THE LAW AS A SOCIAL PRACTICE: Are Shared Activities at the Foundations of Law?

Legal Theory ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 265-292 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Noah Smith

A central tenet of positivism is that social practices are at the foundations of law. This has been cashed out in a variety of ways. For example, Austin argues that, among other practices, a habit of obedience to a sovereign is at the foundations of law, and Hart argues that at the foundations of law is the converging attitudes and behaviors of a class of relevant officials. Since Hart, some prominent positivists have employed either David Lewis's analysis of conventions or Michael Bratman's theory of shared cooperative activities to develop new accounts of the social practices that are at the foundations of law, whatever those foundations might be. In this paper, I identify five features characteristic of the Lewisean and Bratmanian models of social facts—models of what I call hypercommittal social practices. I then show that models of social facts that have these features ought not to be used to explain the way in which a social practice is at the foundations the law. I conclude that hypercommittal social practices such as Lewisean conventions or Bratmanian shared activities are not at the foundations of law.

1999 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-121 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Middleton ◽  
Helen L. Hewitt

This work represents the development of two lines of interest, one in the study of social practices of remembering and the other concerning issues of identity in the care of people with profound learning difficulties. We examine of the way life story work is used as a resource in providing for continuities in the experience of people with profound learning difficulties when moved from hospital to community based care. Our concern is the way carers attend to issues of identity in their relationships with people who are unable to speak on their own behalf. We discuss how identities are accomplished as part of the social practice of remembering in the construction of life story books designed to resource continuities of identities across changes in the provision of care. Identities are not examined in terms of some subjective representation of coherence across time and space. We examine the way social organisation of remembering in life story work makes visible identities in terms of continuities of participation in the social practices that make up the conditions of living of the recipients of care and the working practices of those who provide it.


2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 187
Author(s):  
Azmi Sirajuddin

Abstract               Implementation of law is the most useful for a nation and a state in a country thas has powerfull of protecting its people to do better and the best in their attitudes and behaviors when they live and do everything in order to have good connection among society in the social climate. Having understood in law is one thing to do every action based on the law either God’s law or state’s law. The functions of law are to control the human’action, to change the situation to better situation and to give justice and prosperious for people in a country. No one to disturb and make noisy till one has good condition by obeying law that is created by God and Human (Indonesian Legislative Assembly in Indonesian Contects).             By knowing and obeying law, person will get safety when they go and live. Law means regulations that manage human to surrender to that law that is created by God and Human (state). In Islamic law, law is consist of five principles, wajib (compulsory), not allowed (haram), allowed (sunnah), hate (makruh), and mubah. All those fungtions of the law always protect us/human from demage, poverty, and crime. Law is as a soul for every human and too law is as a foundation for a country to protect its people from demage, povery, and crime. Law gives freedom to do by the condition obey to the law. Who breaks the law must be funished either by low funishment or hard funishment till go to a jail to be responsible what they have done.      Key word: Implementation, law, persfektive, human’s behaviors in society


Panggung ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Indrayuda

ABSTRACT This article aims to explain the existence of Tari Piring dance as a culture identity of Minang- kabau people, both the people who live in the origin area and outside the area. Tari Piring dance is a traditional cultural heritage of Minangkabau people which is used and preserved by Minangkabau people in their life so that it becomes culture identity of Minangkabau people. As the identity of Minangkabau people, Piring dance is able to express attitudes and behaviors as well as the charac- teristics of Minangkabau people. The dance can serve as a reflection of social and cultural life style of Minangkabau society. Through Tari Piring performance, the outsider can understand Minangkabau people and their culture. Tari Piring, therefore, is getting more adhere to the social life of Minang- kabau people in West Sumatra and in the regions overseas. In the spirit of togetherness, Minang- kabau society preserves the existence of Piring dance as the identity and cultural heritage up to the present time. Keywords: Piring Dance, Minangkabau culture  ABSTRAK Artikel ini bertujuan untuk menjelaskan keberadaan Tari Piring sebagai identitas bu- daya masyarakat Minangkabau, baik yang berada di daerah asal maupun di daerah peran- tauan. Tari Piring merupakan warisan budaya tradisional masyarakat Minangkabau yang digunakan dan dilestarikan oleh masyarakat Minangkabau dalam kehidupannya sehingga menjadi identitas budaya Minangkabau. Sebagai jati diri masyarakat Minangkabau, Tari Piring mampu mengungkapkan sikap dan prilaku serta karakteristik orang Minangkabau. Tari Piring dapat berperan sebagai cerminan dari corak kehidupan sosial budaya masyara- kat Minangkabau. Melalui pertunjukan Tari Piring, masyarakat luar dapat memahami orang Minangkabau dan budayanya. Oleh karena itu, sampai saat ini Tari Piring semakin melekat dengan kehidupan sosial masyarakat Minangkabau di Sumatera Barat maupun di daerah perantauan. Dengan semangat kebersamaan, masyarakat Minangkabau mampu mempertahankan keberadaan Tari Piring sebagai identitas dan warisan budayanya hingga masa kini. Kata kunci : Tari Piring, budaya Minangkabau


Pólemos ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Biet

AbstractTheatre and law are not so different. Generally, researchers work on the art of theatre, the rhetoric of the actors, or the dramaturgy built from law cases or from the questions that the law does not completely resolve. Trials, tragedies, even comedies are close: everybody can see the interpenetration of them on stage and in the courts. We know that, and we know that the dramas are made with/from/of law, we know that the art the actors are developing is not so far from the art of the lawyers, and conversely. In this paper, I would like to have a look at the action of the audience, at the session itself and at the way the spectators are here to evaluate and judge not only the dramatic action, not only the art of the actors, not only the text of the author, but also the other spectators, and themselves too. In particular, I will focus on the “common judgment” of the audience and on its judicial, aesthetic and social relationship. The spectators have been undisciplined, noisy, unruled, during such a long period that theatre still retains some prints of this behaviour, even if nowadays, the social and aesthetic rule is to be silent. But uncertainty, inattention, distraction, contradiction, heterogeneity are the notions which characterise the session, and the judgments of the spectators still depend on them. So, what was and what is the voice of the audience? And with what sort of voice do spectators give their judgments?


2021 ◽  
pp. 7-16
Author(s):  
Rhoda Olkin

This chapter is a review of the relevant literature on effecting changes in attitudes and behaviors toward people with disabilities. It begins with a discussion of the goals of the book and the activities in the book. There is discussion of the relationship between attitudes and behaviors, and whether a change in one is followed by a change in the other. The core research about the bases of attitudes toward disability and attitude change is reviewed. The move in the past few decades from attention to implicit bias to focus on explicit bias is highlighted. The rationale for not using simulation exercises is provided, as well as the social underpinnings of the activities.


Author(s):  
Rajeev Bhargava

Methodological individualists such as Mill, Weber, Schumpeter, Popper, Hayek and Elster argue that all social facts must be explained wholly and exhaustively in terms of the actions, beliefs and desires of individuals. On the other hand, methodological holists, such as Durkheim and Marx, tend in their explanations to bypass individual action. Within this debate, better arguments exist for the view that explanations of social phenomena without the beliefs and desires of agents are deficient. If this is so, individualists appear to have a distinct edge over their adversaries. Indeed, a consensus exists among philosophers and social scientists that holism is implausible or false and individualism, when carefully formulated, is trivially true. Holists challenge this consensus by first arguing that caricatured formulations of holism that ignore human action must be set aside. They then ask us to re-examine the nature of human action. Action is distinguished from mere behaviour by its intentional character. This much is uncontested between individualists and holists. But against the individualist contention that intentions exist as only psychological states in the heads of individuals, the holist argues that they also lie directly embedded in irreducible social practices, and that the identification of any intention is impossible without examining the social context within which agents think and act. Holists find nothing wrong with the need to unravel the motivations of individuals, but they contend that these motivations cannot be individuated without appeal to the wider beliefs and practices of the community. For instance, the acquiescence of oppressed workers may take the form not of total submission but subtle negotiation that yields them sub-optimal benefits. Insensitivity to social context may blind us to this. Besides, it is not a matter of individual beliefs and preferences that this strategy is adopted. That decisions are taken by subtle strategies of negotiation rather than by explicit bargaining, deployment of force or use of high moral principles is a matter of social practice irreducible to the conscious action of individuals. Two conclusions follow if the holist claim is true. First, that a reference to a social entity is inescapable even when social facts are explained in terms of individual actions, because of the necessary presence of a social ingredient in all individual intentions and actions. Second, a reference to individual actions is not even necessary when social facts are explained or understood in terms of social practices. Thus, the individualist view that explanation in social science must rely wholly and exhaustively on individual entities is hotly contested and is not as uncontroversial or trivial as it appears.


2016 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 937-955 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roya Imani Giglou ◽  
Christine Ogan ◽  
Leen d’Haenens

The Gezi Park demonstrations across Turkey in the early summer of 2013 offered another opportunity to examine the role played by social media in a social movement. This survey of 967 ethnic (Turkish or Kurdish) minorities living in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany focuses on attitudes and behaviors alongside uses of offline and online networks to make connections with others during and after Gezi. We investigate whether the respondents living in the diaspora experienced communication-generated social capital. We also examine whether the social capital already built through lives spent in Europe, where connections to majority populations had been forged, was at least temporarily reversed through a process of re-bonding, as ethnic minorities turned their attention and loyalty to the social movement in Turkey.


Author(s):  
Felipe Cesar Rebêlo

A greve é reconhecida como um instituto em constante evolução, representativo dos direitos sociais. Passa por uma evolução constante, de acordo com as demandas que surgem historicamente. Nesse ponto, se averigua como o instituto jurídico é construído, bem como a forma que sua feição política pode desenvolver. A compreensão da doutrina e da jurisprudência se faz necessária, em consonância as determinações legais, bem como ao espírito social que move multidões, em expressão de uma ação social que necessita ser revisitada considerando cânones mais profundos, e do próprio direito e da constituição do Estado, como forma de legitimação da estrutura institucional em que a sociedade pode se formatar. A forma de concretização das demandas sociais, à luz de uma preocupação que se compactue com a luta de classes no ambiente capitalista, em que o direito é analisado como instrumentalização dessa constante social, merece ponderação na análise contemplada.   Abstract: Strike is recognized as a constantly evolving institute, representative of social rights. It goes through a constant evolution, according to the demands that arise historically. At this point, it examines how the legal institute is constructed, as well as the form that its political aspect can develop. Understanding the doctrine and jurisprudence is necessary, in accordance with legal determinations, as well as the social spirit that moves crowds, in expression of a social action that needs to be revisited considering deeper canons, and of the law itself and the constitution of the State, as a way of legitimizing institutional structure in which society can be shaped. The way of concretizing social demands, in the light of a concern that is compacted with the class struggle in the capitalist environment, in which the law is analyzed as an instrumentalization of this social constant, deserves consideration in the analysis.


PMLA ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 133 (5) ◽  
pp. 1118-1134
Author(s):  
Kathryne Bevilacqua

Cora Wilson Stewart's Country Life Readers (1915-17), beginning reading primers designed for white Appalachian adults, contain lessons in the social meaning of reading. he formal interplay of the readers’ illustrations, text, and handwriting exercises show how Stewart's primers teach not how to read but rather how to act like a reader. By instructing students in the habits, attitudes, and behaviors that will make them seem “literate” to the wider world, the primers argue that these performances (some textual, many not) are not supplements to literacy but literacy itself. Setting Stewart's primers against other adult primers from the period further shows how these literate performances were circumscribed by race and region. Rather than dismiss this version of literacy as irredeemably “mythic,” I suggest that sources like Stewart's are evocative reminders to attend to the ways in which nonreading is always implicated in reading's meaning.


Author(s):  
Peggy D. Bennett

On some days teachers need to just “get by.” It’s self- preservation. But when we let this minimalist effort become our habit, we are giving up on our dreams. We didn’t become teachers just to get a job. We became teachers to shape young minds, to make the world a better place, to offer support and guidance to young people, to share our passion for learning, to bring life to our classes and our stu­dents. We aspire to educate. A teacher who “aspires to excel is almost by default a visionary . . . a leader”. Schools can breed challenges and spirit- breaking experi­ences. Yet becoming dispirited about mandates, regulations, procedures, testing, and standards is no reason to give up on our dreams for students. If anything, those are the times to buckle down and work harder. Bolster determination. Ignite students’ interest. Ballast emo­tions with resolve to be our best and do our best. These are the aspirations that revitalize us. When we aspire to excel we can reconfigure our attitudes and behaviors. We can aim to bring out the best in ourselves and others. Nine Ways to Excel in Schools 1. Start the day with intention. Be clear and simple about your resolve. 2. Hold on to the best of you. Use that as a starting point to recover your aspirations. 3. Ignite your energy in the classroom. Stimulate engagement and interactions. 4. Subdue your energy in the classroom. Stimulate quietness. Let students take the lead. 5. Prompt learning. Use unique, clever, and challenging ways to hook students’ interest. 6. Show yourself. Let others see your interest and verve for learning. 7. Shift your classroom persona. Be the teacher you most admire. 8. Treat your students the way you would want your own chil­dren to be treated. Show respect, curiosity, compassion, and loving expectation. 9. Read, study, and query others. Find best practices to energize your classroom.


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