scholarly journals Beyond black and white: heibaika, neuroparenting, and lay neuroscience

BioSocieties ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jia-shin Chen
Keyword(s):  
Postpartum Care ◽  
First Century ◽  
Knowledge Transmission ◽  
Online Forums ◽  
Black And White ◽  
Science And Culture ◽  
Infant Brain ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Interview Analysis

AbstractHeibaika (Mandarin for black-and-white cards) are tools that Taiwanese parents use for infants below 3 months old. These cards are claimed to stimulate vision and enhance the brain. Although the scientific efficacy of heibaika is questionable, the wide circulation of these cards illustrates the ways some try to urge laypeople to imagine and picture the infant brain. Thus, the use of heibaika constitutes a good example of neuroparenting and neuroculture, where flourishing neuroscience transforms the parenting culture. In the present study, multiple methodologies are applied, and the emergence of heibaika is identified as a twenty-first century phenomenon popularised by online forums and postpartum care centres, among many other channels. Heibaika are contextualised in the globalisation of neuroparenting through translation since the 1990s and the rising anxiety of contemporary Taiwanese parents. Through interview analysis, parents are classified into believers, sceptics, and cautious experimenters. Their anticipations and worries are further elaborated. The paper concludes by highlighting its three major contributions: the importance of studying lay neuroscience as a way to rethink and problematise the boundary between science and culture, the enrichment of the concept of neuroparenting, and the emphasis on the dimension of globalisation and knowledge transmission.

Strangers and Friends at the Welcome Table

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Hudnut-Beumler
Keyword(s):  
Public Education ◽  
Urban Communities ◽  
Spanish Language ◽  
First Century ◽  
Black And White ◽  
The Past ◽  
Rural And Urban ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
Evangelical Protestant

In this fresh and fascinating chronicle of Christianity in the contemporary South, historian and minister James Hudnut-Beumler draws on extensive interviews and his own personal journeys throughout the region over the past decade to present a comprehensive portrait of the South’s long-dominant religion. Hudnut-Beumler traveled to both rural and urban communities, listening to the faithful talk about their lives and beliefs. What he heard pushes hard against prevailing notions of southern Christianity as an evangelical Protestant monolith so predominant as to be unremarkable. True, outside of a few spots, no non-Christian group forms more than six-tenths of one percent of a state’s population in what Hudnut-Beumler calls the Now South. Drilling deeper, however, he discovers an unexpected, blossoming diversity in theology, practice, and outlook among southern Christians. He finds, alongside traditional Baptists, black and white, growing numbers of Christians exemplifying changes that no one could have predicted even just forty years ago, from congregations of LGBT-supportive evangelicals and Spanish-language church services to a Christian homeschooling movement so robust in some places that it may rival public education in terms of acceptance. He also finds sharp struggles and political divisions among those trying to reconcile such Christian values as morality and forgiveness—the aftermath of the mass shooting at Charleston’s Emanuel A.M.E. Church in 2015 forming just one example. This book makes clear that understanding the twenty-first-century South means recognizing many kinds of southern Christianities.

scholarly journals The In/Visibility of Mothering Against the Norm in Francophone Contexts: Private and Public Discourses in the Mediation of “Natural Parenting”

2015 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Florence Pasche Guignard
Keyword(s):  
Community Building ◽  
First Century ◽  
Online Media ◽  
Online Forums ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
Source Of Information ◽  
Online Mediation

Mothers who engage in “natural parenting,” an unconventional style of parenting in Francophone contexts, use online media, and in particular online forums, as a source of information, as a place for discussing the variety of authentic maternal experiences, and as a virtual site of community building around shared practices, values, and worldviews. This contribution looks at the ways in which twenty-first-century online mediation participates in the blurring of private/public boundaries in the domain of parenting and how this affects parents who mother outside of the norm, following environmentalist worldviews. It also investigates the association of natural parenting and religion, and the articulations between public and private discourses about institutional motherhood and mothers’ experiences.Les mères qui pratiquent le « parentage naturel », un style de parentage nonconventionnel dans des contextes francophones, utilisent les médias en ligne, et en particulier les forums, comme source d’information, comme un endroit où discuter la diversité des expériences maternelles authentiques, et comme un site virtuel de construction communautaire autour de pratiques, valeurs et visions du monde partagées. Cette contribution examine comment la médiation en ligne rend plus floues les frontières entre public et privé dans le domaine du parentage et comment ceci affecte les personnes qui parentent en dehors des normes, suivant des visions du monde écologistes. Cet article examine aussi l’association entre la parentage naturel et religion, ainsi que les articulations entre discours publics et privés sur la maternité en tant qu’institution et les expériences des mères elles-mêmes.

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