scholarly journals Futures Narratives, Possible Worlds, Big Stories: Causal Layered Analysis and the Problems of Youth

2009 ◽  
Vol 14 (5) ◽  
pp. 231-242 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cate Watson
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Possible Worlds ◽  
Levels Of Analysis ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future ◽  
Causal Layered Analysis ◽  
Four Levels ◽  
Alternative Scenarios ◽  
Causal Variables

Narratives of the future can be seen as a form of colonialisation, structuring fields of discourse, in a process which Johan Galtung (cited in Andersson, 2006) refers to as ‘chronological imperialism’. However, futures narratives can also be used to disrupt these attempts at colonialisation through surfacing problematic assumptions in order to explore alternative scenarios. In this paper I first consider modal narratives and possible worlds and their relevance to the social sciences. I then discuss Sohail Inayatullah's ‘Causal Layered Analysis’ (CLA) - a narrative technique for constructing past and present and imagining the future. CLA draws on a ‘poststructural toolbox’ to examine problematic issues using a process which focuses on four levels of analysis: litany (the official public description of the issue); social science analysis (which attempts to articulate causal variables); discourse analysis or prevailing worldview; and myth/metaphor analysis. The aim is to disrupt current discourses which have become sedimented into practice and so open up space for the construction of alternative scenarios. In the third part I demonstrate how this approach can be used to examine ‘big issues’ taking as my example the current preoccupation with troubled and troublesome youth.

Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tim Lewens
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Potential Functions ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Human Culture ◽  
The Third ◽  
Current State ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
The Social ◽  
Compare And Contrast

Many evolutionary theorists have enthusiastically embraced human nature, but large numbers of evolutionists have also rejected it. It is also important to recognize the nuanced views on human nature that come from the side of the social sciences. This introduction provides an overview of the current state of the human nature debate, from the anti-essentialist consensus to the possibility of a Gray’s Anatomy of human psychology. Three potential functions for the notion of species nature are identified. The first is diagnostic, assigning an organism to the correct species. The second is species-comparative, allowing us to compare and contrast different species. The third function is contrastive, establishing human nature as a foil for human culture. The Introduction concludes with a brief synopsis of each chapter.

Futures Honed

Futures ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 118-134
Author(s):  
Barbara Adam
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Original Work ◽  
Collective Responsibility ◽  
The Past ◽  
Writing Theory ◽  
Time Space ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future ◽  
Verse Form ◽  
The Way

This chapter comprises an interview between Barbara Adam and the editors, and is followed by Adam’s ‘Honing Futures’, which is presented in four short verses of distilled theory. In the interview Adam reflects on thirty-five years of futures-thinking rooted in her deeply original work on time and temporality, and her innovative response to qualitative and linear definitions of time within the social sciences. The interview continues with a discussion of the way Adam’s thinking on futures intersects in her work with ideas of ethics and collective responsibility politics and concludes with a brief rationale for writing theory in verse form. In ‘Honing Futures’, a piece of futures theory verse form, Adam charts the movements and moments in considerations of the Not Yet and futurity’s active creation: from pluralized imaginings of the future, to an increasingly tangible and narrower anticipated future, to future-making as designing and reality-creating performance. Collectively, the verses identify the varied complex interdependencies of time, space, and matter with the past and future in all iterations of honing and making futures.

ESTIMATES OF SOCIAL MINIMUM BASKETS FOR THE SECOND AND THIRD QUARTER OF 2020

2021 ◽  
Vol 562 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-26
Author(s):  
Piotr Kurowski
Keyword(s):  
Household Consumption ◽  
Research Data ◽  
Food Prices ◽  
Energy Carriers ◽  
The Third ◽  
Subsistence Minimum ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Future ◽  
Energy Products

The article presents estimates of social minimum baskets for the second and third quarter of 2020, i.e. when the sanitary restrictions resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic took place. They obviously affected the functioning of households in various aspects. The presented estimates take into account the needs as foreseen in the model under normal conditions; the new circumstances of Covid-19 were not taken into account. There is lack of research data on changes in household consumption in 2020. If there will be a need to change assumptions in the model, the values of social minimum can be recalculated in the future. The value of the social minimum in the 2nd quarter increased by 2.1% in a one-person household and by 1.8% in a four -person household, with inflation by 0.3%.The increase in the subsistence minimum was mainly due to a further increase in food prices (from 4.3 to 4.5%), with the costs of housing and energy carriers rising from 1.7 to 2.0%. The very same factor contributed to a decline in the value of the minimum in the third quarter. In this period, the social minimum estimates decreased by -1% in a one-person household and by -1.1% in a four-person household, with a trace increase in CPI index (+0.1%). Seasonal decreases in food prices caused the value of food in the basket to decrease from -6.1 to -6.4%, with a CPI of -2.3% in this expenditure group. This time, expenditure on housing and energy products did not exceed 0.5%

scholarly journals Energy research and social sciences: thinking outside the box

2021 ◽  
Vol 250 ◽  
pp. 07001
Author(s):  
Wadim Strielkowski
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Renewable Energy ◽  
Social Scientist ◽  
Renewable Energy Sources ◽  
Energy Sources ◽  
Energy Research ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Face

This paper aims at explaining the universality and broadness of the research in energy studies. Specifically, it wants to show that the energy research is not a solely engineering or natural sciences field and how it can be done in social sciences. The paper draws some relevant examples including energy research in literature and poetry, history, religion, art, as well in other social sciences and humanities. In general, it becomes apparent that energy research can boast vast depths and angles that are worth exploring for any social scientist. Given the key importance of energy research in the third decade of the 21st century and the worldwide focus on the renewable energy sources, electrification of transport and heating in the face of the threatening global warming and climate change, it seems relevant to focus on researching the perspectives and paradigms for the traditional and renewable energy sources in the 21st century using the toolbox of the social sciences.

Cultural Influences on Body Image and Eating Disorders

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eileen Anderson-Fye
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Eating Disorders ◽  
Body Image ◽  
Cultural Influences ◽  
Levels Of Analysis ◽  
Empirical Literature ◽  
Sociocultural Factors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Theories ◽  
The Rich

Sociocultural factors have long been implicated in body image and eating disorders. Decades of data, drawn from multiple disciplines, consistently demonstrate the influence of culture on body image and eating disorders across several levels of analysis. This chapter engages the rich empirical literature on this subject to retheorize the role and importance of these contextual factors in light of anthropological and related social theories relevant to contemporary circumstances. Specifically, this chapter first analyzes and operationalizes what we mean by “culture” in body image and eating disorder scholarship, describes trends in salient sociocultural factors, and highlights the varying impacts of globalization where societies are increasingly interconnected. It also urges research that builds on current understandings by increasing collaborations among not only multiple disciplines within the social sciences but also biological and clinical sciences.

Writing History: Problems of Neutrality

2020 ◽  
pp. 87-126
Author(s):  
Donald Bloxham
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Moral Evaluation ◽  
Important Case ◽  
Fourth Section ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Social ◽  
Value Judgements ◽  
Historical Accounts ◽  
Value Neutrality ◽  
Made In

Part 2 Writing History: Problems of Neutrality This Part of the book challenges widespread assumptions that, where it matters, it is possible or desirable for historians to avoid value judgements and the sorts of evocative descriptions that imply or could reasonably be expected to prompt such judgements. The first section distinguishes between History and particular traditions within the social sciences in order to show why the ‘rules’ about moral evaluation can be different in these differing endeavours. The second section establishes the widespread existence of evocations and evaluations in the very labelling and description of many historical phenomena, suggesting not just how peculiar works of History would look in their absence of evocations and appraisals, but that their absence would often distort what is being reported. These arguments are key to the distinction made in the third section about rejecting value neutrality as a governing ideal while insisting on truthfulness as a historian’s primary duty. The fourth section highlights the nature of most historical accounts as composites of a range of perspectives as it considers questions of context, agency, outcome, and experience. The composition gives rise to the overall impression, evaluative or evocative, provided by the work. The fifth section brings together a number of the chapter’s themes as it examines an important case of the historian’s judgement—judgement about the legitimacy of power in past worlds where legitimacy could be as contested as often today.

Building a global scientific community

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 115-122
Author(s):  
Stefan Bargheer
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Latin America ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
North Africa ◽  
Scientific Community ◽  
European Research ◽  
Research Perspective ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Social

The three volumes reviewed in this essay assemble over 40 case studies written by more than 50 contributors that trace the development of the social sciences and humanities in Europe (East and West) and a number of countries in Latin America, North Africa, and East Asia. Two of these volumes grew out of the European research project ‘International Cooperation in the Social Sciences and Humanities’ (INTERCO-SSH); the third volume extends the focus of this project to Eastern Europe. A particularly innovative aspect shared by all contributions is the application of a transnational research perspective.

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