966: The Army-Party Symbiosis (New York, NY: Halstead Press, 1972) gives an intimate portrait of the pivotal power struggles that set the course of Ba'thist Syria. Uniquely based on primary documents. N. V. Dam's The Struggle for Power in Syria: Sectarianism, Regionalism and Tribalism in Politics, 1961[ndash]1980 (London: Croom-Helm, 1981) is the most scholarly and well-researched example of the popular "mosaic" interpretation of Syrian politics. V. Perthes'The Political Economy of Syria under Asad (London: I.B Taurus, 1995) is the classic political economy of Syria under Hafiz. H. Batatu, Syria's Peasantry, The Descendants of its Lesser Rural Notables and their Politics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999). The Ba'th state in many ways originated in peasant mobilization. Batatu examines the rural roots of the Syrian regime and its consequneces. For those interested in the details, his book may be read in tandem with the two volume work of R. Hinnebusch on a similar theme, Peasant and Bureaucracy in Ba`thist Syria: The Political Economy of Rural Development (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1989); and Authoritarian Power and State Formation in Ba`thist Syria: Army, Party and Peasant (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1990). E. Kienle, Contemporary Syria: Liberalisation between Cold War and Cold Peace (London: British Academic Press, 1994), examines various aspects of Syria's economic liberalization under Hafiz. F. Leverett, Inheriting Syria: Bashar's Trial by Fire (Washington, DC: Brookings Institute Press, 2005), carries the story forward to the post-Hafiz period. Syrian Studies Association: http://www.ou.edu/ssa/ The professional association of scholars of Syria. Centre for Syrian Studies, University of St. Andrews: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/intrel/css/ Publishes the series, St Andrews Papers on Contemporary Syria, cutting edge research on contemporary Syrian political economy. Syria Comment: http://joshualandis.com/blog/ Extensive resource on contemporary Syrians affairs Syria History: http://www.syrianhistory.com/ An on-line museum of modern Syrian history Creative Syria: http://creativesyria.com/discussion/thinktank.php Opinions by Syria analysts Levant Watch: http://levantwatch.blogspot.com/ Posts news and comment on Syria and Lebanon Syria Daily: http://syriadaily.com News reports on the Middle East and Syria Topic 1: Introduction to Syrian Studies. Focus Questions: What are the main issues in modern Syrian studies?; can rival "schools" or approaches be identified? Readings: R. Hinnebusch, "Modern Syrian Politics", History Compass, 6 (Nov 2007): 263[ndash]285 R. Hinnebusch, Syria: Revolution from above, introduction. Topic 2: From Empire to sovereignty Focus Question: how did Syria's trajectory from empire (s) to sovereignty create challenges for state builders. Readings: P. Khoury, Urban Notables and Arab Nationalism: the Politics of Damascus, 1860[ndash]1920 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983). P. Khoury, Syria and the French Mandate: the Politics of Nationalism 1920[ndash]1936 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987). E. Dawn, "The Rise of Arabism in Syria'', Middle East Journal, 16/2 (1962): 145[ndash]68. M. Muslih, "The Rise of Local Nationalism in the Arab East", in R. Khalidi (ed.), The Origins of Arab Nationalism (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1991), 167[ndash]85. E.Tauber, The Formation of Modern Syria and Iraq (London: Frank Cass, 1995). A. L. Tibawi, A Modern History of Syria (London: Macmillan, 1969). Z. N. Zeine, The Struggle for Arab Independence (Beirut: Khayats, 1960). Topic 3: State and Identity Focus Questions: Discuss the strategies by which Syrian state builders have dealt with the competition to the state from sub and supra-state identities. Readings: J. Gelvin, Divided Loyalties: Nationalism and Mass politics in Syria at the Close of Empire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998). M. Kedar, Asad in Search of Legitimacy (Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2005). M. Maoz, "Attempts at Creating a Political Community in Modern Syria", Middle East Journal, 26/4 (1972): 389[ndash]404. M. Van Dusen, "Political Integration and Regionalism in Syria,"Middle East Journal, 26/1 (1972): 123[ndash]136. R. Hinnebusch, "Syria under the Ba`th: State Formation in a Fragmented Society", Arab Studies Quarterly, 4/3 (Summer 1982): 177[ndash]199. M. Mufti, Sovereign Creations: Pan-Arabism and Political Order in Syria and Iraq (Ithaca & London: Cornell U. Press, 1996). Topic 4: The Rise and Fall of Oligarchic Liberalism Focus Questions: What strategies did post-independence elites and their rivals use to shape the pathway of Syrian political and economical development? Assess the roles of the military and of landlord-peasant conflict in the de-stabilization of the state. Readings: Hinnebusch, Revolution from Above ch 2. R. B. Winder, "Syrian Deputies and Cabinet Ministers: 1919[ndash]1959", Middle East Journal, 16 (August 1962): 407[ndash]429 and 17 (Winter[ndash]Spring 1963): 35[ndash]54. P. Seale, The Struggle for Syria (London and Oxford: RIIA, Oxford University Press, 1965). M. Van Dusen, "Downfall of a Traditional Elite", in F. Tachau (ed.), Political Elite and Political Development in the Middle East (Cambridge, MA: Schenkman/Wiley, 1975), 115[ndash]155. G. Torrey, Syrian Politics and the Military, 1945[ndash]1958 (Columbus: Ohio State University, 1964). S. Heydemann, Authoritarianism in Syria: Institutions and Social Conflict (Ithaca & London: Cornell University Press, 1999). Topic 5: Rise of the Ba'th Focus Questions: Was the rise of the Ba'th a revolution? Assess the different interpretations of the power struggles in the 1963[ndash]70 period? Readings: Hinnebusch, Revolution from Above, ch 3 K. S. Abu Jaber, The Arab Ba`th Socialist Party: History, Ideology, and Organization (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1966). J. Devlin, The Ba`th Party: A History from its Origins to 1966, (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1976). M. Seymour, "The Dynamics of Power in Syria since the Break with Egypt", Middle Eastern Studies, 6/1 (January 1970): 35[ndash]47. G. Torrey, "The Ba`th: Ideology and Practice'', Middle East Journal, 23/4 (Autumn (1969): 445[ndash]470. N. Van Dam, The Struggle for Power in Syria: Sectarianism, Regionalism and Tribalism in Politics, 1961[ndash]1980 (London: Croom-Helm, 1981). A. Perlmutter, "From Obscurity to Rule: The Syrian Army and the Ba`th Party", Western Political Quarterly, 22/4 (1969). I. Rabinovich, Syria Under the Ba`th, 1963[ndash]1966: The Army-Party Symbiosis (New York, NY: Halstead Press, 1972). Topic 6: The Consolidation of the Asad Regime Focus Question: How did Asad consolidate the Ba'th regime? Readings: Hinnebusch, Revolution from Above, ch 4, 5 H. Batatu, "Some Observations on the Social Roots of Syria's Ruling Military Group and the Causes of its Dominance", Middle East Journal, 35/3 (1981): 331[ndash]344. A. Dawisha, "Syria Under Asad, 1970[ndash]1978: The Centres of Power", Government and Opposition, 13/3 (Summer 1978): 341[ndash]354. A. Drysdale, "Ethnicity in the Syrian Officer Corps: A Conceptualization", Civilisations, 29/3[ndash]4 (1979): 359[ndash]373. A. Drysdale, "The Syrian Political Elite, 1966[ndash]1976: A Spatial and Social Analysis", Middle Eastern Studies, 17/1 (1981b): 3[ndash]30. M. A. Faksh, "The Alawi Community of Syria: A New Dominant Political Force", Middle Eastern Studies, 20/2 (April 1984): 133[ndash]153. R. Hinnebusch, Authoritarian Power and State Formation in Ba`thist Syria: Army, Party and Peasant (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1990). M. Kedar, Asad in Search of Legitimacy (Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2005). E. Picard, "Clans militaires et pouvoir ba`thiste en Syrie", Orient, Hamburg, (1979): 49[ndash]62. M. Maox, Asad, the Sphinx of Damascus: A Political Biography (New York, NY: Grove Weidenfeld, 1988). Y. Sadowski, "Ba'thist Ethics and the Spirit of State Capitalism: Patronage in Contemporary Syria", in P. J. Chelkowski and R. Pranger (eds.), Ideology and Power in the Middle East (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1988), 160[ndash]184. P. Seale, Asad: The Struggle for the Middle East (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1988). L. Wedeen, Ambiguities of Domination: Politics, Rhetoric and Symbols in Contemporary Syria (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1999). E. Zisser, Asad's Legacy: Syria in Transition (London: Hurst, 2001). E. Zisser, Decision Making in Assad's Syria (Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 1998). Topic 7: Ba'thist Political Economy Focus Question: Analyze the class content of Ba'thist development strategies and explain their evolution. Readings: Hinnebusch, Revolution from Above, ch 6. A. Drysdale, "The Regional Equalization of Health Care and Education in Syria since the Ba`thi Revolution", International Journal of Middle East Studies, 13 (1981a): 93[ndash]111. S. Heydemann, "The Political Logic of Economic Rationality: Selective Stabilisation in Syria", in H. Barkey (ed.), The Politics of Economic Reform in the Middle East (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992), 11[ndash]39. R. Hilan, Culture et developpement en Syrie et dans les pays retardes (Paris: Editions Anthropos, 1969). R. Hinnebusch, "The Political Economy of Economic Liberalization in Syria", International Journal of Middle East Studies, 27 (1995): 305[ndash]320. R. Hinnebusch, "Syria: the Politics of Economic Liberalization", Third World Quarterly, 18/2 (1997): 249[ndash]256. E. Longuenesse, "La classe ouvriere au Proche Orient: La Syrie", Pensee, 197 (February 1978): 120[ndash]132. E. Longuenesse, "The Class Nature of the State in Syria", MERIP Reports, 9/4 (1979): 3[ndash]11. V. Perthes, "The Bourgeoisie and the Ba'th", Middle East Report, 21/170 (May[ndash]June 1991): 31[ndash]37. V. Perthes, "The Syrian Private Industrial and Commercial Sectors and the State", International Journal of Middle East Studies, 24/2 (May 1992): 207[ndash]230. V. Perthes, The Political Economy of Syria under Asad (London: I.B Taurus, 1995). D. Waldner, State Building and Late Development in Syria, Turkey, Korea and Taiwan (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999). Topic 8: Agrarian Politics and Policy Focus Question: Discuss the change in the Syrian countryside under the Ba'th Readings: F. Metral, "State and Peasants in Syria: A Local View of a Government Irrigation Project", Peasant Studies, 11/2 (1984): 69[ndash]89. Z. Keilany, "Land Reforms in Syria,''Middle Eastern Studies, 16 (1980): 208[ndash]224. R. Hinnebusch, Peasant and Bureaucracy in Ba`thist Syria: The Political Economy of Rural Development (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1989). H. Batatu, Syria's Peasantry, the Descendants of its Lesser Rural Notables and their Politics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999). I. Za`im, "Le probleme agraire Syrien: Etapes et bilan de la reforme", Developpement et Civilisations, 31 (1967): 68[ndash]78. J. Hannoyer, "Grands projects hydrauliques en Syrie: La tentation Orientale", Maghreb-Machrek, 109 (July[ndash]August 1985): 24[ndash]42. Topic 9: State and Islam in Syria. Focus Questions: Why did Islamic revolution fail in Syria? What residue has the struggle of regime and political Islam left on their relations? Readings: U. F. Abd-Allah, The Islamic Struggle in Syria (Berkeley: Mizan Press, 1983). H. Batatu, "Syria's Muslum Brethren", MERIP Reports, 12/110 (Nov[ndash]Dec 1982): 12[ndash]20. R. Hinnebusch,. "State and Islamism in Syria", in A. S. Sidahmed and A. Ehteshami (eds.), Islamic Fundamentalism (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996), 199[ndash]214. T. Mayer, "The Islamic Opposition in Syria, 1961[ndash]1982", Orient, 24/4 (December 1983): 589[ndash]609. H. G. Lobmeyer, Opposition and Resistance in Syria (London: IB Tauris, 2001). I. Weismann, "Said Hawwa: The Making of a Radical Muslim Thinker in Modern Syria", Middle Eastern Studies, 29 (1993): 607[ndash]11. Topic 10: Leadership Succession and Authoritarian Adaptation under Bashar Focus Question: Explain authoritarian persistance and adaptation in Syria (that is, what techniques and conditions have enabled the regime to evade democratization) Readings: R. Hinnebusch, "Calculated Decompression as a Substitute for Democratization: Syria", in B. Korany, R. Brynen and P. Noble (eds.), Political Liberalization and Democratization in the Arab World (Boulder, CO: Lynn Rienner Press, 1998), 223[ndash]240. E. Kienle, Contemporary Syria: Liberalisation between Cold War and Cold Peace (London: British Academic Press, 1994). A. George, Syria: Neither Bread Nor Freedom (London & New York: Zed Books, 2003) Haddad, Bassam., 'Change and Stasis in Syria: One Step Forward[hellip]", Middle East Report, 29/4 (winter 1999). V. Perthes, Syria under Bashar al-Asad: Modernisation and the Limits of Change. Adelphi Papers (London: Oxford University Press for IISS, 2004). D. Lesch, The New Lion of Damascus: Bashar al-Asad and Modern Syria (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005). F. Leverett, Inheriting Syria: Bashar's Trial by Fire (Washington, DC: Brookings Institute Press, 2005). E. Zisser, "Bashar al-Asad and his Regime [ndash] Between Continuity and Change", Orient, 45/2 (June 2004): 239[ndash]256. E. Zisser, Commanding Syria: Bashar al-Asad and the First Years in Power (London: I.B. Taurus, 2006). S. Abboud, "The Transition Paradigm and the Case of Syria", in Syria's Economy and the Transition Paradigm (St Andrews: St Andrews Papers on Contemporary Syria, 2009), 3[ndash]31. Topic 11: Syrian Foreign Policy Focus Question: Discuss the Determinants of Syrian Foreign Policy Readings: Hinnebusch, Revolution from Above, chapter 7. P. Seale, Asad: The Struggle for the Middle East (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1988). A. Dawisha, 'Syria's intervention in Lebanon, 1975[ndash]1976', Jerusalem Journal of International Relations, 3/2[ndash]3 (1978): 245[ndash]64. A. Drysdale and R. Hinnebusch, Syria and the Middle East Peace Process (New York, NY: Council on Foreign Relations Press, 1991). A. Ehteshami and R. Hinnebusch, The Syrian-Iranian Alliance: Middle Powers in a Penetrated Regional System (London, Routledge, 1997). E. Chalala, "Syrian Policy in Lebanon: 1976[ndash]1984: Moderate Goals and Pragmatic Means", Journal of Arab Affairs, 4/1 (Spring 1985): 67[ndash]87. H. Cobban, The Israeli-Syrian Peace Talks: 1991[ndash]96 and Beyond (Washington, DC: U.S. Institute of Peace Press,1999). Imagine you are advisor to President Bashar al-Asad. Write a report recommending reforms necessary to revive Syria's economy. This report must be practical, not purely theoretical, in that it takes account of Syria's political and social realities, the historically constructed norms shared between leaders and public, and the constraints, resources and opportunities perceived by policy-makers.

Transportation, Communication, and the Movement of Peoples in the Frankish Kingdom, ca. 500–900 C.E

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:39:00 -0700

As historians and archeologists continue to debate the volume of commercial traffic in Western Europe following the disappearance of Roman imperial rule, it has become increasingly clear that an infrastructure of transportation and communication continued to facilitate travel and the movement of people in this period. This is particularly apparent in the Frankish Kingdom between the sixth and tenth centuries. Relying to a substantial degree on technology and routes inherited from the Roman past, the Franks employed this communication infrastructure for purposes dictated by entirely contemporary concerns. Recent scholarship has demonstrated conclusively that commerce was far from the only motivation for travel in the Frankish Kingdom, and that the diversity of means and motives for communication is indicative of a mobile society.

Gender and Sexuality in the North American Borderlands, 1492–1848

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:38:00 -0700

Borderlands history has traditionally been dominated by the masculine concerns of warfare, politics, and diplomacy, but in the past two decades, women's and gender historians have produced studies that reveal that gender and sexuality were central to all colonial North American borderlands encounters among and between Native Americans and Europeans. This new scholarship argues not just for the importance of women in borderlands societies, but for the importance of looking at gender identities, work roles, and sexual and marriage practices, and the role all of these things played in intercultural contact and conflict. Scholars interested in gender and sexuality should take a broadly comparative approach in this field, because of the striking similarities as well as important differences that emerge with a continental perspective.

Recent Research into the History of Early Shi'ism

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:38:00 -0700

This article examines some of the scholarship on early published in the last decade in English, French and German. Particular emphasis is paid to the emergence of the majority trend, its self-definition and the development of doctrinal unity. Any social or political history of early will inevitably be partial as the division between these categories of analysis and the intellectual development of dogma and doctrine is somewhat artificial when considering early Islam. The emergence of a dogmatic orthodoxy is linked with both the production of a distinctive identity and the subsequent or Twelver tradition of thought.

Quantifiers and Discourse Processing

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 23:09:00 -0700

Quantifiers are ubiquitous in natural language and, in addition to providing information about quantity, they serve important discourse functions. We outline several theoretical accounts of the functions that quantifiers perform in a discourse and the factors governing their interpretation, focusing on two specific topics that have received substantial attention from researchers working in linguistics and psychology. The first topic concerns the interpretation of pronominal anaphora in different quantification contexts, and we review evidence showing that the focusing effects of positive and negative quantifiers license different patterns of pronominal reference. The second topic concerns the interpretation of quantifiers that function as anaphors in a discourse, and we consider recent experimental evidence in relation to two current and highly influential theories of semantic interpretation.

The Crisis in the Investiture Crisis Narrative

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 22:55:00 -0700

Recent research has undermined the connection between lay investiture and the iconic event usually seen as the most dramatic expression of the investiture conflict: the encounter of Pope Gregory VII and King Henry IV of Germany at Canossa. This is just one, however, of many interpretive problems plaguing historical narratives of the investiture crisis. This essay briefly summarizes the classic interpretations that have dominated 20th-century understanding of these events and sets out the major problem raised in more recent research. Arguing that a new interpretive framework is necessary, the author suggests two paths forward: a radical reconsideration of the papacy from a truly post-confessional perspective and a reevaluation of the conflict in the context of new understandings of lordship and political change.

Defining Prostitution and Redefining Women's Roles: The Colonial State and Society in Early 19th Century India

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 22:55:00 -0700

The seismic shifts in Indian society which took place over the course of the 19th century have been the focus of a number of studies in recent years. These changes permanently altered the lives and livelihoods of many groups across the socioeconomic spectrum. Among the most dramatically affected were those women who would come to be categorised as 'prostitutes'. Prior to their inclusion in the category of 'prostitute', the women ranged from temple dancers, erudite courtesans and (monogamous) concubines to those women who come closest to our contemporary understanding of 'prostitute'[ndash] working as they did in bazaars or cantonments as sex workers. Yet, in the century before, very few of these groups of women would have considered themselves to be of 'ill-repute'. These ideas about 'morality' and 'prostitution' in India were not simply adopted from Europe. Instead, they were born out of a complex process of contestation and negotiation across the subcontinent, involving various parties, from army surgeons to pandits. As this article will argue, analysing the conditions which prompted these changed categories is as important as understanding the political and social implications of the practice of prostitution in India and the empire.

People Use their Knowledge of Common Events to Understand Language, and Do So as Quickly as Possible

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 23:52:00 -0700

People possess a great deal of knowledge about how the world works, and it is undoubtedly true that adults use this knowledge when understanding and producing language. However, psycholinguistic theories differ regarding whether this extra-linguistic pragmatic knowledge can be activated and used immediately, or only after a delay. The authors present research that investigates whether people immediately use their generalized knowledge of common events when understanding language. This research demonstrates that (i) individual isolated words immediately activate event-based knowledge; (ii) combinations of words in sentences immediately constrain people's event-based expectations for concepts that are upcoming in language; (iii) syntax modulates people's expectations for ensuing concepts; and (iv) event-based knowledge can produce expectations for ensuing syntactic structures. It is concluded that theories of sentence comprehension must allow for the rapid dynamic interplay among these sources of information.

The Travels of Naturalism and the Challenges of a World Literary History

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:55:00 -0700

The history of the naturalist novel reveals shortcomings of recent proposals for the study of world literature, such as those of Franco Moretti and Pascale Casanova. After a naturalist esthetic coalesced in France in the 1860s naturalist schools appeared around the world. Contrary to what models of diffusion predict, naturalism flourished in distant parts of the world at the same time as its triumph in Europe, while writers nearer France rejected it. The examples of naturalism in Argentina, Brazil, Japan, China, and Korea, reveal multiple, overlapping histories that make up the heterogeneous planetary history of the form. Naturalism's movement was aided by its association with non-fictional genres such as criminology, and flourished where other forms of realistic fiction were not well established. Even when naturalism bore the standard for realism, however, it formed unexpected alliances with other esthetics and shifted its associations with non-fictional genres. Rather than focusing on the origination and reception of forms such as the naturalist novel, studies of world literature should focus on the conditions of travel through which such unexpected transformations occur.

New Approaches to the Work of Robert Herrick

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:55:00 -0700

The new edition of Robert Herrick's works Hesperides and His Noble Numbers will enable readers to study the poems he circulated in manuscript alongside printed versions of the same poems. As scholarly work continues on the intersection of print and scribal culture in the 17th century in general and in relation to Stuart lyric poetry in particular, there is increasing interest in examining how the technologies of manuscript and print affect the composition of poetry. Herrick is one of first poets personally to gather and rework his verses for print but does so having spent three decades circulating his poems exclusively in manuscript. An analysis both of individual poems and of his entire printed collection reveal that Herrick's revisions and the order and structure of his book are heavily influenced by the scribal method of serial composition and by 17th-century readers' habits of compiling poetry into verse miscellanies. Both discoveries challenge the tendency to consider Herrick's printed versions as invariably representing his final intention for his poetry and suggest that Hesperides as a whole work should be read as participating in the trend for compiling verse miscellanies in both manuscript and print between the 1620s and 1650s.

The Study of Affect and Romanticism

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:55:00 -0700

What follows is a review essay in two parts: the first, a consideration of the general problem affect poses for literary criticism and for romantic studies in particular; the second a review of some recent, outstanding work on affect and its significance to Romanticism. The problem of affect derives primarily from the difficulty of defining or locating affect and from its equivocal relationship to modern science [ndash] as both an object of scientific scrutiny and as an emblem of the pseudo- or even unscientific. The articles and books discussed in the second half of this review handle this problem in sophisticated and surprising ways, unlocking the critical possibilities available when we read affect with less skepticism and more self-reflection.

Critic Provocateur

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:55:00 -0700

Analyzing the importance of various kinds of critical provocation and polemics to Middle English Literary Study, this essay argues for a need to assess, rather than simply repudiate, the work of our critic provocateurs.

Energy, Climate Change, Meat, and Markets: Mapping the Coordinates of the Current World Food Crisis

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:51:00 -0700

The widely used metaphor of a perfect storm identifies the world food crisis as a contingent event that will end when food prices decline. The problem is one of supply and demand. The solution is a technological fix focused upon increasing the productivity of small farmers through a second green revolution and integrating them into markets. An international political economy/ecology approach to the food crisis reveals that the food crisis is a predictable outcome of an oil-dependent feedgrain[ndash]livestock complex supplying a meat-centric diet for those who can buy it. This complex contributes substantially to climate change and is framed by neoliberal development policies, which deepen the commoditization of food, monetize food security and leave the world's people vulnerable to periodic food price spikes. The food crisis is linked to energy, climate change, the financial crisis and a socially and environmentally unsustainable grain[ndash]livestock complex and must be analyzed and addressed in its relational position to these other crises.

Spaces of Work and Everyday Life: Labour Geographies and the Agency of Unorganised Temporary Migrant Workers

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:51:00 -0700

In this study, I focus on the agency of unorganised temporary migrant workers [ndash] people who travel away to work for just a few weeks or months. Such workers have been relatively neglected in labour geography. Perhaps surprisingly, given the focus on the agency of capital in much of his writing, I build on two arguments made by David Harvey. First, workers' spatial mobility is complex and may involve short as well as longer term migrations, and secondly that this can have significance both materially and in relation to the subjective experience of employment. The spatial embeddedness of temporary migrant workers' everyday lives can be a resource for shaping landscapes (and ordinary histories) of capitalism, even though any changes may be short-lived and take place at the micro-scale. The article is illustrated with case study material from research with workers in the agriculture sector in India and the UK, and concludes with more general implications for labour geographers engaged with other sectors and places.

The Textual Criticism of Middle English Manuscript Traditions: A Survey of Critical Issues in the Interpretation of Textual Data

Tue, 06 Oct 2009 02:51:00 -0700

This essay is intended to survey two broad issues which determine the use of textual data. The first is the underlying orientation towards the use of textual data and how this relates to critical evaluations of agency, authority and materiality. This essay surveys two broad orientations: (i) an essentially retrospective genetic orientation and, (ii) an orientation which focuses on the phenomenon of change. Both approaches are dependent on the ability to distinguish original readings from scribal readings, identify genetic relationships and account for acts of horizontal transmission. With this in mind, the second issue with which this essay is concerned is the importance of critical interpretation in the categorisation of textual data. This essay argues that textual criticism is a practical demonstration of the difficulties of interpretation and that no textual data 'has any real evidential value until it has been interpreted' (Patterson 90).

The Geopolitics of Disease

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 22:29:00 -0700

This article reflects on the increasing use of the term geopolitics in discussions of disease. It notes that although the term geopolitics has been used increasingly often, its precise meaning has not received sustained attention. Neither has it been conceptualized in relation to the extensive literature in critical geopolitics. To lay the groundwork for a more considered understanding of geopolitics in relation to disease, the article elaborates upon the senses in which geopolitics has been invoked in recent literature and links them with themes in critical geopolitics. It identifies three intersecting themes, in connection with which issues of geopolitics have been raised: the spatialization of governance, biopolitics and transnational political economies. In discussing these themes, the article identifies a number of questions and avenues for further research. Overall, it argues that there is considerable scope to investigate further the ways in which disease becomes geopolitical. In conclusion, the article raises a series of questions that may serve to connect research on the geopolitics of disease with debates taking place in and around critical geopolitics and geography more generally.

Blending History with Geographic Information System Technology: Using USS Arizona GIS Data to Engage Students in Technology and History of the Pearl Harbor Attack

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 22:28:00 -0700

As we rely more and more heavily on technology in our teaching methods, utilizing Geographic Information Systems (GIS) has become increasingly commonplace for instructing students how to interact successfully with scientific data and data analysis tools. With students' increasing fascination with technology such as GIS, there is a unique opportunity to incorporate spatial learning techniques with more qualitative subjects such as history. The applied history techniques described in this study represent a creative methodology that can be used at several teaching and learning levels. In this study, I review a recently completed GIS dataset of the USS Arizona completed by a dual effort of the Park Service and Northrop-Grumman Mission Systems. This dataset is used in a successful case-study approach to integrating historical simulation techniques of the Pearl Harbor Incident with learning to analyze spatial data in a GIS environment.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Sustainable Development and Environmental Justice in African Cities

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 22:28:00 -0700

This piece aims at analyzing reasons why the study of Africa's cities and the practice of urban planning on the continent are so full of 'sustainable development' rhetoric and comparatively silent on questions of social and environmental justice. I use case studies from two countries with significant bibliographies of urban geographical research, South Africa and Tanzania, to examine this puzzle. A related absence to that of environmental justice analysis is that of the literature of urban political ecology, which often incorporates critical analysis of environmental justice. To date, with some exceptions [ndash] most being in South Africa [ndash] few scholars have used an urban political ecology approach in African cities. South Africa also represents virtually the only country on the continent with an extensive movement for and literature about specifically urban environmental justice. Tanzania, like almost every other African country, places major rhetorical emphasis on sustainable urban development in planning, and most scholarship has followed suit, absent discussion about urban social or environmental justice. I trace the path by which sustainable urban development (SUD) came to predominate, as it does even in South Africa. I highlight the major roles of the World Bank, the United Nations, and Western donors in setting the urban agenda in Africa as the principal reason for the neoliberal SUD approach's domination. South Africa's rights-based development agenda, compared with the long history of state control over civil society in Tanzania, are central to the contrasting outcomes in the case studies. This topic is important to the field because the time is ripe for urban political ecology research on urban environmental justice in sub-Saharan African cities outside of South Africa to contribute to urban geography. It is also a valuable article for its encouragement of cross-fertilization and comparative research between and among different African countries on urban geography. Collaborative visioning: a contemporary strategy or method for urban planning that engages the general public as 'stakeholders' (see below) to work with urban decision-makers in forums designed to create a vision for a city's future growth and goals. Privatization: the process by which the provision of urban services, meaning such things as water supply, sewerage, solid waste collection and deposition, and road management, is transferred from government institutions to private companies. Stakeholder democracy: refers to circumstances of governance in which those deemed to be central to urban issues as important leaders from among the citizenry, civil society, community and neighborhood associations, private sector companies and government organizations (i.e. the stakeholders) collaborate to form collectively derived plans for urban management and growth, all the while responsive to the voting public. Sustainable urban development: an agenda for bringing the loosely understood balance between environmental management and economic growth (i.e. sustainable development) to the fore in urban planning. Urban environmental justice: the cause of reducing the politically (and often racially) charged social inequalities in distribution of the negative environmental externalities (e.g. pollution, toxic wastes, erosion, flooding, etc.) from urban development. Urban political ecology: an emerging school of though seeking to see urban environmental degradation in terms of political, economic, cultural, or historical dimensions and not simply ecological ones. Kombe, W. (2005). Land use dynamics in peri-urban areas and their implications on the urban growth and form: the case of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Habitat International 29, pp. 113[ndash]135. A detailed empirical analysis of urban land development failings in Tanzania. McDonald, D. (2002). What is environmental justice? In: McDonald, D. (ed.) Environmental justice in South Africa. Cape Town, South Africa: UCT Press, pp. 1[ndash]48. A useful introduction to environmental justice research and activism as applied to South Africa. The Municipal Services Project website, at http://www.queensu.ca/msp/. The MSP has focused a critical eye on sustainable urban development planning and the privatization of urban services in South Africa, with more recent working expanding the analysis across Sub-Saharan Africa and into other regions of the developing world. Njeru, J. (2006). The urban political ecology of plastic bag waste problem in Nairobi, Kenya. Geoforum 37, pp. 1046[ndash]1058. A rare example of urban political ecology analysis in Africa outside South Africa. Patel, Z. (2006). Of questionable value: the role of practitioners in building sustainable cities. Geoforum 37, pp. 682[ndash]694. A very well reasoned critique of SUD in South Africa. Visser, G. (2004). Social justice, integrated development planning and post-apartheid urban reconstruction. Urban Studies 38, pp. 1673[ndash]1699. A valuable theoretical analysis of the meaning of justice and implications of defining it for urban planning policy. SCP Documentation Series n. 3: The Sustainable Dar es Salaam Project 1992[ndash]2003. UN-Habitat's assessment of the pilot city's results, available for downloading at: http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/getPage.asp?page=bookView&book=1809 The Sustainable Cities Programme in Zambia (1994[ndash]2007), Addressing the challenges of rapid urbanization. UN-Habitat's excellent analysis of its own program's strengths and weaknesses in its second country of operation. Available for downloading at: http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/getPage.asp?page=bookView&book=2646 Are collaborative visioning, stakeholder democracy and privatization approaches capable of producing effective planning results in African cities? What other impediments might exist to the expansion of urban environmental justice advocacy, activism or research in Africa, thinking about other African countries beyond South Africa and Tanzania? To what extent are there correlations between racial justice, social justice and environmental justice in your community? What roles should donors have in urban environmental planning in Africa? Discuss Crespin's argument in the quotation: 'poverty cannot be tackled without addressing problems of power relations and the cultural and social interests that sustain unequal access to economic opportunity and social resources'. Do you agree or disagree with her? Why or why not? Sustainable development as a key theme, applied to urban areas of the developing world. The roles of the World Bank, United Nations and Western donors in setting development agendas. Neoliberal development and neoliberal good governance rhetoric in African development. Urban environmental justice and sustainable urban development in South Africa as a case study. Tanzania as a case study of sustainable urban development. Comparative urban development and urban environmental planning in Africa.

Jihad on the Frontier: A History of Religious Revolt on the North-West Frontier, 1800–1947

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Jihad is an idea and phenomenon receiving increasing popular, policy and scholarly attentions. The current violence in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, encompassing much of its borderlands with Afghanistan, is often depicted as a jihad, with many linking it to a larger global 'war on terror'. Yet religious, or rather rhetorically religious violence has a long history on the Frontier. From at least the advent of British administration in the region in the nineteenth century, there have been repeated jihads against the intrusions of colonial authority, often in the same places with a similar cast of characters. But violence on the Frontier is more than some simplistic outbreak of religious bigotism. This article explores the issues raised by the repeated episodes of jihad on the Frontier and the literature addressing its occurrence.

The Xhosa Cattle-Killing Movement in History and Literature

Sun, 27 Sep 2009 23:59:00 -0700

In South Africa's Eastern Cape frontier zone, a millenarian movement known as the Xhosa Cattle-Killing (1856[ndash]1857) devastated local populations and stunned observers. How could the messages of its prophetess, Nongqawuse, and the exhortations of her uncle, Mhlakaza, lead to the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of cattle, to the death of tens of thousands of people, and to the subjugation of the Xhosa? Historians and authors of literary works have attempted to answer this question, and their explanations have followed the contours of South African history through three general phases. The first (1857[ndash]1947) characterized the movement as a failed revolt against British expansion and a necessary step in social and religious Darwinism. The second period (1948[ndash]1988) saw the continuation of these interpretations, and, with National Party rule and the rise of the Black Consciousness Movement, an increasingly radical group of historians brought about politicized and alternative interpretations embedded in Xhosa oral history. The third phase (1989[ndash]) began with the publication of Jeff Peires'The Dead Will Arise, which renewed interest in the history and has inspired a new wave of historical critique.

Actions Can Speak as Loud as Words: Measuring Behavior in Psychological Science

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:20:00 -0700

It has been argued that there is a growing trend in personality and social psychological science concerning the preference of self-report measures over the use of direct observations of behavior for the outcome variables of interest. Augmenting the use of self-reports with measures of behavior helps achieve methodological pluralism that allows researchers to triangulate on the phenomenon of interest and have increased confidence in understanding the phenomenon. To facilitate this process, we discuss a sample of social psychological and personality studies published during APA's 'Decade of Behavior' that use straightforward and innovative ways of measuring behavioral outcome variables. Specifically, we identify three different strategies for incorporating behavior in a study: behavioral traces, behavioral observations, and behavioral choice. In each case, we show how measures of behavior complement self-report measures. By making a conscientious effort to include more behavior measures in our research, we can broaden the appeal of psychological science by enhancing our understanding of the causes and antecedents of human behavior.

Lay Psychology and the Social Value of Persons

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:19:00 -0700

Personality traits are basic constructs of lay psychology. Unlike the traditional view in which traits are considered as descriptive tools, we argue that the most frequent traits are evaluative criteria, that is, they do not point out what people are, but what people are socially worth. First, we intend to report on various studies showing that traits can be viewed as generalizations of affordances in social relations: traits supply information not only on what people are doing, but also, and several times more, on what is possible to do with people. Second, we challenge the dominant view underlying social judgments by showing that the two traditional factors can be viewed as aspects of the social value of persons. We called them social desirability and social utility. We shall show that the two dimensions intervene in situations in which social value of the person is engaged. To finish, we shall address the link between these dimensions with some aspects of individualism.

On the Relationship between Social Capital and Individualism–Collectivism

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:19:00 -0700

Both social capital and individualism[ndash]collectivism (IC) have been, and still are, popular and well-researched constructs in social sciences. Many theorists have argued that individualism poses a threat to social cohesion and communal association. Other researchers believe that growth of individuality, autonomy, and self-sufficiency are necessary conditions for the development of social solidarity and cooperation. The present article reviews the studies on the relationship between social capital and IC, using different data and different measures. We conclude that countries with higher level of social capital (where people believe that most people can be trusted) are also more individualistic, emphasizing the importance of independence, personal accomplishments, and freedom to choose one's own goals. In societies where trust is limited to the nuclear family or kinship alone, people have lower levels of social capital. Social capital increases as the radius of trust widens to encompass a larger number of people and social networks, bridging the 'gap' between the family and state.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: The Nature of Contemporary Prejudice: Insights from Aversive Racism

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:19:00 -0700

Intergroup bias is one of the most actively researched topics in the field of social psychology. Hundreds of books and thousands of research articles have addressed this issue over more than half a century. Although the psychological roots of blatant prejudices are well documented, the development of more subtle and often unintentional forms in societies in which its expression is discouraged poses new and unique challenges to the pursuit of justice and equality in contemporary society. Our interests in the psychological underpinnings of prejudice as researchers and educators are both practical and conceptual. On the practical side, understanding the nature of contemporary forms of prejudice has clear implications for developing effective techniques for combating bias and discrimination. In 1967, nearly 3 years after the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, race riots in the United States prompted the Kerner Commission to investigate the sources of racial tension. Upon the conclusion of its investigation, the commission cited White America's failure to assist Blacks in need, rather than actively trying to harm Blacks, as a primary cause of racial disparities and, ultimately, civil unrest (Report of the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, 1968). Indeed, it was research on the differential helping behavior of politically liberal Whites toward Black and White motorists who were stranded on a highway that represented the first empirical work on aversive racism (Gaertner, 1973). Considerable subsequent research on aversive racism has revealed that the consequences of subtle bias can be as severe and pernicious as those of blatant prejudice. Conceptually, the complexities of contemporary forms of prejudice and recent advances in techniques and tools for studying non-conscious biases make this research area an exciting and challenging one. We hope that this guide can help orient educators to the many excellent resources that exist and convey our enthusiasm for exploring what psychological methods and theories can contribute to understanding one of the most challenging social issues faced in contemporary society. Allport, G. W. (1954/1979). The Nature of Prejudice (25th anniversary edition). Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. A classic text by one of the most influential prejudice scholars of the 20th century. Dovidio, J. F., Glick, P., & Rudman, L. A. (Eds.). (2005). On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years after Allport. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Organized around Allport's central themes, this edited volume commemorates the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Gordon Allport's classic work by examining the current state of knowledge in the field. Renowned international scholars review recent developments and share their insights into where the next few decades may take us. Certain to be a future classic! Devine, P. G. (1989). Stereotypes and prejudice: Their automatic and controlled components. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,56, 5[ndash]18. A seminal article that demonstrates both automatic and controlled components of stereotyping. The first series of studies to show that racial stereotypes are activated automatically upon perceiving a person's group membership. Also one of the first papers to use indirect cognitive methods (e.g., subliminal priming) to assess stereotypic group judgments. Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. L. (2004). Aversive racism. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology (Vol. 36, pp. 1[ndash]51). San Diego, CA: Academic Press. A comprehensive review of research on aversive racism, detailing historical trends and over three decades of theoretical and empirical work on the causes, consequences, and challenges of contemporary racial prejudice. Glick, P., & Fiske, S. T. (2001). An ambivalent alliance: Hostile and benevolent sexism as complementary justifications for gender inequality. American Psychologist, 56, 109[ndash]118. An engaging review of research on contemporary sexism, distinguishing benevolent and hostile forms of sexism and their complementary contributions to gender inequality within the United States and internationally. Pettigrew, T. F., & Tropp, L. R. (2006). A meta-analytic test of intergroup contact theory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,90, 751[ndash]783. The most comprehensive empirical review, to date, of the effectiveness of intergroup contact for reducing prejudice. Important questions tested in this review include that of whether intergroup contact is associated with less prejudice even when Allport's 'optimal' conditions (e.g., shared goals, equal status between groups) are not met (it is), whether these conditions significantly enhance the degree to which contact promotes positive intergroup relations (it does), and whether the contact[ndash]prejudice link extends to group contexts beyond interracial and interethnic samples (it does). Dovidio, J. F., Kawakami, K., & Gaertner, S. L. (2002). Implicit and explicit prejudice and interracial interaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 62[ndash]68. The first study to examine how implicit and explicit racial attitudes systematically influence verbal and non-verbal behavior and subsequent impressions during interracial interactions. Hebl, M. R., Foster, J. B., Mannix, L. M.., & Dovidio, J. F. (2002). Formal and interpersonal discrimination: A field study of bias toward homosexual applicants. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 815[ndash]825. One of the first studies to examine discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and the interpersonal processes involved in such stigmatization in actual employment settings. Pettigrew, T. F., & Meertens, R. W. (1995). Subtle and blatant prejudice in Western Europe. European Journal of Social Psychology, 25, 57[ndash]75. A cross-national perspective on subtle and blatant forms of prejudice and their distinction. Son Hing, L. S., Li, W., & Zanna, M. P. (2002). Inducing hypocrisy to reduce prejudicial responses among aversive racists. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 71[ndash]78. This study identifies a potent strategy (hypocrisy induction) for reducing aversive racists' prejudicial behavior and employs a new individual difference measure for assessing aversive racism. Greenwald, A. G., Poehlman, T. A., Uhlmann, E. L., & Banaji, M. R. (2009). Understanding and using the Implicit Association Test: III. Meta-analysis of predictive validity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 9, 17[ndash]41. A meta-analysis of judgmental biases and discrimination effects using the Implicit Association Test (IAT) demonstrating the power of indirect measures for predicting modern forms of discrimination. Pearson, A. R., Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. L. (2009). The nature of contemporary prejudice: Insights from aversive racism. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 3, 314[ndash]338. An overview of theoretical and empirical work on contemporary racism in the United States, detailing its consequences for everyday social interactions and decision-making, techniques for combating subtle forms of bias, and emerging developmental perspectives on its origins and maintenance. 1. Project Implicit http://implicit.harvard.edu An educational and research resource for studies on implicit social cognition, featuring online demonstrations and tests of implicit bias and stereotyping, including assessments of implicit attitudes toward racial and ethnic groups, weight, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and political orientation. 2. UnderstandingPrejudice.org The most comprehensive online resource to date for information on prejudice, discrimination, multiculturalism, and diversity. A wonderful compilation of educational resources, including research summaries on key topics in the field, multimedia links, teaching resources (including in-class exercises, springboard topics for discussions, bibliographies, and suggested assignments), links to relevant organizations, and a directory of experts in the field. 3. ReducingStereotypeThreat.org An excellent resource for educators, researchers, and policy-makers on the nature, causes, and consequences of stereotype threat, including descriptions of situational and personality influences, mechanisms, unresolved questions, and critiques of research on this important phenomenon. The website also includes an extensive collection of research articles, chapters, and books in this research area. 4. A Class Divided http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/divided http://www.newsreel.org/guides/blueeyed.htm (teaching guide) Two comprehensive web guides to the dramatic 1968 classroom demonstration by elementary school teacher Jane Elliott revealing the power and ease with which intergroup biases can develop, including teaching guides, online readings and links, transcripts of interviews, and free access to a full-length PBS Frontline documentary on the original demonstration. 5. CROW: Course Resources on the Web http://jonathan.mueller.faculty.noctrl.edu/crow/activities.htm A resource for online demonstrations and class exercises covering a wide variety of introductory topics in prejudice, stereotyping, and discrimination. 6. What Would You Do? http://abcnews.go.com/WhatWouldYouDo Video clips from a hidden camera television show on ABC showing bystander reactions to racism, sexism, and homophobia. Excellent for generating discussion on variability in bystander responses to prejudice, and personal and situational antecedents and social norms that drive these responses. Course Description This course is a cross-disciplinary seminar on the cultural, biological, and psychological underpinnings of intergroup prejudice, designed for graduate students and advanced undergraduates in psychology, sociology, anthropology, communications, and related disciplines. Although course content will emphasize the causes and consequences of traditional and contemporary forms of racial bias in the United States, other forms of 'isms' will also be explored, both nationally and cross-nationally. Topics will include psychological and behavioral manifestations of blatant and subtle forms of bias, prejudice in everyday interpersonal interactions, techniques for reducing conscious and non-conscious biases, and emerging developmental and neuroscientific perspectives on intergroup bias. Requirements and Grading The primary requirements of the course are to complete assigned readings and actively participate in class discussions, which include posting reading responses to the course bulletin board in advance of class discussions and serving as a co-facilitator of one class discussion. Grading for the course will be based on discussion participation (25%), weekly reading responses (25%), a mid-term 'exam', which may involve alternative exercises such as debates on key controversies in the field (25%), and a final 12[ndash]15-page research proposal (which should relate to students' personal research interests, 25%). Course Readings Readings for each class will include selected chapters from the recent edited volume by Dovidio, Glick, and Rudman (2005) reflecting on Allport's seminal book, and two to three journal articles illustrating relevant processes. Optional readings are indicated for some topics to provide interested readers with additional information. Class facilitators will also have the flexibility to choose alternative articles for the class to read, with the permission of the instructor. All readings will be made available through the course website. Texts Allport, G. W. (1954/1979). The Nature of Prejudice (25th anniversary edition). Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books. (Optional) Dovidio, J. F., Glick, P., & Rudman, L. A. (Eds.). (2005). On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years after Allport. Malden, MA: Blackwell. (Selected readings) Assignments Reading responses. Students will be asked to post a two- to three-paragraph reading response to the online course bulletin board by 7 p.m. the evening before class. Reading responses can incorporate a wide range of questions/comments, including (but not limited to) identifying key issues that are confusing or need clarification, highlighting strengths and weaknesses of the research, discussing alternative explanations, possible boundary conditions, discussing theoretical and/or practical implications of the study findings, identifying points of contact with other readings or prior class discussions, and/or describing alternative ways of testing the study hypotheses. Class facilitator. To allow flexibility to accommodate student interests, students will be asked to co-facilitate one class. Students will work with the instructor to organize the class, formulate questions, and highlight key controversies to guide class discussion. In addition, facilitators will identify a 'stump the chump' study from an empirical article. The article should be one that is not covered in the readings and that illustrates a key insight related to the topic. For this exercise, the student facilitator will describe the design of the study and will ask the class to make predictions and formulate a rationale for these predictions before revealing the study results. Research proposal. A short research proposal (12[ndash]15 pages) will be due at the end of the semester. The proposal should build on a topic relevant to the study of prejudice but ideally relate to one's own research interests. The paper should be in APA format and include a thorough introduction (background), a methods section, a proposed results section, and a discussion of the contribution such a project would make to the field. Week 1: Prejudice: Past and Present (DGR Ch. 1) Duckitt, J. H. (1992). Psychology and prejudice: A historical analysis and integrative framework. American Psychologist, 47, 1182[ndash]1193. Pearson, A. R., Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. L. (2009). The nature of contemporary prejudice: Insights from aversive racism. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 3, 314[ndash]338. Week 2: The Nature of the Problem (DGR Ch. 3) Kurzban, R., & Leary, M. (2001). Evolutionary origins of stigmatization: The functions of social exclusion. Psychological Bulletin, 127, 187[ndash]208. Brewer, M. B. (1999). The psychology of prejudice: Ingroup love or outgroup hate? Journal of Social Issues, 55, 429[ndash]444. Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. (2000). Aversive racism and selection decisions: 1989 and 1999. Psychological Science, 11, 315[ndash]319. Week 3: Motivational Processes (DGR Chs 6, 15) Fein, S., & Spencer, S. J. (1997). Prejudice as self-image maintenance: Affirming the self through derogating others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 31[ndash]44. Monin, B., & Miller, D. T. (2001). Moral credentials and the expression of prejudice. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81, 33[ndash]43. Glick, P., & Fiske, S. T. (2001). An ambivalent alliance: Hostile and benevolent sexism as complementary justifications for gender inequality. American Psychologist, 56, 109[ndash]118. Optional: Pratto, F., & Shih, M. (2000). Social dominance orientation and group context in implicit group prejudice. Psychological Science, 11, 521[ndash]524. Week 4: Cognitive Processes (DGR Chs 11, 13) Hamilton, D. L., & Gifford, R. K. (1976). Illusory correlation in interpersonal perception: A cognitive basis of stereotypic judgments. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 12, 392[ndash]407. Nelson, T. E., Biernat, M. R., & Manis, M. (1990). Everyday base rates (sex stereotypes): Potent and resilient. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 664[ndash]675. Hodson, G., Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. L. (2002). Processes in racial discrimination: Differential weighting of conflicting information. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 460[ndash]471. Optional: Bargh, J. (1999). The cognitive monster: The case against the controllability of automatic stereotype effects. In S. Chaiken & Y. Trope (Eds.), Dual-Process Theories in Social Psychology (pp. 361[ndash]368). New York, NY: Guilford Press. Week 5: Emotion Processes (DGR Ch. 22) DeSteno, D. et al. (2004). Prejudice from thin air: The effect of emotion on automatic intergroup attitude. Psychological Science, 15, 319[ndash]324. Cottrell, C. A., & Neuberg, S. L. (2005). Different emotional reactions to different groups: A sociofunctional threat-based approach to "prejudice". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 770[ndash]789. Optional: Mackie, D. M., Devos, T., & Smith, E. R. (2000). Intergroup emotions: Explaining offensive action tendencies in an intergroup context. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 79, 602[ndash]616. Cuddy, A. J. C., Rock, M., & Norton, M. I. (2007). Aid in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina: Inferences of secondary emotions and intergroup helping. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 10, 107[ndash]118. Week 6: Mid-Term Exam (Debates) Week 7: Prejudice in Social Interactions I: Processes Word, C. O., Zanna, M. P., & Cooper, J. (1974). The nonverbal mediation of self-fulfilling prophecies in interracial interaction. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 10, 109[ndash]120. Dovidio, J. F., Kawakami, K., & Gaertner, S. L. (2002). Implicit and explicit prejudice and interracial interaction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 62[ndash]68. Optional: Snyder, M., Tanke, E. D., & Berscheid, E. (1977). Social perception and interpersonal behavior: On the self-fulfilling nature of social stereotypes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 655[ndash]666. Week 8: Prejudice in Social Interactions II: Consequences (DGR Ch. 10) Hebl, M. R., Foster, J. B., Mannix, L. M., & Dovidio, J. F. (2002). Formal and interpersonal discrimination: A field study of bias toward homosexual applicants. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 815[ndash]825. Kawakami, K., Dunn, L., Karmali, F., & Dovidio, J. F. (2009). Mispredicting affective and behavioral responses to racism. Science, 323, 276[ndash]278. Richeson, J. A., & Shelton, J. N. (2007). Negotiating interracial interactions: Costs, consequences, and possibilities. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 16, 316[ndash]320. Week 9: Institutional Biases (DGR Ch. 14) Graham, L. O. (1995). Invisible man: Why this Harvard-trained lawyer went undercover as a busboy at an all-white Connecticut country club. In Lawrence Otis Graham (Ed.), Member of the Club: Reflections on Life in a Racially Polarized World (pp. 1[ndash]26). New York, NY: HarperCollins. Eberhardt, J. L., Davies, P. G., Purdie-Vaughns, V. J., & Johnson, S. L. (2006). Looking deathworthy: Perceived stereotypicality of black defendants predicts capital-sentencing outcomes. Psychological Science, 17, 383[ndash]386. Dovidio, J. F., Penner, L. A., Albrecht, T. L., Norton, W. E., Gaertner, S. L., & Shelton, J. N. (2008). Disparities and distrust: The implications of psychological processes for understanding racial disparities in health and health care. Social Science & Medicine, 67, 478[ndash]486. Week 10: Combating Explicit Biases (DGR Ch. 17) Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. (1999). Reducing prejudice: Combating intergroup biases. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 8, 101[ndash]105. Pettigrew, T. F., & Tropp, L. R. (2006). A meta-analytic test of intergroup contact theory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90, 751[ndash]783. Paluck, E. L. (2009). Reducing intergroup prejudice and conflict using the media: A field experiment in Rwanda. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 96, 574[ndash]587. Optional: Stangor, C., Segrist, G. B., & Jost, J. T. (2001). Changing racial beliefs by providing consensus information. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 486[ndash]496. Son Hing, L. S., Li, W., & Zanna, M. P. (2002). Inducing hypocrisy to reduce prejudicial responses among aversive racists. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 71[ndash]78. Week 11: Combating Implicit Biases (DGR Ch. 20) Devine, P. G. (1989). Stereotypes and prejudice: Their automatic and controlled components. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 56, 5[ndash]18. Blair, I. V. (2002). The malleability of automatic stereotypes and prejudice. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 6, 242[ndash]261. Rudman, L. A., Ashmore, R. D., & Gary, M. L. (2001). "Unlearning" automatic biases: The malleability of implicit prejudice and stereotypes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 81, 856[ndash]868. Optional: Turner, R. N., Hewstone, M., & Voci, A. (2007). Reducing explicit and implicit outgroup prejudice via direct and extended contact: The mediating role of self-disclosure and intergroup anxiety. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93, 369[ndash]388. Week 12: Developmental Perspectives (DGR Ch. 19) Dunham, Y., Baron, A. S., & Banaji, M. R. (2008). The development of implicit intergroup cognition. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12, 248[ndash]253. Apfelbaum, E. P., Pauker, K., Ambady, N., Sommers, S. R., & Norton, M. I. (2008). Learning (not) to talk about race: When older children underperform in social categorization. Developmental Psychology, 44, 1513[ndash]1518. Optional: McGillicuddy-De Lisi, A. V., Daly, M., & Neal, A. (2006). Children's distributive justice judgments: Aversive racism in Euro-American children? Child Development,77, 1063[ndash]1080. Week 13: Neuroscientific Perspectives Cunningham, W. A., Johnson, M. K., Raye, C. L., Gatenby, J. C., Gore, J. C., & Banaji, M. R. (2004). Separable neural components in the processing of Black and White Faces. Psychological Science,15, 806[ndash]813. Amodio, D. M., & Ratner, K. (forthcoming). The brains behind intergroup relations: A social neuroscience analysis of the regulation of intergroup responses. To appear in J. Decety and J. T. Cacioppo, Handbook of Social Neuroscience. Oxford University Press. Optional: Olsson, A., Ebert, J. P., Banaji, M. R., & Phelps, E. A. (2005). The role of social groups in the persistence of learned fear. Science,309, 785[ndash]787. Week 14: Wrap-Up & Synthesis (DGR Ch. 26) Steele, S. (1990) A negative vote on affirmative action. Excerpted from The Content of Our Character. Originally published in The New York Times Magazine, 13 May 1990. Fiske, S. T., Bersoff, D. N., Borgida, E., Deaux, K., & Heilman, M. E. (1991). Social science research on trial: Use of sex stereotyping research in Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins. American Psychologist, 46, 1049[ndash]1060. Paluck, E. L., & Green, D. P. (2009). Prejudice Reduction: What works? A critical look at evidence from the field and the laboratory. Annual Review of Psychology,60, 339[ndash]367. Optional: Class Exercise Instructor Preparation: Prepare stick-on labels (one for each student) with a single trait (e.g., lazy, ambitious, athletic, etc.) printed large enough to be visible at a distance of 5[ndash]6 feet. Exercise: Place the trait labels in an envelope and ask each student to select one label at random and place it on the forehead or chest of the student to his or her left, such that the trait remains to be visible to all members of the class except for the student for whom the trait was selected. Is Fate at Work? Ask each student to provide the class with a brief (1[ndash]2 min) verbal description of what he or she did over the summer or winter break. Upon the conclusion of each description, ask the class to formulate questions for the speaker with the aim of assessing whether or not the speaker's personality actually reflects elements of the randomly chosen trait (i.e., is fate at work?). Relay to the class that any question is a fair game, as long as it does not mention the assigned trait or a synonym of the trait. Author Commentary and Discussion: Following this exercise, it is useful to discuss Darley and Gross's (1983) classic study on confirmatory bias and a recent adaptation and extension of this study by Wegener, Clark, and Petty (2006), which tie well into a discussion of processes that work to perpetuate subtle forms of discrimination (see Hodson, Dovidio, & Gaertner, 2002). Indeed, the point of the Darley and Gross study is that people believe that they are objective information processors and that they typically refrain from using non-diagnostic information, such as race or social class, to develop impressions of another person's character or ability when more direct diagnostic information is available. In the Darley and Gross experiment, participants are presented with 'non-diagnostic' information about a young girl's socioeconomic status as being either high or low. Participants are then shown a video of an ambiguous test performance by the girl (i.e., one that reveals both successes and failures). In their study, those who were led to believe that the girl was higher in socioeconomic status developed the impression that the student's performance was well above grade level. In contrast, although the student's performance was identical in both conditions, participants who were led to believe that the student was of low socioeconomic status reported her performance to be well below grade level. Additionally, only those viewing the video developed these strong impressions: whereas those who did not view the video but only possessed the non-diagnostic information guessed that her abilities were at grade level; those who viewed the video believed that they had diagnostic information confirming expectations derived from the non-diagnostic information. In the present exercise, the class questions following each speaker description are often quite revealing, as they frequently expose just how much of our searching for the truth looks to confirm, rather than disconfirm, evidence of a suspected trait or ability. Questions that seek to confirm a trait lead one to think of those situations in which the trait might be true or ability might be revealed. After several such questions, the person answering the questions may come to believe that he or she actually is, for example, quite athletic, which can lead respondents to further confirm the questioner's initial suspicions (or stereotypes) through a self-fulfilling prophecy. This exercise should take 15[ndash]20 min. Darley, J. M., & Gross, P. H. (1983). A hypothesis-confirming bias in labeling effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,44, 20[ndash]33. Hodson, G., Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. L. (2002). Processes in racial discrimination: Differential weighting of conflicting information. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin,28, 460[ndash]471. Wegener, D. T., Clark, J. K., & Petty, R. E. (2006). Not all stereotyping is created equal: Differential consequences of thoughtful versus non-thoughtful stereotyping. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,90, 42[ndash]59.

Guns, Germs, and Sex: How Evolution Shaped Our Intergroup Psychology

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:18:00 -0700

A phenomenon of perennial interest to social psychologists is people's tendency to categorize others on the basis of group membership and to exhibit a preference for members of the ingroup relative to the outgroup. Recent work emphasizing the evolutionary functions of outgroup aggression, exploitation, and avoidance have shed new light on previously observed intergroup phenomena and generated many new empirical findings. We delineate two distinct evolved psychologies of intergroup relations and review recent research pertaining to each. One research line (on the psychology of warfare) focuses on the intergroup competition for resources; as we describe below, such competition [ndash] and the associated exploitative psychology [ndash] is more amplified among men. The other research line (on the psychology of disease avoidance) focuses on the need to avoid contagious disease. Because the threats posed by competitive versus disease-carrying outgroups are qualitatively distinct, the psychological reactions may also be qualitatively distinct.

Lay Theories of Personality: Cornerstones of Meaning in Social Cognition

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:18:00 -0700

Lay theories (or 'implicit theories') are cornerstones for social cognition: people use lay theories to help them make sense of complex and ambiguous behavior. In this study, we describe recent research on the entity and incremental theories (the belief that personality is fixed or malleable). In so doing, we demonstrate that each theory does not act alone. Instead, each is associated with a set of allied beliefs, the sum total of which cohere into two distinct meaning systems. We present evidence that these meaning systems produce systematic differences in a range of fundamental social cognition processes, with important implications for the field's understanding of trait/situation attribution, moral judgment, person memory, and stereotyping. We further argue that because meaning systems serve a central meaning-making function, people are motivated to believe that the meaning system they are using is effective and accurate. Accordingly, we present evidence that people exhibit processing distortions and compensatory mechanisms to minimize the impact of information that violates their meaning system. We discuss the implications of these findings for the field's understanding of basic social cognition.

Relational Self-Construal: Past and Future

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:18:00 -0700

Relational self-construal is characterized as the extent to which a person defines the self in terms of close relationships. In this article, I distinguish relational self-construal from collective-interdependent self-construal and from other similar-sounding constructs. I review the history of the concept of relational self-construal and how it is most frequently measured or manipulated. The remainder of the article focuses on research that examines the role of relational self-construal in cognition, affect, motivation, and close interpersonal relationships.

The ABC's of LGM: An Introductory Guide to Latent Variable Growth Curve Modeling

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:18:00 -0700

In recent years, we have witnessed an increase in the complexity of theoretical models that attempt to explain behavior from both contextual and developmental perspectives. This increase in the complexity of our theoretical propositions regarding behavior parallels recent methodological advances for the analysis of change. These new analysis techniques have fundamentally altered how we conceptualize and study change. Researchers have begun to identify larger frameworks to integrate our knowledge regarding the analysis of change. One such framework is latent growth modeling, perhaps the most important and influential statistical revolution to have recently occurred in the social and behavioral sciences. This study presents a basic introduction to a latent growth modeling approach for analyzing repeated measures data. Included is the specification and interpretation of the growth factors, primary extensions such as the analysis of growth in multiple populations, and structural models including both precursors of growth, and subsequent outcomes hypothesized to be influenced by the growth functions.

The Self-Conscious Emotions: How are they Experienced, Expressed, and Assessed?

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:17:00 -0700

The self-conscious emotions (e.g., embarrassment, guilt, pride, shame) are a special class of emotions that critically involve the self, including the capacity to form stable self-representations and to evaluate oneself relative to internal and external standards. In this article, we summarize five areas of recent research on self-conscious emotions: (a) the cognitive elicitors, or causal appraisals, that generate them; (b) their non-verbal expressions; (c) the underlying neural processes; (d) the degree to which their experience and expression varies across cultures; and (e) the measures that have been developed to assess them. In each section, we provide recommendations for future research directions.

Getting Emotional About Explanations: Social Explanations and Social Explanatory Styles as Bases of Prosocial Emotions and Intergroup Attitudes

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:17:00 -0700

We are interested in the bases of social emotions such as compassion and hostility. Our analysis centers on social explanations, or people's answers to the question: Why does the target behave that way or experience those outcomes? Below, we review classic approaches to social explanation and then review work linking explanations to emotions. Finally, we focus on work from our lab that connects explanations to prosocial emotions and intergroup attitudes, including compassion for the disadvantaged and reduced vengefulness toward the violent. A crucial contribution of our work is to illuminate complex connections between explanations and emotions: A given explanation has different socio-emotional implications depending on the explainer's motives. Finally, we review our work suggesting that individuals have social explanatory styles, and that particular styles are predictive of dispositional compassion. A key implication of our work is that social explanations are another basis of prosociality, in addition to factors such as empathy and moral principles.

Memory as a Self-Protective Mechanism

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:17:00 -0700

The autobiographical memory literature has established that people remember poorly unpleasant, relative to pleasant, life events. We complemented this literature with a theoretical model [ndash] the mnemic neglect model [ndash] and an experimental paradigm that exerts tight control over the to-be-remembered material. Participants recall poorly self-threatening feedback compared to self-affirming or other-relevant feedback [ndash] a phenomenon we labeled mnemic neglect. The phenomenon is motivational: it is in the service of self-protection. The phenomenon is also flexible. Participants can switch from self-protection (e.g. avoiding negative feedback) to an alternative goal (e.g. striving for feedback with improvement potential), when circumstances call for it such as when the feedback is provided by a close other rather than a stranger. Finally, self-threatening feedback may be forgotten, but it is not lost: the mnemic neglect effect is not obtained in recognition recall.

How can We Reduce the Distress Associated with Health Screening? From Psychological Theory to Clinical Practice

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:16:00 -0700

Health screening involves the early identification of risk factors for disease or early-stage disease. There is clear evidence of a health benefit following many screening programs. However, these programs may also contribute to significant psychological distress in a significant minority of vulnerable individuals. This paper considers the impact of screening in relation to breast cancer, focusing on assessment of genetic risk for breast cancer and mammography. It then reviews how these programs presently try to minimize any distress among participants before examining how health and clinical psychological theory can contribute to the development of new interventions, focusing on the use of cognitive challenge and teaching appropriate emotion-focused coping strategies such as mindfulness and distraction. Future research developments are then addressed.

Evidence of System Justification in Young Children

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:16:00 -0700

The near ubiquity of ingroup preference is consistent with the view that it is an automatic consequence of social categorization, possibly a basic foundation of intergroup relations. However, research with adults has demonstrated that automatic ingroup preference is notably absent among less dominant, less advantaged groups, an outcome predicted by System Justification Theory (Jost & Banaji, 1994). How basic is this tendency to justify existing social arrangements? Data from young children are crucial in addressing whether such an opposing orientation is itself a fundamental feature of intergroup social cognition. The developmental data summarized here suggest that knowledge about the relative status of one's ingroup is absorbed and internalized sufficiently early in life, revealing system-justifying tendencies by age 5, the earliest age such questions have been examined to date. Across several studies summarized here young children from non-dominant groups failed to show an implicit ingroup preference, similar to their adult counterparts. We conclude that from an early age intergroup preferences are constrained by knowledge, implicit or explicit, about the relative status differences among groups and may suggest an orientation toward supporting existing social and political structures. The possibility that system-justifying tendencies may exist in even younger children remains open for future tests.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: The Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory as a Culturally Relevant Personality Measure in Applied Settings

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:16:00 -0700

This paper introduces the development of the Cross-Cultural (Chinese) Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI) as a culturally relevant measure for personality assessment in collectivistic cultures. The CPAI was developed as a joint effort of psychologists at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in the late 1980s. In response to the critique of the imposed etic approach in cross-cultural personality assessment, the team considered it timely to develop an indigenous measure suitable for the Chinese people who constituted at least one-fourth of the world's population. The team built on their experience in the methodology of the adaptation and standardization of the Chinese MMPI to design a comprehensive indigenous instrument covering personality characteristics for normal as well as diagnostic assessment of the Chinese people. In addition to universal personality traits, the CPAI included indigenously derived scales that assessed the relational aspects of personality. The cross-cultural relevance of the CPAI was assessed by examining the convergence and divergence of the CPAI with the NEO PI-R (Costa, & McCrae, 1992) measuring the Five Factor Model, which was claimed to cover universal personality dimensions. A joint factor analysis of the CPAI and the NEO PI-R in both Chinese and Singaporean samples showed that the CPAI factor of Interpersonal Relatedness (IR) did not load on any of the Big Five factors, whereas none of the CPAI scales loaded on the Openness to Experience factor of the NEO PI-R. In the present article, we reported three studies that illustrated the usefulness of these indigenous scales in Chinese organizational settings. The Interpersonal Relatedness factor scales on the CPAI contributed additional value beyond scales from the universal factors of Social Potency and Dependability in profiling MBA students at senior-level positions, in assessing hotel workers' customer orientation, and in predicting senior executives' leadership behaviors. 1. Cheung, F. M., Leung, K., Fan, R. M., Song, W. Z., Zhang, J. X. & Zhang, J. P. (1996). Development of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI). Journal of Cross-cultural Psychology, 27, 181[ndash]199. This article described the methods and procedures used in developing the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI), reports initial findings on the reliability of the inventory, and discusses related issues in cross-cultural personality assessment. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., Leung, K., Ward, C., & Leong, F. (2003). The English version of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 34, 433[ndash]452. The article examined the structure of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI), an indigenous Chinese assessment instrument, in two English-speaking samples. In Study 1, the English version of the CPAI was developed and administered to a sample of 675 Singaporean Chinese (aged 18[ndash]73 years). In Study 2, the English version CPAI was administered to a Caucasian American sample (n = 137). Factor analysis showed that the factor structure of the English version CPAI was similar to the structure of the original Chinese version in the normative sample. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., Zhang, J. X., Leung, K., Leong, F., & Yeh, K. H. (2008). Relevance of openness as a personality dimension in Chinese culture: Aspects of its cultural relevance. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 39, 81[ndash]108. The Openness factor was missing from the original Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI). We used a combined emic-etic approach to generate six culturally relevant Openness scales. Joint factor analyses showed that four of the CPAI-2 Openness scales loaded with the Openness factor of the NEO-FFI. This article also presents the factor structure of the CPAI-2 and its joint factor analysis with the NEO-FFI in the re-standardization sample. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., & Zhang, J. X. (2004). What is "Chinese" personality?: Subgroup differences in the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI-2). Acta Psychologica Sinica, 36, 491[ndash]499. This paper reported subgroup differences in the CPAI 2 normative sample to illustrate variations and continuity of personality characteristics within the same culture. Sex and age differences on mean scores of the CPAI-2 scales are consistent with expected variations associated with socialization and developmental stages. There is no consistent pattern of variations across Hong Kong and different geographical regions within Mainland China. Within culture and cross-cultural differences illustrate the continuity of individual differences in personality, and the dialectics of emic and etic constructs. Kwong, J. Y. Y., & Cheung, F. M. (2003). Prediction of performance facets using specific personality traits in the Chinese context. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 63, 99[ndash]110. This study examined how personality variables relate differentially to interpersonal and personal facets. Supervisory-level employees completed the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory and provided their recent performance appraisal records. Results indicated that personality traits that relate to interpersonal orientation (e.g., Harmony and Leadership in the CPAI) better predicted interpersonal versus personal contextual behaviors, whereas a trait associated with personal virtues such as moral obligation and loyalty to group (CPAI's Veraciousness) predicted the personal but not the interpersonal domain. Cheung, F. M., Leung, K., Zhang, J. X., Sun, H. F., Gan, Y. Q., Song, W. Z., & Xie, D. (2001). Indigenous Chinese personality construct: Is the Five Factor Model complete? Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 32, 407[ndash]433. This paper investigated the universality and sufficiency of the 5-factor model in the Chinese context. The Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R) and the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI) were employed among Chinese students, Chinese Managers, and Hawaiian students. A comprehensive analysis showed that the 6-factor models were superior to the 5-factor models and that the Interpersonal Relatedness factor which was defined only by CPAI scales could not be consistently explained by a combination of the Big Five factors. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., & Zhang, J. X. (2004). Convergent validity of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2: Preliminary findings with a normative sample. Journal of Personality Assessment, 82, 92[ndash]103. This study examined the convergent validity of the CPAI, an indigenously constructed measure, by comparing its patterns of correlations with the MMPI-2 (Butcher et al., 2001). Results provide preliminary support for the convergence between most of the CPAI clinical scales and the relevant MMPI-2 scales. The CPAI personality scales further illustrated the patterns of personality features associated with the MMPI-2 scales in a Chinese cultural context. Cheung, S. F., Cheung, F. M., Howard, R., & Lim, Y. H. (2006). Personality across ethnic divide in Singapore: Are "Chinese traits" uniquely Chinese? Personality and Individual Differences, 41, 467[ndash]477. In this study, the English version of the Cross-Cultural (Chinese) Personality Assessment Inventory-2 (CPAI-2) was administered to three samples representing the main ethnic groups in Singapore. Factor analysis and Procrustes rotation showed that the four CPAI-2 factors, Social Potency, Dependability, Accommodation, and Interpersonal Relatedness, could generally be recovered. Cross-cultural (Chinese) Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI): http://ww3.psy.cuhk.edu.hk/~cpaiweb/ This website indexes a description for the Cross-cultural (Chinese) Personality Assessment Inventory [ndash] 2 (CPAI-2) and the Cross-cultural (Chinese) Personality Assessment Inventory [ndash] Adolescent Version (CPAI-A) in English and Chinese. We provide directions for researchers to request for research use of these measures that will contribute to building up the database on the validity of the CPAI-2 or CPAI-A. The website also provides related references including publications by our research team and other researchers who used the CPAI-2 and CPAI-A. The aim of this seminar is to introduce students to universal and culture-specific personality. Personality models, research paradigms, and cross-cultural issues of personality assessment are discussed. The Cross-cultural Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI-2) is cited as an example of the combined etic-emic approach to develop indigenous personality assessment. The program of research to validate the CPAI-2, especially its utility in applied settings, is reviewed. This seminar on personality assessment consists of lectures, class discussion, readings, small group activities, and a proposed group project. There are some required readings. In addition, each student will be responsible for presenting one extra journal article. The primary requirement of the course is to do all required and additional readings in preparation for the discussions, to present a journal report in class outside of the assigned readings, and to work together in small groups to develop a research project. All students are expected to participate thoughtfully and actively in the class discussions. Final grades will be based on the amount and quality of student participation in general (20%), individual presentation of the journal report (40%), and a group presentation (including powerpoint and handout) that proposes a new study (40%) that answers an interesting question on cross-cultural personality assessment, based on the current state of knowledge on this topic. Using powerpoint, outline the journal article that you were assigned and present it to the class, as a teacher would present the material to his or her class. State clearly what the rationale was for the research, what literature was pertinent, what the hypotheses were, how the study was done, what the results were, and what the authors felt the primary contribution was. Then, offer your own assessment of the research, as a reviewer would. What were its strengths and what were it weaknesses? Did you spot any alternative explanations or confounds? Do you think the findings would generalize to other manipulations, measures, and populations (if not, why not)? What further studies would you suggest doing based on this research? The presentation of the group research project should consist of a powerpoint that includes: (i) a title page; (ii) a brief introduction, citing relevant research; (iii) the hypothesis, stated clearly; (iv) a method section that the reader could use to replicate the study; (v) a graph or table of the expected results; (vi) a brief discussion section that indicates, if the results supported the hypothesis, what the theoretical and practical significance would be for the field; and (vii) a reference section. The group should also hand in a 150-word (maximum) abstract. Your final grading will be based on a composite score of your presentation and your seminar contributions. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., Zhang, J. X., Leung, K., Leong, F. T. L., & Yeh, K. H. (2008). Relevance of openness as a personality dimension in Chinese culture. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 39, 81[ndash]108. Cheung, F. M., Leung, K., Fan, R., Song, W. Z., Zhang, J. X., & Zhang, J. P. (1996). Development of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI). Journal of Cross-cultural Psychology, 27, 181[ndash]199. Church, A. T. (2001). Personality measurement in cross-cultural perspective. Journal of Personality, 69, 979[ndash]1006. Van de Vijver, F., & Leung, K. (1997). Methods and data analysis for cross-cultural research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Individual article (or cluster of articles), from which each of you chooses one (each student needs to choose a different article). If you would like to choose something not on this list, get lecturer's approval: Butcher, J. N., Cheung, F. M., & Lim, J. (2003). Use of the MMPI-2 with Asian populations. Psychological Assessment, 15, 248[ndash]256. Chan, B. (2005). From West to East: The impact of culture on personality and group dynamics. Cross-Cultural Management, 12, 31[ndash]45. Chen, S. X., Bond, M. H., & Cheung, F. M. (2005). Personality correlates of social axioms: Are beliefs nested within personality? Personality and Individual Differences, 40, 509[ndash]519. Cheung, F. M. (2004). Use of Western- and indigenously-developed personality tests in Asia. Applied Psychology: An International Review, 53, 173[ndash]191. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., & Leung, F. (2008). Clinical validity of the Cross-Cultural (Chinese) Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI-2) in the assessment of substance use disorders among Chinese mean. Psychological Assessment, 20, 103[ndash]113. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., Leung, K., Ward, C., & Leong, F. (2003). The English version of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 34, 433[ndash]452. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., Wada, S., & Zhang, J. X. (2003). Indigenous measures of personality assessment in Asian countries: A review. Psychological Assessment, 15, 280[ndash]289. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., & Zhang, J.X. (2004a). What is "Chinese" personality?: Subgroup differences in the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI-2). Acta Psychologica Sinica, 36, 491[ndash]499. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., & Zhang, J.X. (2004b). Convergent validity of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2: Preliminary findings with a normative sample. Journal of Personality Assessment, 82, 92[ndash]103. Cheung, F. M. & Leung, K. (1998). Indigenous personality measures: Chinese examples. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 29, 233[ndash]248. Cheung, F. M., Leung, K., Zhang, J. X., Sun, H. F., Gan, Y. Q., Song, W. Z., & Xie, D. (2001). Indigenous Chinese personality construct: Is the Five Factor Model complete? Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 32, 407[ndash]433. Cheung, S. F., Cheung, F. M., Howard, R., & Lim, Y. H. (2006). Personality across ethnic divide in Singapore: Are "Chinese traits" uniquely Chinese? Personality and Individual Differences, 41, 467[ndash]477. Fu, H., Watkins, D., & Hui, E., K. P. (2004). Personality correlates of the disposition towards interpersonal forgiveness: A Chinese perspective. International Journal of Psychology, 39, 305[ndash]316. Heine, S. J., & Buchtel, E. E. (2009). Personality: The universal and the culturally specific. Annual Review of Psychology, 60, 369[ndash]394. Ho, M. Y., Cheung, F. M., & Cheung,S. F. (2008). Personality and life events as predictors of adolescents' life satisfaction: Do life events mediate the link between personality and life satisfaction? Social Indicators Research, 89, 457[ndash]471. Kwong, J Y. Y., & Cheung, F. M. (2003). Prediction of performance facets using specific personality traits in the Chinese context. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 63, 99[ndash]110. Leung, K., Cheung, F. M., Zhang, J. X., Song, W. Z., & Xie, D. (1997). The five factor model of personality in China. In K. Leung, Y. Kashima, U. Kim, & S. Yamaguchi (Eds.), Progress in Asian social psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 231[ndash]244). Singapore: John Wiley. Lin, E. J., & Church, A. T. (2004). Are indigenous Chinese personality dimensions culture-specific? An investigation of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory in Chinese American and European American samples. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 35, 586[ndash]605. Liu, L. A., Friedman, R. A., & Chi, S. C. (2005). 'Ren Qing' versus the 'Big Five': The role of culturally sensitive measures of individual difference in distributive negotiations. Management and Organizational Review, 1, 225[ndash]247. McCrae, R. R., Yik, M. S. M., Trapnell, P. D., Bond, M. H., & Paulhus, D. L. (1998). Interpreting personality profiles across cultures: Bilingual, acculturation, and peer rating studies of Chinese undergraduates. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1041[ndash]1055. Sun, H. F., & Bond, M. H. (2000). Choice of influence tactics: Effects of the target person's behavioral patterns, status and the personality influencer. In Li, J.T., Tusk, A. S., & Weldon. E. (Eds.), Management and organizations in the Chinese context (pp. 283[ndash]302). London: MacMillan. Yang, K. S. (1997). Theories and research in Chinese personality: An indigenous approach. In H. S. R. Kao & D. Sinha (Eds.), Asian perspectives on psychology (pp. 236[ndash]262). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Yik, M. S., & Bond, M. H. (1993). Exploring the dimensions of Chinese person perception with indigenous and imported constructs: Creating a culturally balanced scale. International Journal of Psychology, 28, 75[ndash]95. Introduction (1) the brief history of cross-cultural personality assessment, (2) international research on the Five Factor Model, (3) the application of etic and emic approaches in the field of personality assessment, (4) indigenous research on personality assessment in Asia, (5) the development of CPAI, and (6) the application of the CPAI/CPAI-2 in applied settings. Cheung, F. M., Cheung, S. F., Wada, S., & Zhang, J. X. (2003). Indigenous measures of personality assessment in Asian countries: A review. Psychological Assessment, 15, 280[ndash]289. Cheung, F. M., Leung, K., Fan, R., Song, W. Z., Zhang, J. X., & Zhang, J. P. (1996). Development of the Chinese Personality Assessment Inventory (CPAI). Journal of Cross-cultural Psychology, 27, 181[ndash]199. Church, A. T. (2001). Personality measurement in cross-cultural perspective. Journal of Personality, 69, 979[ndash]1006. Van de Vijver, F., & Leung, K. (1997). Methods and data analysis for cross-cultural research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Individual presentations, and group presentations. What are the problems of the imposed etic approach in personality assessment? What is the primary content of a combined emic-etic approach used in personality assessment? Why should the indigenous dimensions of personality be emphasized beyond the classic Big-Five factors? How would you evaluate newly developed measures of personality traits in a non-Western culture? What is the main contribution of the CPAI scales in the field of personality assessment? What is the added value of the emic CPAI scales in applied settings? We designed a classroom demonstration on personality assessment, and request students (or a small group, for instance, 2[ndash]5 persons) develop a mini scale to assess one culturally-relevant personality construct. We expect this classroom activity to assist students to understand the meaning of an emic personality trait that reflects a culturally-relevant construct in their own life.

Teaching and Learning Guide for: Recent Work on Propositions

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:15:00 -0700

Some of the most interesting recent work in philosophy of language and metaphysics is focused on questions about propositions, the abstract, truth-bearing contents of sentences and beliefs. The aim of this guide is to give instructors and students a road map for some significant work on propositions since the mid-1990s. This work falls roughly into two areas: challenges to the existence of propositions and theories about the nature and structure of propositions. The former includes both a widely discussed puzzle about propositional designators as well as direct and indirect arguments against the existence of propositions. The latter is dominated by what is currently the central debate about the metaphysics of propositions, i.e. whether they are structured, composite entities or unstructured ontological simples. This issue has eclipsed older debates about whether propositions can be identified with sets of possible worlds or other kinds of sentence intensions. Soames, Scott. 'Direct Reference, Propositional Attitudes, and Semantic Content.'Philosophical Topics 15 (1987): 47[ndash]87. Reprinted in Propositions and Attitudes. Eds. N. Salmon and S. Soames. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988. 197[ndash]239. Essential groundwork for more recent work on propositions. Soames gives a careful and exacting presentation of the case against identifying propositions with sets of possible worlds or other truth-supporting circumstances. Also contains a detailed statement of the Russellian conception of propositions on which propositions are ordered sets of objects, properties and relations. King, Jeffrey. 'Designating Propositions.'The Philosophical Review 111 (2002): 341[ndash]71. Sometimes substituting a definite description for a corresponding 'that'-clause can lead to bizarre changes in truth-conditions: compare 'Bill fears that Hillary will be president' with 'Bill fears the proposition that Hillary will be president'. This puzzle about propositional designators threatens the relational analysis of propositional attitude reports, the view that 'believes' expresses a relation to the proposition designated by its 'that'-clause, and thereby poses an indirect threat to the existence of propositions. King's solution posits an ambiguity in verbs like 'fear' that embed both 'that'-clauses and definite descriptions. Jubien, Michael. 'Propositions and the Objects of Thought.'Philosophical Studies 104 (2001): 47[ndash]62. A direct attack on the existence of propositions. Jubien deploys an analogue of the problem that Paul Benacerraf raised for set-theoretical reductions of numbers against metaphysical reductions of propositions. Just as numbers can be reduced to sets in many different ways, any reduction of propositions brings with it equally good variants, thus making any such reduction arbitrary and unmotivated. The only alternative is to treat propositions as abstract metaphysical primitives. As Jubien argues, however, abstract primitive entities are incapable of doing what propositions must do, i.e. represent objects and states of affairs on their own, without the input of thinking subjects. The upshot is the propositions cannot be reduced and they cannot be primitive, and so they must not exist. Hanks, Peter. 'How Wittgenstein Defeated Russell's Multiple Relation Theory of Judgment.'Synthese 154 (2007): 121[ndash]46. Scepticism about propositions has recently led some philosophers, Jubien included, to resuscitate Russell's multiple relation theory of judgment, the idea that judgment is a many-place relation to objects, properties and relations. This paper explains why Russell himself abandoned that theory, and why the theory is still refuted by an objection due to Wittgenstein. Hofweber, Thomas. 'Inexpressible Properties and Propositions.'Oxford Studies in Metaphysics. 2 vols. Ed. D. Zimmerman. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. 155[ndash]206. An indirect attack on the existence of propositions. Hofweber argues that sentences like 'Bill believes something that Hillary asserted' do not commit us to the existence of propositions. His view is that propositional quantification is an instance of what he calls 'internal' or 'inferential role' quantification, a kind of quantification that carries no ontological implications. Schiffer, Stephen. The Things We Mean. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. esp. chs 1[ndash]2. Schiffer defends his theory of pleonastic propositions, on which propositions are unstructured, have no parts, and are very finely grained. Bealer, George. 'Propositions.'Mind 107 (1998): 1[ndash]32. Bealer defends his algebraic theory of propositions, which, like Schiffer's pleonastic account, treats propositions as unstructured metaphysical simples. King, Jeffrey. The Nature of and Structure of Content. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. The best developed current theory of the structure in structured propositions. King identifies propositions with certain kinds of facts in which objects, properties and relations are bound together by amalgams of syntactic and semantic relations. Hanks, Peter. 'Recent Work on Propositions.'Philosophy Compass 4 (2009): 1[ndash]18. A survey of work on propositions since the mid-1990s that complements this teaching and learning guide. Contains responses to Jubien's and Hofweber's arguments against propositions and critical discussions of Schiffer's pleonastic propositions and King's theory of propositional structure. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/propositions/ Propositions (Matthew McGrath) http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/propositions-structured/ Structured Propositions (Jeffrey King) http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/propositions-singular/ Singular Propositions (Greg Fitch) The following partial syllabus can be used as a unit on recent work on propositions in graduate level courses in philosophy of language or metaphysics. Week 1: A Substitution Puzzle About Propositional Designators King, Jeffrey. 'Designating Propositions'. Moltmann, Friederike. 'Propositional Attitudes Without Propositions.'Synthese 135 (2003): 77[ndash]118. Week 2: The Benacerraf Problem and Propositional Representation Benacerraf, Paul. 'What Numbers Could Not Be.'Philosophical Review 74 (1965): 47[ndash]73. Jubien, Michael. 'Propositions and the Objects of Thought.' Week 3: Propositional Quantification Hofweber, Thomas. 'Inexpressible Properties and Propositions'. Hofweber, Thomas. 'A Puzzle about Ontology.'Noûs 39 (2005): 256[ndash]83. Week 4: Schiffer on Pleonastic Propositions Schiffer, Stephen. 'Language-Created Language-Independent Entities.'Philosophical Topics 24 (1996): 149[ndash]67. Schiffer, Stephen. The Things We Mean, chs 1[ndash]2. Week 5: King on Structured Propositions King, Jeffrey. 'Structured Propositions and Complex Predicates.'Noûs, 29 (1995): 516[ndash]35. King, Jeffrey. The Nature and Structure of Content, chs 1[ndash]3. Why does identifying propositions with sentence intensions, e.g. sets of possible worlds, 'require the attitudes to have a particular sort of closure under logical consequence, which they clearly don't have' (Mark Richard)? How does the difference between (a) and (b) pose a threat to the existence of propositions? Bill fears that Hillary will be president. Bill fears the proposition that Hillary will be president. What is the Benacerraf problem for metaphysical reductions of propositions? Why must a proposition represent 'on its own cuff' (Michael Jubien)? Why is this a problem for the view that propositions are primitive abstract entities? What does it mean to say that propositions are structured? Give two different accounts of what propositional structure might be.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Frege on Definitions

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:15:00 -0700

Three clusters of philosophically significant issues arise from Frege's discussions of definitions. First, Frege criticizes the definitions of mathematicians of his day, especially those of Weierstrass and Hilbert. Second, central to Frege's philosophical discussion and technical execution of logicism is the so-called Hume's Principle, considered in The Foundations of Arithmetic. Some varieties of neo-Fregean logicism are based on taking this principle as a contextual definition of the operator 'the number of [hellip]', and criticisms of such neo-Fregean programs sometimes appeal to Frege's objections to contextual definitions in later writings. Finally, a critical question about the definitions on which Frege's proofs of the laws of arithmetic depend is whether the logical structures of the definientia reflect our pre-Fregean understanding of arithmetical terms. It seems that unless they do, it is unclear how Frege's proofs demonstrate the analyticity of the arithmetic in use before logicism. Yet, especially in late writings, Frege characterizes the definitions as arbitrary stipulations of the senses or references of expressions unrelated to pre-definitional understanding. One or more of these topics may be studied in a survey course in the philosophy of mathematics or a course on Frege's philosophy. The latter two topics are obviously central in a seminar in the philosophy of mathematics in general or more specialized seminars on logicism, or on mathematical definitions and concept formation. Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Trans. P. Guyer and A. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999 [1781, 1787], A7-10/B11-14, A151/B190. In the first Critique, Kant appears to give four distinct accounts of analytic judgments. The initial famous account explains analyticity in terms of the predicate-concept belonging to the subject-concept (A6[ndash]7/B11). In this passage, we also find an account of establishing analytic judgments on the basis of conceptual containments and the principle of non-contradiction. (The other accounts are in terms of 'identity' (A7/B1l), in terms of the explicative[ndash]ampliative contrast (A7/B11), and by reference to the notion of 'cognizability in accordance with the principle of contradiction' (A151/B190).) Frege, Gottlob. The Foundations of Arithmetic. Trans. J. L. Austin. 2nd ed. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1980 [1884], especially sections 1[ndash]4, 87[ndash]91. Frege here criticizes and reformulates Kant's account of analyticity. Central to Frege's account is the provability of an analytic statement on the basis of (Frege's) logic and definitions that express analyses of (mathematical, especially arithmetical) concepts. Frege, Gottlob. Review of E. G. Husserl. 'Philosophie der Arithmetik I [1894],' in Frege, Collected Papers. Ed. B. McGuinness. Trans. M. Black et al. Oxford: Blackwell, 1984. 195[ndash]209. In this review, Frege responds to Husserl's charge that Frege's definitions fail to capture our intuitive pre-analytic arithmetical concepts by claiming that the adequacy of mathematical definitions is measured, not by their expressing the same senses, but merely by their having the same references, as pre-definitional vocabulary. It follows not only that Husserl's criticism is unfounded, but also that there can be alternative, equally legitimate, definitions of mathematical terms. Frege, 'Logic in Mathematics,' in Frege, Posthumous Writings. Trans. P. Long and R. White. Oxford: Blackwell, 1979 [1914]. 203[ndash]50. These are a set of lecture notes including, among other things, an account of proper definitions as mere abbreviation of complex signs by simple ones, in contrast to definitions which purport to express the analyses of existing concepts. Frege here claims that if there is any doubt whether a definition purporting to express an analysis succeeds in capturing the senses of the pre-definitional expressions, then the definition fails as an analysis, and should be regarded as the introduction of an entirely new expression abbreviating the definiens. Picardi, Eva. 'Frege on Definition and Logical Proof,'Temi e Prospettive della Logica e della Filosofia della Scienza Contemporanee. i vol. Eds. C. Cellucci and G. Sambin. Bologna: Cooperativa Libraria Universitaria Editrice Bologna, 1988. 227[ndash]30. Picardi sets out forcefully the view that unless Frege's definitions capture the meanings of existing arithmetical terms, his logicism cannot have the epistemological significance he takes it to have. Dummett, Michael. 'Frege and the Paradox of Analysis,' in Dummett, Frege and other Philosophers. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991. 17[ndash]52. Dummett agrees with Picardi's view and analyzes the philosophical pressures that led Frege to the account of definition in 'Logic in Mathematics.' Especially significant is Dummett's claim of the centrality of the transparency of sense [ndash] that if one grasps the senses of any two expressions, one must know whether they have the same sense [ndash] in Frege's account. Benacerraf, Paul. 'Frege: The Last Logicist,'Midwest Studies in Philosophy. vol. 6. Eds. P. French, T. Uehling, and H. Wettstein. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1981. 17[ndash]35. Frege's aims, on Benacerraf's reading, are primarily mathematical. Frege was interested in traditional philosophical issues such as the analyticity of arithmetic only to the extent that they can be exploited for the mathematical goal of proving previously unproven arithmetical statements. Hence, Frege never had any serious interest in or need for showing that his definitions of arithmetical terms reflect existing arithmetical conceptions. Weiner, Joan. 'The Philosopher Behind the Last Logicist,' in Frege: Tradition and Influence. Ed. C. Wright. Oxford: Blackwell, 1984. 57[ndash]79. Weiner argues that on Frege's view, prior to his definitions of arithmetical terms the references of such expressions are in fact not known by those who use arithmetical vocabulary. Thus, in Foundations, Frege operated with a 'hidden agenda' (263) namely, replacing existing arithmetic with a new science based on stipulative definitions that assign new senses to key arithmetical terms. Tappenden, Jamie. 'Extending Knowledge and 'Fruitful Concepts': Fregean Themes in the Foundations of Mathematics.'Noûs 29 (1995): 427[ndash]67. Tappenden argues that Frege takes his crucial innovation over previous practices and accounts of mathematical concept formation to be the role of quantificational structure made possible by his logical discoveries. Horty, John. Frege on Definitions: A Case Study of Semantic Content. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. A useful interpretation of Frege's views of definition, together with suggestive extensions for resolving the issues framing Frege's views. Shieh, Sanford. 'Frege on Definitions,'Philosophy Compass 3/5 (2008): 992[ndash]1012. A more detailed account of Frege's views on definition and the philosophical issues they raise, surveying and discussing critically the main substantive and interpretive issues. On Frege http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/frege/ On the Paradox of Analysis http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/analysis/ The following is a 3-week module that can be incorporated into fairly focused historically oriented graduate-level seminars on logicism or on the paradox of analysis. It is also possible to compress the material into 2 weeks in an undergraduate or graduate class Frege's thought in general. Week I: Background, Kant on Analyticity; Definition in Foundations, Review of Husserl, and 'Logic in Mathematics' Readings Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason, A7[ndash]10/B11[ndash]14. Frege, Gottlob. The Foundations of Arithmetic, sections 1[ndash]4, 87[ndash]91. Frege, Gottlob. Review of E. G. Husserl, Philosophie der Arithmetik I. Frege, Gottlob. 'Logic in Mathematics.' Optional Proops, Ian. 'Kant's Conception of Analytic Judgment,'Philosophy and Phenomenological Research LXX, 3 (2005): 588[ndash]612. Week II: The Supposed Paradox of Analysis, Picardi and Dummett; Bypassing Traditional Epistemological Issues About Mathematics, Benacerraf Readings Picardi, Eva. 'Frege on Definition and Logical Proof.' Dummett, Michael. 'Frege and the Paradox of Analysis.' Benacerraf, Paul. 'Frege: The Last Logicist.' Optional Tappenden, Jamie. 'Extending Knowledge and 'Fruitful Concepts': Fregean Themes in the Foundations of Mathematics.' Week III: Weiner's Hidden Agenda Interpretation Readings Weiner, Joan. 'The Philosopher Behind the Last Logicist.' Optional Weiner, Joan. Frege in Perspective. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990. To what extent is Frege's account of analyticity in Foundations a rejection, and to what extent an updating, of Kant's view of analyticity? According to Picardi it 'would be incomprehensible' how Frege's proofs tells us anything about the arithmetic we already have unless his 'definitions [are] somehow responsible to the meaning of [arithmetical] sentences as these are understood' (228). Why does she hold this? Why does Dummett agree with her? Do you think Frege's logicism needs to address this worry? What are the major differences and continuities in Frege's discussions of definition in mathematics in Foundations, the review of Husserl and 'Logic in Mathematics'? Frege writes that definitions must prove their worth by being fruitful. He also says that nothing can be proven using a proper definition that cannot be proven without it. Are these claims consistent? Why or why not? Weiner held that in Foundations Frege had 'hidden agenda.' What, according to her, is this agenda? How does this fit with Frege's later views of definition? What are Frege's main complaints about Weierstrass's definitions in 'Logic in Mathematics'? Are these criticisms consistent with Frege's account of 'definition proper' in the same text? What, if anything, is the relation between Frege's critique of Hilbert's use of definitions and Frege's later views of definitions?

God and the Natural World in the Seventeenth Century: Space, Time, and Causality

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:15:00 -0700

The employment by seventeenth-century natural philosophers of stock theological notions like creation, immensity, and eternity in the articulation and justification of emerging physical programs disrupted a delicate but longstanding balance between transcendent and immanent conceptions of God. By playing a prominent (if not always leading) role in many of the major scientific developments of the period, God became more intimately involved with natural processes than at any time since antiquity. In this discussion, I am particularly concerned with the causal and spatio-temporal relations between God and nature in the seventeenth century as recent scholarship has revealed how dramatically traditional conceptions of these relations were transformed by philosophers and scientists like Descartes, Malebranche, More, and Newton.

Cartesian Sensations

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:15:00 -0700

Descartes maintained that sensations of color and the like misrepresent the material world in normal circumstances. Some prominent scholars have argued that, to explain this Cartesian view, we must attribute to Descartes a causal account of sensory representation. I contend that neither the arguments motivating this reading nor the textual evidence offered in its support is sufficient to justify such attribution. Both textual and theoretical reasons point in the direction of an (at least partial) internalist account of Descartes' views on sensory representation.

Buck-Passing Accounts of Value

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:15:00 -0700

This paper explores the so-called buck-passing accounts of value. These views attempt to use normative notions, such as reasons and ought to explain evaluative notions, such as goodness and value. Thus, according to Scanlon's well-known view, the property of being good is the formal, higher-order property of having some more basic properties that provide reasons to have certain kind of valuing attitudes towards the objects. I begin by tracing some of the long history of such accounts. I then describe the arguments which are typically used to motivate these views. The rest of this article investigates how some of the central details of the buck-passing accounts should be specified, and what kind of problems these views face.

Computational Methods for Normalizing Acoustic Vowel Data for Talker Differences

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 23:05:00 -0700

Direct acoustic[ndash]phonetic comparison of vowels produced by different talkers can be difficult due to the effects of anatomical and physiological talker differences on first and second formant frequencies. Since the mid-1960s, numerous computational algorithms have been proposed to normalize formant frequency measures and reduce the effects of talker-specific variability. These algorithms vary widely in their conceptualization: some require samples of the entire vowel space (vowel extrinsic), whereas others can be conducted on a single vowel class (vowel intrinsic); some are based on a single-scale factor to align broad classes of talkers (such as females and males), whereas others use scale factors and/or vowel space ranges for individual talkers to align their vowel systems in the same acoustic[ndash]phonetic space. In this study, an overview of the most commonly used normalization algorithms is provided and the advantages and disadvantages of each of the approaches are discussed.

Mirror Neurons, the Motor System and Language: From the Motor Theory to Embodied Cognition and Beyond

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 23:05:00 -0700

The motor theory of speech perception states that phonetic segments in the acoustic speech stream activate stored motor commands in the brain that give rise to perception of discrete speech sounds. The motor theory fell out of favor when growing evidence from lesion and behavioral studies led aspects of the theory to appear untenable. However, with the recent discovery of mirror neurons and their potential role in action understanding, interest in the motor theory of speech perception is renewed. We review the function and properties of mirror neurons in monkeys, and briefly describe the current literature that focuses on the role of a putative human mirror system in cognition and language processing. Further, we describe proposed evidence for the involvement of the motor system in perceptive speech processing, and point out ambiguities in the literature that arise from the tight coupling of sensory and motor processes in speech comprehension. An alternative theory proposing that sensory representations in superior temporal cortex are mapped onto frontal production networks is offered. We cite evidence that confirms the failure of the motor theory to accurately describe perceptive processes in speech, and promote the conclusion that speech representations are fundamentally sensory in nature.

The Sociolinguistics of Ethnicity in Pittsburgh

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 23:04:00 -0700

Recently, there has been a growing interest in regional variation within African American English. This study reviews a work done on local speech in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, discussing trends for both African American and White ethnic groups. Just as scholars have found in other geographic regions, in Pittsburgh, African Americans and Whites share a number of feature characteristics of the local dialect, but remain distinct in a number of other ways. Research in Pittsburgh, as elsewhere, highlights the complexity, rather than the homogeneity, of African American speech across the country, as speakers exhibit alignment to both regional and supraregional ethnic linguistic norms.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: The Study of Variation from Two Perspectives

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 23:04:00 -0700

The study of language variation is fundamental to both sociolinguistics and forensic linguistics (FL). By understanding the similarities between the two fields, sociolinguists can begin to contribute to forensic issues, such as speaker identification. In forensic speaker identification, the linguist determines whether an unknown voice belongs to a known speaker. An example of this would be determining the likelihood that a recorded extortion threat was made by a particular suspect. FL is an applied field which is not only valuable to academia but to society as well. In the United States, many FL tasks are performed by nonlinguists; however, a few sociolinguists have stepped up to the challenge. Sociolinguists are especially well equipped for forensic casework, as they are already familiar with working with real speech and its inherent variation. In this guide, forensic speaker identification is approached by analyzing five types of variation, which sociolinguists are amply familiar with: variation across groups of speakers, variation within speakers, variation between speakers, variation over time, and variation in perception. Rose, Philip. 2002. Forensic speaker identification. New York: Taylor & Francis. A must for anyone interested in forensic phonetics. This is a thorough introduction to forensic phonetics that promotes a Bayesian (likelihood ratio or LR) framework for interpreting the importance of various linguistic parameters. Detailed coverage is given to all aspects of forensic speaker identification, with helpful comments on the forensic significance of several phonetic issues. Hollien, Harry. 2002. Forensic voice identification. London: Academic Press. Another comprehensive book about forensic phonetics. This is a great reference and introduction. The writing style is informal and enjoyable, and the book is peppered with interesting short stories about previous cases. International Journal of Speech, Language, and the Law (formerly Forensic Linguistics). The go-to journal for FL. This is certainly not limited to forensic phoneticians; originally entitled Forensic Linguistics, the journal changed its name in 2003 to reflect a broader scope of language and law issues. Membership in IAFPA and/or IAFL (see Internet Resources that follow) includes subscription to this. Coulthard, Malcolm and Alison Johnson. 2008. An introduction to forensic linguistics. New York: Routledge. This is a good introduction to the many varied topics that fall within the domain of FL, such as text analysis and legal language. It is great for a class on FL in general that will not be focusing on forensic phonetics. Shuy, Roger W. 2006. Linguistics in the courtroom: a practical guide. New York: Oxford University Press. Once the linguist begins to get involved with forensic cases, this handbook will explain how to go about the actual casework. It gives practical advice for every step of the case, from starting out to dealing with attorneys to courtroom testimony. Milroy, Lesley and Matthew Gordon. 2003. Sociolinguistics: method and interpretation. Malden, MA: Blackwell. This is what every sociolinguist should read before launching a research project. It explains the history and theory behind every aspect of sociolinguistic methodology. Bayley, Robert and Ceil Lucas. 2007. Sociolinguistic variation: theories, methods, and applications. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. An up-to-date overview of the field of sociolinguistics. Each chapter is a different topic written by a leading expert. Sections include theories, methods, and applications. Chambers, J. K., Peter Trudgill, and Natalie Schilling-Estes. 2002. The handbook of language variation and change. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Another great resource that covers the spectrum of language variation research. The chapters are again written by sociolinguistic leaders. Sections include methodologies, linguistic structure, social factors, contact, and language and societies. Wolfram, Walt and Natalie Schilling-Estes. 2002. American English: dialects and variation. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Good introduction to dialects and language variation in the United States. International Association of Forensic Phonetics and Acoustics (IAFPA): Website for the International Association of Forensic Phonetics and Acoustics. Includes a code of practice and resolutions, as well as association and conference information. International Association of Forensic Linguists (IAFL): Website for the International Association of Forensic Linguists. Includes an expansive bibliography (through 2002) in addition to association and conference information. Forensic-Linguistics List: A fairly active e-mail listserv dealing with various FL themes. Dynamic Variability in Speech (DyViS): Website for the Dynamic Variability in Speech project. The authors of a large forensic phonetic study of British English provide a detailed overview of their project, along with downloadable reports of their results. Thomas, Erik R. and Tyler Kendall. 2007. NORM: The vowel normalization and plotting suite: A fantastic free resource that allows you to normalize and plot vowels. Includes explanations of multiple normalization techniques so you can use one that is appropriate for your data. It is simple to use, explained clearly, and cranks out color plots that look great. Forensic phonetics is the primary focus of this course. It approaches this from a variationist perspective, targeting students with an interest in and knowledge of sociolinguistics. The class is for advanced undergraduate and graduate students (knowledge of statistics is beneficial, although not required). The recommended text is Forensic Speaker Identification (2002) by Philip Rose. Week 1: What is variation? Why and how do we study variation? This is a general review of variation and sociolinguistics, followed by a brief introduction to FL. Different types of variations are presented. Suggested reading: Milroy, Lesley and Matthew Gordon. 2003. Sociolinguistics: method and interpretation, chapter 1. Malden, MA: Blackwell. 1[ndash]22. Brunner, Elizabeth. 2009. The study of variation from two perspectives. Language and Linguistics Compass 3(3).734[ndash]750. Rose, chapter 1, 1[ndash]8. Week 2: Class corpus collection and creation Students learn about the corpus they will create as a class and begin recruiting participants. This should be completed by Week 5. Suggested reading: Nolan, Francis, Kirsty McDougall, Gea de Jong, and Toby Hudson. 2006. A forensic phonetic study of 'dynamic' sources of variability in speech: The DyViS project. Proceedings of the 11th Australasian International Conference on Speech Science and Technology, ed. by Paul Warren and Catherine I. Watson, 13[ndash]18, Auckland, New Zealand, 6[ndash]8 December. Byrne, Catherine and Paul Foulkes. 2004. The 'mobile phone effect' on vowel formants. International Journal of Speech, Language, and the Law 11(1).83[ndash]102. Week 3: Why and how do we study FL? The class starts to delve deeper into the field of FL, discussing the ethical and practical questions associated with it. Suggested reading: Rose, chapter 2, 9[ndash]31. Braun, Angelika and Hermann J. Künzel. 1998. Is forensic speaker identification unethical [ndash] or can it be unethical not to do it? Forensic Linguistics 5(1).10[ndash]21. Week 4: How do we study FL (continued) This week focuses on the different types of forensic speaker identification. It also includes how not to do FL, discussing the denounced concept of voiceprints. Suggested reading: Rose, chapter 5, 81[ndash]123. Week 5: Research Methods in FL The technical details of FL analysis are introduced, including the parameters (features) which are used. The LR is introduced, and Learning Exercise #1 is used to demonstrate this (see next section). Suggested reading: Rose, chapter 3, 33[ndash]53 and chapter 4, 55[ndash]79. Week 6: Variation across groups of speakers This begins the in-depth coverage of the five types of variations introduced during the first week. Dialectal variation is discussed, both in itself and from a forensic standpoint. Suggested reading: Dumas, Bethany K. 1990. Voice identification in a criminal law context. American Speech 65(4).341[ndash]348. Shuy, Roger W. 1990. Dialect as evidence in law cases. Journal of English Linguistics 23.195[ndash]208. Labov, William, Sharon Ash, and Charles Boberg. 2006. The Atlas of North American English, chapter 11. New York: Walter de Gruyter. 119[ndash]151. Week 7: Variation across groups of speakers (continued) This continues the focus on variation across dialect groups. It also stresses the need for knowledge of the distribution of linguistic features throughout the population. Learning Exercise #2 gives students experience with dialectal variation. Suggested reading: Labov, William and Wendell A. Harris. 1994. Addressing social issues through linguistic evidence. Language and the law, ed. by John Gibbons, 265[ndash]305. New York: Longman. Hudson, Toby, Gea de Jong, Kirsty McDougall, Philip Harrison, and Francis Nolan. 2007. F0 statistics for 100 young male speakers of Standard Southern British English. Proceedings of the 16th International Congress of Phonetic Sciences, Saarbrucken, ed. by Jürgen Trouvain and William J. Barry, 1809[ndash]12. Germany, 6[ndash]10 August. Week 8: Variation within speakers The next type of variation centers on style-shifting and the resulting differences within speakers. Suggested reading: Schilling-Estes, Natalie. 2002. Investigating stylistic variation. The handbook of language variation and change, ed. by J.K. Chambers, Peter Trudgill, and Natalie Schilling-Estes, 375[ndash]401. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Bahr, Ruth Huntley, and Kimberley J. Pass. 1996. The influence of style-shifting on voice identification. Forensic Linguistics 3(1).24[ndash]38. Week 9: Variation within speakers (continued) This continues looking at intra-speaker variation, particularly intentional changes such as disguise. Learning Exercise #3 is used. Suggested reading: Blatchford, Helen and Paul Foulkes. 2006. Identification of voices in shouting. International Journal of Speech, Language, and the Law 13(2).241[ndash]254. Masthoff, Herbert. 1996. A report on a voice disguise experiment. Forensic Linguistics 3(1).160[ndash]167. Week 10: Variation between speakers The concept of an idiolect is introduced and the investigation of individuals is discussed. Suggested reading: Hazen, Kirk. 2006. Idiolect. The encyclopaedia of language and linguistics, 2nd edn., Vol. 5, ed. by Keith Brown, 512[ndash]514. Oxford, UK: Elsevier. Schreier, Daniel. 2006. The backyard as a dialect boundary: individuation, linguistic heterogeneity, and sociolinguistic eccentricity in a small speech community. Journal of English Linguistics 34(1).26[ndash]57. Week 11: Variation between speakers (continued) Researching individual differences using siblings is presented. Learning Exercise #4 is used. Suggested reading: Loakes, Deborah. 2003. A forensic phonetic analysis of the speech patterns of non-identical twins. Melbourne Papers in Linguistics and Applied Linguistics 3(1).57[ndash]75. Week 12: Variation over time The concepts and problems of real and apparent time are discussed and related to the issue of noncontemporary speech samples in FL. Suggested reading: Bailey, Guy. 2002. Real and apparent time. The handbook of language variation and change, ed. by J.K. Chambers, Peter Trudgill, and Natalie Schilling-Estes, 312[ndash]332. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Hollien, Harry and Reva Schwartz. 2000. Aural-perceptual speaker identification: problems with noncontemporary samples. Forensic Linguistics 7(2).199[ndash]211. Week 13: Variation in perception The importance of perception is addressed, particularly focusing on those factors that can influence the perception of earwitnesses. Learning Exercise #5 demonstrates how to conduct a voice line-up. Suggested reading: Thomas, Erik R. 2002. Sociophonetic applications of speech perception experiments. American Speech 77(2).115[ndash]147. Yarmey, A. Daniel. 2004. Common-sense beliefs, recognition and the identification of familiar and unfamiliar speakers from verbal and non-linguistic vocalizations. International Journal of Speech, Language, and the Law 11(2).267[ndash]277. Week 14: Summing it all up Forensic speaker identification is reviewed. Ends with an overview of drawing conclusions about a speaker based on their voice (the areas of linguistic asylum and linguistic profiling) and a class debate about these issues. Suggested reading: Rose, chapter 12, 327[ndash]335. Eades, Diana and Jacques Arends. 2004. Using language in the determination of national origin of asylum seekers: an introduction. International Journal of Speech, Language, and the Law 11(2).179[ndash]199. Baugh, John. 2007. Attitudes toward variation and ear-witness testimony. Sociolinguistic variation: theories, methods, and applications, ed. by Robert Bayley and Ceil Lucas, 338[ndash]348. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Week 15: Project presentations Students present the results of their projects. Learning Exercise #1: LR demonstration The purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate the Likelihood Ratio (LR) and how it works. The point of this exercise is NOT to labor over a calculator. (Remember, this is not a math class. We do not want students to get bogged down in statistical details and give up!) So stick to the basics of what the LR is comparing. Walk students through the examples given in Rose, chapter 11. (As you are presenting it, they do not need to read it.) Make sure to show this visually, for example, by including spectrograms and tables (like Rose's Tables 11.2 and 11.3). Ask students about the different cells within the tables to ensure they understand them. They do not necessarily need to do the math themselves, but they need to be able to verbally express what the various LRs mean. Learning Exercise #2: Detecting dialect differences The purpose of this exercise is to help students realize the difficulties of discriminating between similar dialects, especially if they are unfamiliar with them. Play recordings of multiple speakers to students. (You may obtain speech samples from a variety of electronic corpora, depending on your institution's access, or from your own research.) Ask the students how many different dialects are represented. Ask students which speakers belong to the same dialects. Which features/parameters are they using to make these distinctions? Discuss the role of familiarity. For example, can students in South Dakota tell the difference between NYC and Boston dialects? Can students in Ohio tell the difference between Texas and Georgia dialects? Contrast this to dialects that students are likely to be very familiar with. Learning Exercise #3: Single speaker style-shifting The goal of this exercise is to highlight the differences within a single person's speech. Record someone (perhaps yourself or a helpful acquaintance) in a variety of speaking situations. These may include, for example, speaking in their work setting, speaking with their spouse, with their children, on the phone with older relatives, to a store clerk, when they have a cold, etc. In addition to this, record them deliberately disguising their voice in a variety of ways. Play (short clips of) these recordings to students and ask them to identify five features/parameters that remain the same across most or all of the speaking situations and five features that vary among most or all of the speaking situations. This will be fairly difficult to do auditorily, with many recordings, but it should get the point across. You may also do some acoustic analyses ahead of time so you can show them additional similarities and differences. Learning Exercise #4: Sibling similarities and differences The purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate the difficulty of differentiating the speech of two speakers with similar voices. Record two siblings of the same gender (ideally twins). Play several short clips of the recordings and ask students to determine if the voices they hear are from the same or different speakers (mix up the answers, of course). Discuss whether and why this is an easy or difficult task. Play the two speakers again and ask the students to identify three features they share and three features that differentiate them. (If this task is too easy, you might want to use speakers whose voices are more similar.) In addition to the auditory features identified, discuss and show acoustic features that you discerned beforehand. Learning Exercise #5: Earwitness experience The point of this exercise is for students to participate in a voice line-up. Enlist an acquaintance with whom your students are unfamiliar. Have this person stick their head into the room and interrupt at the beginning of the class. Continue with the lesson. Towards the end of the period, inform students that they are now going to participate in a voice line-up as earwitnesses of the earlier speaker. Present the line-up you have already created (see Forensic Linguistics, volume 3, issue 1, 1996, for instructions), requiring students to follow recommended line-up procedures. Reveal the correct answer. (For a twist, you could have a target-absent line-up so that the correct answer is none of the voices heard.) Discuss the students' accuracy and the task itself. At the beginning of the course, create a class corpus that can be used for the project. Students are responsible for finding 2[ndash]3 participants each. This may be a very involved corpus (such as the one based on the DyViS project, Nolan et al. 2006), but the type and quality of data is at the professor's discretion. Regardless of the corpus' structure, ensure that each participant is recorded using a variety of styles. Also, make sure the participants are all similar (matched for gender, age, socioeconomic status, dialect, etc.), ideally including some siblings. The students will then use this corpus as their data for the project. There are five topics to choose from (shown next), based on the types of variation presented in class. Students will present brief presentations on their project during the last week of the course. Similarities across multiple speakers in the corpus: begin to gather population data for this corpus. Stylistic variation: choose 1[ndash]3 speakers in this corpus and analyze the similarities and differences within each speaker's different styles. Sibling variation: analyze the similarities and differences between 2[ndash]3 speakers who sound similar (ideally siblings/twins). Differences over time: interview one of the original participants 2 months later and determine what, if any, differences exist in their non-contemporary speech samples. Voice line-up: create an earwitness study and conduct it with 4[ndash]6 people who are not familiar with the speakers. What is variation? How is it the focus of both sociolinguistic and FL research? What are the strengths and weaknesses of auditory and acoustic approaches? What are typical parameters/features that are studied with each approach? What is an LR? How does it apply to linguistic variation? Why are large-scale population studies important to FL? How can dialectal studies be important in some FL casework? Why is knowledge about style important to FL? Explain the concept of an idiolect. What are some ways of distinguishing individual voices? Explain the idea of real and apparent time. How is this relevant to FL? What is a voice (earwitness) line-up? What are some limitations of the speakers' perceptions?

Shakespeare and Elizabeth I: Icons and their Afterlives1

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:33:00 -0700

Shakespeare and Queen Elizabeth I are each potent cultural icons in their own right, but from the 18th century to the present day their afterlives have been intertwined and mutually dependent. Despite the absence of evidence of any encounter between them, and the scant and ambivalent references to Elizabeth in Shakespeare's works, many different kinds of writers and artists have imagined a meeting, or patronage relationship, or even intimacy between them. This article surveys this joint iconography as it has appeared not only in historical fictions, historical paintings, and costume-dramas on film, but also in Shakespeare biography, Shakespeare criticism and the Shakespeare authorship controversy. It considers the role of this mythology in the formation of national identity in both Britain and America. It also briefly surveys recent critical work on the individual afterlives of Shakespeare and Elizabeth.

Literary Criticism's Road Scholars at the American Century's Turn

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:32:00 -0700

Literary scholarship's spatial turn has produced a number of studies exploring the site of the road and its automobile culture. This article surveys seven monographs published between 1996 and 2007 that analyze works of American fiction and nonfiction for their representation of highway narratives. These works (by Ronald Primeau, Roger Casey, Kris Lackey, Rowland Sherrill, Deborah Paes de Barros, Katie Mills, and Deborah Clarke) explore the genre's rendering of mobility, identity, and politics on the 20th-century's roads of America. The essay compares these analyses for their critical methods and offers a sense of what work remains in the ongoing study of road narratives.

Romantic Federalism: Atlantic Republican Literature between Cosmopolitanism and Confederation

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:31:00 -0700

The age of democratic revolution in the Atlantic world (1776[ndash]1815) was marked by writing whose politics have been described as both patriotic and universalist. Far from reflecting a simple contradiction in revolutionary republicanism, these two strains reflect the simultaneous development of federalist and cosmopolitan discourses in the late Enlightenment and early Romanticism. This essay argues that we need a paradoxical conception of 'Romantic federalism' to account for transatlantic republican discourse in this period. Romantic federalism, in this essay's account, facilitated both an ethnological interest in human diversity and a universalist understanding of popular sovereignty. The essay first takes as its case studies an anonymous visionary pamphlet, entitled The Golden Age; Constantin-François Volney's best-known work, The Ruins; and the literary legacy of Anacharsis Cloots, the 'Orator of the Human Race'. The essay concludes with a review of recent literary studies of both federalism and nationalism, and suggests ways that overemphasis on the nation form has led to neglect not only of republicanism but also of imperialism.

Using Websites to Disseminate Research on Urban Spatialities

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 22:32:00 -0700

This paper reviews a selection of websites that explore urban geographies. Many sites use the web as a depository for large amounts of research data. However, many are using websites to disseminate research findings, and the paper focuses on these. It suggests that, thus far, there are three significant ways in which urban researchers are exploiting the potentialities of web technologies to interpret urban spaces: by evoking a sense of the complexity of urban spatialities; by inviting site visitors to engage actively and performatively with the research materials; and by emphasising the sensory qualities of urban spaces. The paper discusses how one website in particular invites its visitors to engage with complex, sensory urban spatialities. The paper compares geographers' use of collage and montage as part of this discussion, and ends by reflecting on current work and commenting on its future development.

Climate–Suicide Relationships: A Research Problem in Need of Geographic Methods and Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 22:32:00 -0700

Many locations on Earth experience peaks in suicide rates during the late spring and early summer, and there is evidence that climatic variables may be causal factors. Beyond this seasonal characteristic, there is little consistency in the results of various climate[ndash]suicide studies. Almost all of the published climate[ndash]suicide research has been conducted by mental health experts with relatively little input from geographers and/or climatologists, thus highlighting the need for future collaborative efforts. Previous research has shown how the use of a single statistical method, as opposed to multiple methods, can yield misleading or confusing results. Future research on climate[ndash]suicide relationships should allow for more consideration for spatial and temporal variations in climate, culture, demographics, etc. Ultimately, improved methods and the use of cross-disciplinary methods will help arrive at consistent results that identify climate variables that significantly affect suicide rates, if any exist.

Women and Property in Late Eighteenth-Century Fiction: Gendered Property and Generic Belonging in Charlotte Smith and Mary Wollstonecraft

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:35:00 -0700

The relationship between women and property has been a central investigative concern for literary scholars in recent years. While there can be little doubt that women made up an important part of the increased print market and audience of the 18th century, their participation in other aspects of public life remained highly regulated and constrained by legal requirement and cultural conventions. Yet print offered women an opportunity to explore new kinds of property and foster new communities of sympathetic readers equally versed in literary convention and real-life experiences of oppression. Writing at the end of a century of dramatic change in marriage legislation, property law, and social expectations, Mary Wollstonecraft and Charlotte Smith examine the relationship between gender and genre through the lens of property and ownership. Their novels challenge the limits of generic representation and gesture towards the paradoxical construction of women as marginal and central to the inheritance of real property. Most interestingly, for the purposes of this paper, both demonstrate a keen awareness of the importance of genre and the central role of narrative, not only in fiction but also in relation to discourses that shape women's roles in and relationship with families, social groups, and national communities.

Archipelagic Orinda? Katherine Philips and the Writing of Welsh Women's Literary History

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:34:00 -0700

This essay engages in current debates concerning the writing of early modern women's 'archipelagic' literary history with specific reference to the 17th-century poet Katherine Philips (1632[ndash]1664), known as the 'matchless Orinda'. Taking into account literary scholarship on both women's writing and British studies, the essay argues that both Wales and Anglophone Welsh women writers need to be incorporated into the debate if we are to have a genuinely inclusive archipelagic picture of early modern literary practices. The essay asks in what ways Katherine Philips can be discussed as a Welsh writer in an archipelagic frame and how this reassessment might impact on how we read her poetry. Further areas of investigation opened up by taking Katherine Philips as a case study include the extent to which Anglophone and Welsh women writers can be compared in the early modern period. The conclusion raises the possibility that there may have been little contact between the two literatures of Wales as practiced by early modern women writers.

Bartolomé de las Casas and the African Slave Trade

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 21:33:00 -0700

A revisionist view of Bartolomé de las Casas as the 'author' of the introduction of African slaves to the Indies/Americas in the early 16th century. The article details Las Casas' thinking and actions and concludes that while Las Casas did[mdash]among other contemporaries[mdash]suggest the importation of African slaves to lift the burden of oppression off the Amerindians, his perspective and view was altered radically in the last third of his life. The article explores the meaning of African slavery in the context of the place and time where Las Casas grew up[mdash]Andalucia in southern Spain[mdash]where slavery was quite different from the way it developed on the plantations of the Americas. And the article relates how Las Casas' theoretical and practical defense of Amerindians eventually was extended by Las Casas' into a defense of liberty for all men, including African slaves.

Corruption in Africa – Part 2

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 21:33:00 -0700

In order to succeed in minimizing corruption in the African countries, one must start by examining the nature of institutional arrangements in each country with a review to modifying them. This calls for the reconstruction and reconstitution of the post-colonial state through democratic constitution making to provide a new set of laws and institutions that reflects the values of each country's relevant stakeholders. Most of today's African countries have incentive structures, which actually encourage and enhance corruption. Increasing government intervention in the market-place is not likely to reduce corruption as the evidence from more than 50 years of government attempts to control venality in Africa's public sectors shows. The most effective way to deal with corruption in Africa is to engage the people in comprehensive institutional reforms that modify existing incentives and produce new ones, which are capable of successfully inducing participants in both political and economic markets to undertake only activities that produce the outcomes desired by society. Thus, to cleanup corruption from the African economies, improve both productive and allocative efficiency, and generally enhance development, national leaders must engage their people in democratic institutional reforms to provide society with transparent, accountable, and participatory governance structures.

The Changing Fortunes of Britain's 'Heritage' of Historic Buildings since 1945

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 04:26:00 -0700

The past 60 years have seen a dramatic turnaround in public attitudes to historic buildings in the UK, shifting from contempt to veneration. This has resulted in a corresponding change in fortunes; buildings that would have been carelessly demolished 50 years ago are now protected and cherished. The historiographical literature of the period is largely dominated, in the post-war years, by despairing pleas for greater attention, funding and respect for historic buildings, written by those who championed the seemingly hopeless cause of preservation and conservation. From the mid 1970s, the climate became increasingly favourable to 'heritage' and conservation, and several restoration narratives were published by those who rebuilt ruinous historic buildings for reoccupation. In the 1980s, the circle began to turn as an 'anti-heritage' literature sprang up to challenge the conservationists; 'heritage' still has almost comic connotations in some academic circles. The current conservation debate among architectural historians and heritage supporters, crudely put, is a polarized stand-off between the Ruinists and the Restorers, with economics now edging in as a justification for interventions.

Integrating Knowledge: The Key Challenge for a New Paradigm in River Management

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 04:25:00 -0700

Claims for the arrival of a new paradigm in river management argue that substantial progress has been made away from top-down, reach-scale engineering towards catchment-scale planning, community participation, ecosystem science and adaptive management. Implementing these new principles is widely seen as essential in reversing damage to river systems and in promoting sustainable management. However, the appraisal of a shift in river management is far from straightforward across the range of biophysical and social contexts involved. Literature from the philosophy and sociology of science suggests that such transitions are usually patchy and uneven. In particular, a paradigm shift requires recognition and integration of three levels of knowledge: technical, scientific and what Aristotle referred to as 'phronesis'[ndash] contextualised and place-based wisdom built on experience and incorporation of cultural values. The application of these forms of knowledge to river management is considered by reference to recent reviews and case studies from Europe, North America and Australasia. The conclusion is that integration is still proving elusive. Claims for a wholesale paradigm shift in river management must therefore be treated with considerable caution.

From Tracking Statistics to Learning words: Statistical Learning and Lexical Acquisition

Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:29:00 -0700

By age 1, infants display remarkable sensitivity to the sound structure of their native language. Statistical learning, the process of detecting structure in the environment by tracking patterns in the input, is hypothesized to contribute to infants' early learning about sound. The present paper explores how infants' ability to track distributional information in the speech signal contributes to a fundamental aspect of language development, linking sounds with meanings in word learning. Previous research has demonstrated that infants detect several cues that mark where words begin and end in the fluent stream of speech (e.g., transitional probability, phonotactic regularities). Tracking such patterns may allow infants to isolate individual words, making them available to be associated with referents. Even very early in vocabulary development, statistical learning about which sound sequences are likely or unlikely to occur within words in the native language may also shape word learning. We propose that early experience with sound sequence regularities provides infants with a foundation for lexical acquisition.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: What is at Stake in the Cartesian Debates on the Eternal Truths?

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 05:23:00 -0700

Any study of the 'Scientific Revolution' and particularly Descartes' role in the debates surrounding the conception of nature (atoms and the void v. plenum theory, the role of mathematics and experiment in natural knowledge, the status and derivation of the laws of nature, the eternality and necessity of eternal truths, etc.) should be placed in the philosophical, scientific, theological, and sociological context of its time. Seventeenth-century debates concerning the nature of the eternal truths such as '2 + 2 = 4' or the law of inertia turn on the question of whether these truths were created along with nature, or were uncreated and subsisting in God's mind. One's answer to that question has direct consequences for conceptions of the necessity/contingency of mathematical and natural knowledge, how knowledge of such truths is accomplished by humans, and what grounds these truths. In this paper, I review the positions of four successors to Descartes' philosophy on the question of the eternal truths to illustrate how in specific ways that question with its theological, metaphysical, modal, and epistemological dimensions concerned the objectivity and certainty of the discoveries of the new science. Clarke, Desmond. Descartes' Philosophy of Science. University Park, Penn State Press, 1982. This work provides an account of Descartes as a practicing scientist whose rationalism is mitigated by reliance on experiment and experience. Author re-examines Descartes' philosophical and scientific works in this new light. Dear, Peter. Revolutionizing the Sciences: European Knowledge and its Ambitions, 1500[ndash]1700. Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2001. This work provides a useful overview of the issues and thinkers of the Scientific Revolution. Of particular relevance is chapter 8 on Cartesian and Newtonian science. Funkenstein, Amos. Theology and the Scientific Imagination from the Middle Ages to the Seventeenth Century. Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1986. This work is an advanced study of the theological and metaphysical foundations of early modern science. Discussions include questions of God's nature, God's knowledge in relation to human knowledge, providence, the laws of nature, and the truths of mathematics. In particular, chapter 3 discusses Descartes' account of the eternal truths and divine omnipotence. Garber, Daniel. Descartes' Metaphysical Physics. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1992. This work examines how Descartes' metaphysical doctrines of God, soul, and body set the groundwork for his physics. It includes a study of God and the grounds for the laws of physics (chapter 9). Henry, John. The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science. 3rd ed. New York, Palgrave, Macmillan Press, 2008. This work provides a brief, general, and informative overview of the Scientific Revolution, including the themes of method, magic, religion, and culture. Osler, Margaret J. Divine Will and the Mechanical Philosophy: Gassendi and Descartes on Contingency and Necessity in the Created World. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994. This work is an examination and comparison of the mechanical philosophies of Gassendi and Descartes. It offers in-depth discussion of the issue of voluntarism and intellectualism in the period and how that related to conceptions of laws of nature and the eternal truths. Shapin, Steven. The Scientific Revolution. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1996. This work provides a critical synthesis of as well as a guide to recent scholarship in the history of science for a general readership. Dr. Robert A. Hatch's Scientific Revolution Website: http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/rhatch/pages/03-Sci-Rev/SCI-REV-Home/ A compendium of resources for the study of Scientific Revolution. Early English Books Online: http://eebo.chadwyck.com/home Early English Books Online (EEBO) contains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473 to 1700. Early Modern Resources: http://www.earlymodernweb.org.uk/emr/ Early Modern Resources is a gateway for all those interested in finding electronic resources relating to the early modern period in history. Gallica, the Digital Library of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France: http://gallica.bnf.fr/ An ever-growing digital library which includes numerous primary and secondary texts of relevance to Descartes and his role in Scientific Revolution. Hatfield, Gary, 'René Descartes', The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Spring 2009 ed. Ed. Edward N. Zalta; URL: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2009/entries/descartes/ Slowik, Edward, 'Descartes' Physics', The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Winter 2008 ed. Ed. Edward N. Zalta; URL: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2008/entries/descartes-physics/ The following is five weeks covering Cartesian Science in a course on Descartes or the Scientific Revolution, or 17th-century theories of matter, or related themes on early modern truth and method, especially on the continent. This material is best suited to a graduate level audience, but it could be modified to suit an upper-division undergraduate course, as the readings are basically primary texts whose context and background can be explained in lectures. Week 1: Cartesian Revolution in France Scientific method Role of mathematics and experiment Certainty of scientific knowledge Readings: Hatfield, Gary, 'René Descartes', The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Spring 2009 ed. Ed. Edward N. Zalta; URL: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2009/entries/descartes/ Descartes, Discourse on Method, Parts 1[ndash]3 Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy, First Meditation. Week 2: Descartes' Scientific Treatises Mechanization and mathematization of nature Primary[ndash]secondary quality distinction Readings: Discourse on Method, Parts 4[ndash]6 Selections from Descartes' Scientific Essays: The World or Treatise on Light (ATXI 3[ndash]48); Treatise on Man (ATXI 119[ndash]202); Optics (ATVI 82[ndash]147). Slowik, Edward, 'Descartes' Physics', The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Winter 2008 ed. Ed. Edward N. Zalta; URL: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2008/entries/descartes-physics/ Henry, John, 'The Mechanical Philosophy,' chapter 5. The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science. 3rd ed. Macmillan, 2008. Week 3: Descartes' Theory of Nature Descartes' derivation of the law of conservation and the three laws of motion God's role in the metaphysics and physics of nature Readings: Selections from Principles of Philosophy, Preface (all); Letter to Elizabeth; Part I: 1[ndash]8; Part II: 1[ndash]45, 55, 64; Part III: 1[ndash]4, 15[ndash]19, 45[ndash]47; Part IV: 187[ndash]207. John Henry, 'Religion and Science,' chapter 6. The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science. 3rd ed. Macmillan, 2008. Week 4: Post-1650 Cartesian Science: Necessity and Contingency in Nature Debates on God, Creation, and Causes Readings: Easton, Patricia, 'What is at Stake in the Cartesian Debates on the Eternal Truths?' Philosophy Compass 4.2 (2009): 348[ndash]62. Malebranche, Nicolas, 'Elucidation 10', from The Search after Truth (1674). Note: All selections available in Nicolas Malebranche (1992). Philosophical Selections, edited by S. Nadler, Hackett. Gottfried Leibniz (1714) Monadology. Week 5: Causes in Nature and Morals Theodicy as an explanation of defect and evil in a lawful universe: Malebranche v. Leibniz Readings: Nicolas Malebranche, Elucidation XVI (on occasionalism), and Treatise on Nature and Grace, Discourse One, Part 1. Gottfried Leibniz (1706), Theodicy. Weekly questions can be used to focus the readings. This can be done in a web or e-mail discussion thread, as a weekly assignment, or for in class discussion. I require students to post a short paragraph in response to the question or some posting by a classmate on the question. Students are required to post by 10 a.m. the day before we meet for class on a course website. Week 1: According to Descartes, what role does skepticism play in scientific reasoning? Week 2: Comment on the following: 'But I am supposing this machine to be made by the hands of God, and so I think you may reasonably think it capable of a greater variety of movements than I could possibly imagine in it, and of exhibiting more artistry than I could possibly ascribe to it' [Treatise on Man; ATXI 120]. Week 3: What is Descartes' conception of the relation between the metaphysics and physics of nature? Week 4: Critically discuss the positions of Descartes, Malebranche, and Leibniz on what provides the foundation for the certitude of natural knowledge? Week 5: Explain why both Malebranche and Leibniz consider moral sin to be analogous to natural defect? Hold a debate on the question of the status of the eternal truths. The proposition will be Descartes' position: 'Eternal truths must be both created and necessary if certainty in science is to be possible'. Format: At the beginning of the 5-week module, students will be assigned to one of three roles: Team A, Team B, and judge's panel. Students will be given the debate proposition, but will not be told which team will take the affirmative and which team the negative until the time of the debate. Recommend a variation on the Classic Debate Format to encourage the development of argument: sequence begins with affirmative construction (8 minutes), negative construction (8 minutes), second affirmative construction (8 minutes), second negative construction (8 minutes), first negative rebuttal (4 minutes), first affirmative rebuttal (4 minutes), final negative rebuttal (4 minutes) and final affirmative rebuttal (4 minutes). Judges Panel: will consist of 3[ndash]4 judges who will assess the performance of Teams A and B. Judgment should be based on the persuasiveness of the team position. Debate will be held at the end of the fifth week, or semester, whichever makes most sense given the course length and structure. The author gratefully acknowledges the immensely helpful comments and suggestions by the participants in her graduate seminar on the Scientific Revolution: Benjamin Chicka, Sarah Jacques-Ross, Richard Ross, Marcella Stockstill, and Zohra Wolters.

Emergence in Physics

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 05:23:00 -0700

This paper begins by tracing interest in emergence in physics to the work of condensed matter physicist Philip Anderson. It provides a selective introduction to contemporary philosophical approaches to emergence. It surveys two exciting areas of current work that give good reason to re-evaluate our views about emergence in physics. One area focuses on physical systems wherein fundamental theories appear to break down. The other area is the quantum-to-classical transition, where some have claimed that a complete explanation of the behaviors and features of the objects of classical physics entirely in quantum terms is now within our grasp. We suggest that the most useful way to approach the emergent/non-emergent distinction is in epistemic terms, and more specifically that the failure of reductive explanation is constitutive of emergence in physics.

Disagreement as Evidence: The Epistemology of Controversy

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 05:22:00 -0700

How much should your confidence in your beliefs be shaken when you learn that others [ndash] perhaps 'epistemic peers' who seem as well-qualified as you are [ndash] hold beliefs contrary to yours? This article describes motivations that push different philosophers towards opposite answers to this question. It identifies a key theoretical principle that divides current writers on the epistemology of disagreement. It then examines arguments bearing on that principle, and on the wider issue. It ends by describing some outstanding questions that thinking about this issue raises.

Taste and Objectivity: The Emergence of the Concept of the Aesthetic

Sun, 23 Aug 2009 05:22:00 -0700

Can there be a philosophy of taste? This paper opens by raising some metaphilosophical questions about the study of taste [ndash] what it consists of and what method we should adopt in pursuing it. It is suggested that the best starting point for philosophising about taste is against the background of 18th-century epistemology and philosophy of mind, and the conceptual tools this new philosophical paradigm entails. The notion of aesthetic taste in particular, which emerges from a growing sense of dissatisfaction with an undifferentiated category of taste, comes to be set apart from gustatory taste on account of its normativity and aspirations to objectivity. The paradox of taste, as found in Hume and Kant, is examined, and shown to be highly relevant to contemporary metaphysical debate within aesthetics. Specifically, this paper argues that both Realists and Anti-Realists rely more heavily than assumed on the idea of taste.

Computer Simulation and the Philosophy of Science

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 05:49:00 -0700

There are a variety of topics in the philosophy of science that need to be rethought, in varying degrees, after one pays careful attention to the ways in which computer simulations are used in the sciences. There are a number of conceptual issues internal to the practice of computer simulation that can benefit from the attention of philosophers. This essay surveys some of the recent literature on simulation from the perspective of the philosophy of science and argues that philosophers have a lot to learn by paying closer attention to the practice of simulation.

Works and Performances in the Performing Arts

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 05:49:00 -0700

The primary purpose of the performing arts is to prepare and present 'artistic performances', performances that either are themselves the appreciative focuses of works of art or are instances of other things that are works of art. In the latter case, we have performances of what may be termed 'performed works', as is generally taken to be so with performances of classical music and traditional theatrical performances. In the former case, we have what may be termed 'performance-works', as, for example, in free improvisations. Where we have performances of performed works, a number of distinctive philosophical questions arise: What kind of thing is a performed work? How is it appreciated through its performances? Is 'authenticity' an artistically relevant quality of performances of performed works, and, if so, why? How much of what goes on in the performing arts is rightly viewed as the performance of performed works? Artistic performances, whether or not they are of performed works, raise philosophical questions of their own. Can a performance itself be rightly viewed as a work of art? How do improvisation and rehearsal enter into the performing arts, and how do they bear on the appreciation of artistic performances? What role does the audience play in such performances? Does the performer's use of her own body as an artistic medium, as for example in dance performance, generate special constraints on appreciation? How, finally, does what is usually classified as 'performance art' relate to activities in the performing arts more generally construed? I critically survey the ways in which these questions have been addressed by principal theorists in the field.

Teaching & Learning Guide for: Locke on Language

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 05:48:00 -0700

Although a fascination with language is a familiar feature of 20th-century empiricism, its origins reach back at least to the early modern period empiricists. John Locke offers a detailed (if sometimes puzzling) treatment of language and uses it to illuminate key regions of the philosophical topography, particularly natural kinds and essences. Locke's main conceptual tool for dealing with language is 'signification'. Locke's central linguistic thesis is this: words signify nothing but ideas. This on its face seems absurd. Don't we need words to signify things as well? But its very absurdity [ndash] our inclination to dismiss Locke as a 'linguistic idealist'[ndash] should signal to us that we have not yet understood Locke. Doing so must begin with an analysis of signification. Each of the three main interpretations on offer allows Locke to escape the charge of linguistic idealism, although they do so in very different ways. Locke's text also offers an influential account of linguistic particles, words like 'is', 'and' and 'if'. These signify, not ideas, but acts of the mind. These acts can either take place within a proposition, uniting its constituent ideas into a thought that admits of a truth-value, or they can take propositions as their objects, in which case they express attitudes like doubt, assertion and so on. Even this seemingly innocuous sketch of Locke's view is controversial, and many writers, from J.S. Mill onwards, have argued that Locke cannot make sense of propositional attitudes. Apart from the intrinsic interest of these questions, understanding how Locke thinks language works is a prerequisite for understanding his arguments against scholastic essentialism. It also illuminates later discussions of language in Berkeley, Hume and Mill. Losonsky, Michael. 'Language, Meaning, and Mind in Locke's Essay.'The Cambridge Companion to Locke's Essay. Ed. Lex Newman. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. 286[ndash]313. In addition to making some original points, Losonsky provides an excellent overview of the three main competing positions on Lockean signification: the Fregean reading, the Scholastic reading and the Indicator theory (see entries 2[ndash]5 in the following). Kretzmann, Norman. 'The Main Thesis of Locke's Semantic Theory.'Locke on Human Understanding. Ed. I. C. Tipton. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1975. 123[ndash]40. Kretzmann's influential paper offers a broadly Fregean analysis, according to which primary signification is sense and secondary, reference. Locke can then avoid the charge of linguistic idealism, as it is not the case that words signify only ideas. Ashworth, E. J. 'Do Words Signify Ideas or Things?'Journal of the History of Philosophy 19 (1981): 299[ndash]326. Ashworth rejects Kretzmann's view, partly on the grounds of anachronism, and sets Locke in his historical context. As she reads Locke, he holds a scholastic position, according to which signification amounts to 'making known' or 'expressing'. This preserves the portmanteau analysis of Kretzmann: words can primarily signify or express ideas, while secondarily signifying things. Lowe, E. J. 'Language and Meaning,' chapter 4. Locke. London: Routledge, 2005. This is a spirited defense of Locke's claim that words signify ideas against contemporary prejudices. Like Ian Hacking (see entry 7 in the following), Lowe argues that Locke is not offering a semantic theory in anything like the contemporary sense; rather, he is concerned with explaining human communication. Ott, Walter. Locke's Philosophy of Language. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004. On the interpretation offered in chapter 1, Lockean signification is indication: words signify ideas in the same sense in which clouds signify rain. If this view is correct, Locke is departing from the particular scholastic tradition Ashworth focuses on, and embracing instead a tradition running from the Stoics through Thomas Hobbes. http://www.springerlink.com/content/xv362655719101n3/ Winkler, Kenneth. 'Signification, Intention, Projection.' Forthcoming, Philosophia. http://www.springerlink.com/content/xv362655719101n3 Although previous commentators acknowledge the role of intentions in Locke's view (see especially Kretzmann's argument from the uses of words), Winkler claims that they are far more central to Locke's view than has been supposed. In particular, Winkler uses these considerations to criticize the indicator interpretation. Hacking, Ian. Why Does Language Matter to Philosophy? Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1975. Much broader in focus than these other works, Hacking's classic text has much to say about early modern views on language. Hacking argues that Hobbes and Locke do not, properly speaking, even have theories of meaning. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy's entry on Locke, by William Uzgalis: The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy's entry on Locke, author unknown: Ashworth, E. J. 'Do Words Signify Ideas or Things?'Journal of the History of Philosophy 19 (1981): 299[ndash]326. Kretzmann, Norman. 'The Main Thesis of Locke's Semantic Theory.'Locke on Human Understanding. Ed. I. C. Tipton. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1975. 123[ndash]40. Locke, Essay III. i[ndash]iii. Lowe, E. J. 'Language and Meaning,' chapter 4. Locke. London: Routledge, 2005. Locke, Essay III. vii. Ott, Walter. 'Propositional Attitudes in Modern Philosophy.'Dialogue 41 (2002): 1[ndash]18. Owen, David. 'Locke on Judgment.'The Cambridge Companion to Locke's Essay. Ed. Lex Newman. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2007. 406[ndash]35. If one wanted to explore whether and how Locke applies his semiotic theory in his anti-essentialist argument, one might add (or perhaps replace Week 3 with): Locke, Essay III. vi; III.xi. 4[ndash]22. Bolton, Martha. 'The Relevance of Locke's Theory of Ideas to his Doctrine of Nominal Essence and Anti-Essentialist Semantic Theory.'Locke. Ed. Vere Chappell. Oxford: OUP, 1998. pp. 214[ndash]225 Ott, Walter. 'Locke's Argument from Signification.'Locke Studies 2 (2002): 145[ndash]76. What is a semantic theory? What do we want out of such a theory, and does Locke even purport to provide one? What are the differences among the three main competing readings of Locke? What is at stake here? What, if anything, turns on which of them accurately captures Locke's view? How does Locke think his linguistic thesis tells against competing views, such as those of the scholastics? What is the difference between a proposition and a list? Can Locke account for this difference? There is clearly a difference between merely thinking that the cat is on the mat and asserting that it is. Can Locke account for this difference?

Identity Theories

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 05:48:00 -0700

Identity theories are those that hold that 'sensations are brain processes'. In particular, they hold that mental/psychological state kinds are identical to brain/neuroscientific state kinds. In this paper, I isolate and explain some of the key features of contemporary identity theories. They are then contrasted with the main live alternatives by means of considering the two most important lines of objection to identity theories.

Teaching & Learning Guide for Business Ethics: An Overview

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:15:00 -0700

Business ethics is often taught by philosophers, but rarely to students pursuing a degree in philosophy. It is a service course designed primarily for those in business and allied programs (e.g., marketing, accounting). These students typically have little patience for the abstract questions that occupy philosophers. So it is useful to spend time motivating the issues through a consideration of cases drawn from, or modeled on, actual events. Most texts and anthologies are brimming with such cases. From here, the instructor can transition to a careful exploration of the underlying philosophical issues. While the ethical questions raised by business activity are complex and varied, they involve familiar concepts, such as responsibility, autonomy, truth, justice, exploitation, and relativism. The diversity of the field of business ethics allows the instructor to tailor the content of the course to her audience. A course for accounting students may consider the ethical failures leading to Enron's collapse; one for marketing students may consider the ethics of advertising to children; and another for finance students may consider the ethics of insider trading. Most of these articles are widely reprinted. Milton Friedman, 'The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits', Ethical Theory and Business, 8th ed., Eds. Tom L. Beauchamp, Norman E. Bowie, and Denis G. Arnold (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2008), 51[ndash]5. Friedman argues that, within the bounds of law and 'ethical custom', managers should manage the firm as its owners want them to, which usually is to 'make as much money as possible'. R. Edward Freeman, 'A Stakeholder Theory of the Modern Corporation', Business in Ethical Focus: An Anthology, Eds. Fritz Allhoff and Anand Vaidya (Peterborough, ON: Broadview, 2008), 69[ndash]78. In the classic counterpoint to Friedman's shareholder-centered view, Freeman argues that managers should aim to 'balance' the interests of all stakeholders. W. Michael Hoffman, 'Business and Environmental Ethics', Business Ethics Quarterly 1 (1991): 169[ndash]84. Hoffman defends the view, against critics such as Norman Bowie, that firms have moral obligations to the environment beyond what is required by law. In doing so, he appeals to the view that natural things besides persons have moral status. Tara J. Radin and Patricia H. Werhane, 'Employment-at-Will, Employee Rights, and Future Directions for Employment', Business Ethics Quarterly 13 (2003): 113[ndash]30. Werhane, together with her recent collaborator Radin, is an influential contributor to philosophical discussions of job security. This article presents their latest thinking, and contains a helpful bibliography. Michael Davis, 'Some Paradoxes of Whistleblowing', Business and Professional Ethics Journal 15 (1996): 3[ndash]19. In this tightly argued article, Davis motivates the problem of whistleblowing, criticizes Richard DeGeorge's popular justification of it, and presents his own justification. Thomas Carson, 'Deception and Withholding Information in Sales', Business Ethics Quarterly 11 (2001): 275[ndash]306. How much information should sales people be required to disclose to customers? Carson critiques others' views, then articulates, and defends his own theory. Colin Boyd, 'The Structural Origins of Conflicts of Interest in the Accounting Profession', Business Ethics Quarterly 14 (2004): 377[ndash]98. This article explores the conflict of interest at the heart of the collapse of Enron and Arthur Andersen and then considers whether the Sarbanes[ndash]Oxley Act of United States is an adequate response. Michael J. Phillips, 'The Inconclusive Ethical Case Against Manipulative Advertising', Business and Professional Ethics Journal 13 (1994): 31[ndash]64. In this detailed and nuanced article, Phillips identifies weaknesses in many common critiques of manipulative (as opposed to merely informative) advertising, but concludes that this practice remains morally problematic. Thomas Donaldson, 'Values in Tension: Ethics Away from Home', Harvard Business Review 74:5 (1996): 48[ndash]62. When in Rome, do as the Romans? Donaldson says 'no', and offers practical advice on how to navigate the morally significant cultural differences in international business. Ian Maitland, 'The Great Non-Debate Over International Sweatshops', Ethical Theory and Business, 8th ed., Eds. Tom L. Beauchamp, Norman E. Bowie, and Denis G. Arnold (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2008), 597[ndash]608. Maitland rejects a variety of criticisms of 'international sweatshops'. While the conditions in these factories may seem bad to us, he argues, they are often better than anything else available to those who work in them. A History of Business Ethics (Richard T. DeGeorge) http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/focusareas/business/conference/presentations/business-ethics-history.html A history of the field by one of its most distinguished contributors. Business Ethics (Alexei Marcoux) http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/ethics-business/ An up-to-date summary of business ethics research. The Business Ethics Blog (Chris MacDonald) http://www.businessethicsblog.com/ A topical and frequently updated blog on business ethics issues. Knowledge at Wharton/Business Ethics http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/category.cfm?cid=11 Short, accessible pieces covering a range of topics in business ethics. United Nations Global Compact http://www.unglobalcompact.org/AboutTheGC/TheTenPrinciples/index.html Ten principles for ethical business, explained in detail. There are numerous business ethics textbooks and anthologies. Textbooks generally cover a wider range of topics, but can lack the 'punch' of anthologies composed of articles in which authors defend their own views. Effective anthologies include, but are not limited to: Fritz Allhoff and Anand Vaidya (Eds.), Business in Ethical Focus: An Anthology (Peterborough, ON: Broadview, 2008). Tom L. Beauchamp, Norman E. Bowie, and Denis G. Arnold (Eds.), Ethical Theory and Business, 8th ed. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2008). Joseph R. Desjardins and John J. McCall (Eds.), Contemporary Issues in Business Ethics, 5th ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2005). Thomas Donaldson and Patricia H. Werhane (Eds.), Ethical Issues in Business: A Philosophical Approach, 8th ed. (Upper Saddle River: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2008). W. Michael Hoffman, Robert E. Frederick, and Mark S. Schwartz (Eds.), Business Ethics: Readings and Cases in Corporate Morality, 4th ed. (New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2001). My recommendations that follow indicate in which collection(s) the article appears. The reader can also search for the article online to find its original source. Many are from journals, and can be easily downloaded. A course in business ethics often begins with a brief survey of important moral theories (utilitarianism, deontology, virtue theory) and/or theories of distributive justice (egalitarianism, libertarianism). All of these anthologies contain discussions of these theories. In addition (or instead), it might begin with selections from classic works such as Locke's Second Treatise, Smith's The Wealth of Nations, and Marx's Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844. These works engage recurring themes in contemporary business ethics, including the nature and value of property rights (Locke), the efficiency of the market (Smith), and the ethical aspects of wage labor (Marx). Appropriate selections from these readings can be found in [1] and [4]. Milton Friedman, 'The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits', in [1], [2], [3], [4], and [5]. R. Edward Freeman, 'A Stakeholder Theory of the Modern Corporation', in [1] and [5]. Similar articles by Freeman appear in [2], [3], and [4]. John Boatright, 'Fiduciary Duties and the Shareholder[ndash]Management Relation: Or, What's So Special About Shareholders?', Business Ethics Quarterly 4 (1994): 393[ndash]407. Joseph Heath, 'Business Ethics Without Stakeholders', in [1]. Norman Bowie, 'Morality, Money, and Motor Cars', in [2], [3], and [5]. W. Michael Hoffman, 'Business and Environmental Ethics', in [5]. Amory B. Lovins, L. Hunter Lovins, and Paul Hawken, 'A Road Map for Natural Capitalism', in [3]. Ian Maitland, 'Rights in the Workplace: A Nozickian Argument', in [3]. Joseph R. Desjardins and Ronald Duska, 'Drug Testing in Employment', in [1], [3], and [5]. Michael Cranford, 'Drug Testing and the Right to Privacy: Arguing the Ethics of Workplace Drug Testing', in [1]. Richard A. Epstein, 'In Defense of the Contract at Will', in [1], [2], and [4]. Patricia H. Werhane and Tara J. Radin, 'Employment at Will and Due Process', in [1] and [2]. Similar articles by Werhane appear in [3] and [4]. Sissela Bok, 'Whistleblowing and Professional Responsibility', in [4]. Michael Davis, 'Some Paradoxes of Whistleblowing', in [2]. Albert Z. Carr, 'Is Business Bluffing Ethical?' in [1], [3], and [4]. David M. Holley, 'A Moral Evaluation of Sales Practices', in [5]. Thomas Carson, 'Deception and Withholding Information in Sales', in [3]. Michael J. Phillips, 'The Inconclusive Ethical Case Against Manipulative Advertising', Business and Professional Ethics Journal 13 (1994): 31[ndash]64. Thomas Donaldson, 'Values in Tension: Ethics Away From Home', in [1], [4], and [5]. Ian Maitland, 'The Great Non-Debate Over International Sweatshops', in [1], [2], [3], and [4]. Denis G. Arnold and Norman E. Bowie, 'Sweatshops and Respect for Persons', in [2] and [3]. Nien-hê Hsieh, 'The Obligations of Transnational Corporations: Rawlsian Justice and the Duty of Assistance', Business Ethics Quarterly 14 (2004): 643[ndash]61. In whose interests should corporations be managed? Are there any minimum conditions for work quality (including safety, privacy, and participation) that all firms must observe? Or can any conditions be justified, provided that workers freely agree to them? Does the prohibition against deception [ndash] and the requirement to be truthful [ndash] apply just as firmly in the business world as it does in 'real life'? Do firms have obligations to protect the environment beyond what is required by law? What, if anything, makes the environment worthy of special concern? To what extent are firms responsible for the labor practices of their suppliers, especially those in foreign countries? Debate. Have students conduct formal in-class debates about the issues covered in the course. Divide them into teams of 3[ndash]6 students. Each debate will focus on a single question or topic, and will be between two teams who take up opposing views. Each team will prepare a document stating its case. The teams will exchange documents a day or two before the debate. This gives each team time to digest and prepare a response to the other team's case. The original cases and responses will be presented in class, followed by further questions and answers from the debaters and other students. Students can be graded on their in-class performances and work on the supporting documents. (This idea is due to the Wharton Ethics Program.)

The Open Borders Debate on Immigration

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:15:00 -0700

Global migration raises important ethical issues. One of the most significant is the question of whether liberal democratic societies have strong moral obligations to admit immigrants. Historically, most philosophers have argued that liberal states are morally free to restrict immigration at their discretion, with few exceptions. Recently, however, liberal egalitarians have begun to challenge this conventional view in two lines of argument. The first contends that immigration restrictions are inconsistent with basic liberal egalitarian values, including freedom and moral equality. The second maintains that affluent, liberal democratic societies are morally obligated to admit immigrants as a partial response to global injustices, such as poverty and human rights violations. This article surveys the main philosophical arguments for these positions on immigration and discusses the critical responses to these arguments.

Aesthetics and Cognitive Science

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:15:00 -0700

Experiences of art involve exercise of ordinary cognitive and perceptual capacities but in unique ways. These two features of experiences of art imply the mutual importance of aesthetics and cognitive science. Cognitive science provides empirical and theoretical analysis of the relevant cognitive capacities. Aesthetics thus does well to incorporate cognitive scientific research. Aesthetics also offers philosophical analysis of the uniqueness of the experience of art. Thus, cognitive science does well to incorporate the explanations of aesthetics. This paper explores this general framework of expansionism: a research strategy that suggests that the explanatory goals and resources of both aesthetics and cognitive science should expand to include those of the other. Two relations are considered. First, what is the relation between aesthetics and more traditional cognitive science? Second, what is the relation between aesthetics and new developments in cognitive science that de-emphasize mental representation and emphasize body and action?

On the Philosophy of Group Decision Methods II: Alternatives to Majority Rule

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:14:00 -0700

In this companion piece to 'On the Philosophy of Group Decision Methods I: The Non-Obviousness of Majority Rule', we take a closer look at some competitors of majority rule. This exploration supplements the conclusions of the other piece, as well as offers a further-reaching introduction to some of the challenges that this field currently poses to philosophers.

On the Philosophy of Group Decision Methods I: The Nonobviousness of Majority Rule

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 03:14:00 -0700

Majority rule is often adopted almost by default as a group decision rule. One might think, therefore, that the conditions under which it applies, and the argument on its behalf, are well understood. However, the standard arguments in support of majority rule display systematic deficiencies. This article explores these weaknesses, and assesses what can be said on behalf of majority rule.

Popular Culture (Islam, Early and Middle Periods)

Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:00:00 -0800

This contribution dwells on popular culture in Mamluk Egypt and Syria. Following a short examination of this topic and of the sources, the study focuses on three themes: the cycle of life, the cycle of the year and sacred topography. Popular manners and customs provoked opposition from religious circles. A condensed delineation of these voices is provided at the closing part of the article.