Confession, conscience, and selfhood on trial

2018 ◽  
pp. 124-177
Author(s):  
Laura Kounine
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
The Self ◽  
Change Over Time ◽  
Linear Pattern ◽  
Moral Question ◽  
Modern Self ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self ◽  
Over Time

This chapter deals with the role of the self and conscience in defending oneself against the charge of witchcraft. To add depth to intellectual concepts—and teleologies—of the self, we must understand how the individual self was understood, felt, and experienced. Particularly for the crime of witchcraft, the crux of the trial was premised on the moral question of what kind of person would commit such a crime. Those on trial for witchcraft in the Lutheran duchy of Württemberg invoked the idioms of ‘mind’, ‘conscience’, ‘heart’, or ‘self’ in constructing their defence. Through four case studies, ranging from 1565 to 1678, this chapter examines the different ways in which people could conceptualize their person, and shows that change over time in the ‘development’ of the modern self was not a uniform or directly linear pattern.

scholarly journals On Pre-reflectivity of Self-consciousness in the Traditions of Advaita and Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcus Schmücker
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Time And Space ◽  
Pure Consciousness ◽  
Reflective Consciousness ◽  
Individual Consciousness ◽  
Self Knowledge ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self ◽  
Over Time

By pointing out different forms of pre-reflective consciousness and comparing them to the concepts of self in Advaita and Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta, it could be shown that both schools apply a kind of consciousness that corresponds to Frank’s concept of self-consciousness and self-knowledge. As demonstrated, the first form of pre-reflective consciousness complies with the advaitic teaching of an unchangeable eternity of consciousness, which is subjectless and understood as being without time and space, even as being omnipresent. It appears impossible to relate it to something else without it being objectified. The Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta school reinterprets the concept of pure consciousness and accepts it as objectifiable consciousness, which is now considered “knowledge”. At the same time it presupposes a kind of individual consciousness which is called “I”. Moreover, this school uses the argument that consciousness is unobjectifiable against the Advaitin to establish that objectifying does not imply the cessation of consciousness, that is, in their case the consciousness of the individual self. Rāmānuja thus theorises, a thesis continued by Veṅkaṭanātha, that knowledges (saṃvit) can be remembered over time because, first, they are based on a constant self, that is, a pre-reflective “I”-consciousness, and secondly, through this “knowledge”, they can be known again by referring to itself in another state (avasthā) than it earlier held. But what does this mean for the familiarity of (self‑)consciousness? Is it mediated? The self, the “I”-consciousness, is always in a new, changed state of knowledge. As far as self-luminosity is possible, even if the self can be objectified, it is possible to say, without negating consciousness, that it is immediately aware of being in a special state if this can be proven through different means of knowledge.

scholarly journals Foreign Experience in Using Educational Logotherapy in Professional Activities of Primary School Teachers

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 55-61
Author(s):  
Yuliia Stepura
Keyword(s):  
Primary School ◽  
Social Activity ◽  
Therapeutic Concept ◽  
Professional Activities ◽  
Therapeutic Interaction ◽  
The Social ◽  
Primary Schoolchildren ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self

Abstract The article examines the nature and importance of using aesthetic and therapeutic concept and educational logotherapy, in particular, for creating a special emotionally comfortable socioeducational environment for primary education The author has represented inteipretation of foreign scholars' views (J. Bugental, V. Frankl, A. Maslow, R. May, J. Moreno, C. Rogers et al) on such terms as “communication ”, “aesthetotherapy ”, “educational logotherapy” etc. An attempt has been made to analyze the social coTitent of pedagogical activity in the context of using logotherapy in primary school based on an agogical paradigm. In the scope of the article, the specific of using the therapeutic metaphor in the educational environment of primary' school has been represented as well as the basic stages of its implementation have been determined. These stages are the following: description of the storyline, persuasion and binding. The author has defined the role of the “living metaphors” in organization of the therapeutic interaction between the teacher and primary' schoolchildren. Particular attention has been paid to formation of the humanistic competency among primary schoolchildren; this competency is to be based on their understanding of the following philosophical and pedagogical categories: a norm (as a means and a results of pupils' social activity), freedom (as a mean and a result of individual self-expression among primary schoolchildren) and happiness (as an individual self-expression among primaryr schoolchildren). The author has assessed the role of deflection method and paradoxical intention for the social development of the pupil and further formation of the individual. Additional attention has been paid to determination of the socioeducational and psychological and pedagogical potential of such leading method in logotherapy as “The Socratic dialogue” (or “The Socratic circle”): as well have been highlighted the main stages of its implementation: consent (search for what pupil may agree), doubt (an expression of doubts towards weak arguments of interlocutor) and arguments (the teacher must convey' one’s opinion, without any resistance from the child): have been represented different various algorithms of its realization: the method of “aquarium”, “panel method” and “questioning technique”.

Occupy in Ireland: Impacts on activists and subsequent protest

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 250-273
Author(s):  
Anna Szolucha
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Analysis ◽  
Empirical Processes ◽  
Change Over Time ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Over Time

I explore the impact that Occupy in Ireland had on subsequent campaigns and the lives of some of its core activists and analyse the interpretative processes through which they evaluated and modified the lessons and tactics of the protest. The picture that emerges from this empirical analysis is inherently complex and transient. It shows how the symbolic associations and framing of the encampments evolved and stalled the diffusion of their most recognisable practices and tactics such as assemblies. This observation highlights the importance of studying the empirical processes that explain how the interpretations of movements change over time, influencing the potential for the diffusion of tactics from one movement to another. Additionally, movement–movement influence may be constructed subjectively and hence, the individual engagement trajectories of activists can inform the analysis of how past protest influences future campaigns. Even though the practices and tactics that were most characteristic of the movement did not diffuse to subsequent protests, the analysis of the impacts of Occupy in Ireland suggests that the encampments functioned as a space for political training and experimentation which may have durable effects for future protest as well as its participants long after they left Occupy.

scholarly journals Indirectness in the Age of Globalization: A Social Network Analysis

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 930-949
Author(s):  
Marina Terkourafi
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
American English ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Theory Building ◽  
Network Ties ◽  
British English ◽  
Theoretical Predictions ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self

Indirectness has traditionally been viewed as commensurate with politeness and attributed to the speaker’s wish to avoid imposition and/or otherwise strategically manipulate the addressee. Despite these theoretical predictions, a number of studies have documented the solidarity-building and identity-constituting functions of indirectness. Bringing these studies together, Terkourafi 2014 proposed an expanded view of the functions of indirect speech, which crucially emphasizes the role of the addressee and the importance of network ties. This article focuses on what happens when such network ties become loosened, as a result of processes of urbanization and globalization. Drawing on examples from African American English and Chinese, it is argued that these processes produce a need for increased explicitness, which drives speakers (and listeners) away from indirectness. This claim is further supported diachronically, by changes in British English politeness that coincide with the rise of the individual Self. These empirical findings have implications for im/politeness theorizing and theory-building more generally, calling attention to how the socio-historical context of our research necessarily influences the theories we end up building.

scholarly journals The Person and Religious Poetry in Malay

2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 242-261
Author(s):  
Harry Aveling ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
The Self ◽  
Close Connection ◽  
Muslim Community ◽  
Human Identity ◽  
Religious Poetry ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self ◽  
Religion And Poetry

Accepting that there is a close connection between religion and poetry, the paper focuses on the person that is presented in poetry in Malay in response to the Divine. The concept of “the person” used contains three elements: (a) the human identity – our common physiological and psychological qualities; (b) the social identity – arising from our membership in the various groups that make up our particular society; and, (c) the self – the unique personal sense of who I am. It argues that the person in Malay religious poetry is largely a “social identity” the self surrendered to God through membership in the Muslim community. Keywords: religious poetry, person, human identity, social identity, the individual self

scholarly journals Who Am I? An Ethnographic Study Exploring the Construction of Organizational and Individual Self among Indian IT Employees

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 72-83
Author(s):  
A. Venkataraman ◽  
Chandra Shekhar Joshi
Keyword(s):  
Value Chain ◽  
Job Insecurity ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
The Self ◽  
It Industry ◽  
Labour Process ◽  
Gig Economy ◽  
Team Player ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self

The self is both a sociological and a psychological construct. It is investigated in this paper from the perspectives of sociology of work, critical management studies and employment relations. Accordingly, drawing upon ethnographic research, this article seeks to unravel how an employee defines herself or himself in two realms—the organizational and the personal—respectively against the background of changing Indian IT industry marked by uncertainty and rising job insecurity. It examines how these two realms converge to bring about an individual’s sense of ‘dasein’ or being. The self is entwined in the value chain of the Indian IT labour process and, within it, soft HRM discursive practices seek to constitute and mould the ‘disciplined confessional self’ who is supposed to be not only autonomous but a proactive and proactive team player. This article identifies the sources from which the self finds definitions and validation in the liquid modern context of the ‘gig economy’. It seeks to reflect upon the ramifications arising out of the interplay between Western and Indian managerial repertoires and, finally, the interplay of caste and class against changing Indian societal norms and expectations. In doing so, it looks at the micro and macro means through which the self seeks to obviate its incoherence and find resonance and fullness. Given the volatile political economy of the Indian IT industry labour process, much of the work is repetitive and fragmented, and individuals feel alienated and burnt out after the initial excitement of experiencing the Sapient or Cisco way of life. They adopt various coping mechanisms reminiscent of Burawoy’s (1985) respondents to fight job insecurity and to secure their peer group’s acceptance. Thus, the onus of negotiating inherent dualities for finding meaning in the organizational realm, and yet leaving room for a transcendental individual coherent self whose larger ‘internal conversation’ transcends the existential concern of the structured antagonism of the wage–employment relationship, lies upon the individual rather than the organization.

Religion and Constitutional Practices in Asia: Five ‘Cs’ for Reflection

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-225
Author(s):  
Arif A JAMAL
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Comparative Law ◽  
The Other ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Short Commentary ◽  
Five Cs ◽  
The One ◽  
The Individual

AbstractIn considering the articles in this Special Issue, I am struck by the importance of a set of factors that, in my view, both run through the articles like a leitmotif, as well as shape the major ‘take away’ lesson(s) from the articles. In this short commentary, I elaborate on these factors and the lesson(s) to take from them through five ‘Cs’: context; complexity; contestation; the framework of constitutions; and the role of comparative law. The first three ‘Cs’ are lessons from the case studies of the articles themselves, while the second two ‘Cs’ are offered as lessons to help take the dialogue forward. Fundamentally, these five ‘Cs’ highlight the importance of the articles in this Special Issue and the conference from which they emerged on the one hand, while on the other hand, also making us aware of what are the limits of what we should conclude from the individual articles. In other words, taken together, the five ‘Cs’ are, one might say, lessons about lessons.

Promoting exchange between East and West management cultures: The role of dialogue

2009 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 514-525 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muayyad Jabri
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Studies ◽  
Narrative Identity ◽  
Instrumental Rationality ◽  
The Self ◽  
Mistaken Assumption ◽  
East And West ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Cross National

AbstractThis paper calls on cultural studies as a resource for rethinking East and West management cultures. An analysis of East and West management cultures reveals that much of our prevailing knowledge of East and West management cultures is derived from cross-national comparisons of culture. These comparisons are predicated on assumptions of instrumental rationality and the cultural homogeneity of the self with social others, which effectively presume an ontology of the self as stable, enduring, and the same as social others. For promoting exchange between East and West management cultures, there is a need to move beyond this mistaken assumption of ontological ‘sameness’. To achieve this, the paper argues that at least two changes are required: (i) reversing the tendency to treat culture as an entity that is separate from the individual; and (ii) reversing the tendency to treat the narrative identity of the individual as stable and enduring. With a view to realising these changes, the paper proposes the notion of ‘dialogical encounter’ as a means of enabling individuals to be given a role in determining how their culture is ‘made known’ to others.

Sickness and Healing

2020 ◽  
pp. 402-417
Author(s):  
Peregrine Horden
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
The Individual

How should a medieval monk behave when sick? Must submission to divine test or judgement be the only response, or is resort to secular as well as spiritual medicine allowed? What is the role of the infirmary in a monastery and, for the individual monk, what are the benefits and disadvantages of staying in it? The chapter traces medieval answers to such questions through case studies drawn from the earliest phase of monasticism in late antiquity, from Carolingian Europe, from the twelfth century, and from the later Middle Ages, concluding with an outline of a set of topics for further research.

scholarly journals ZANZIBARIS OR AMAKHUWA? SUFI NETWORKS IN SOUTH AFRICA, MOZAMBIQUE, AND THE INDIAN OCEAN

2014 ◽  
Vol 55 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-210 ◽  
Author(s):  
Preben Kaarsholm
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Social Change ◽  
Indian Ocean ◽  
Change Over Time ◽  
The Indian Ocean ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Ritual Practices

AbstractThis article investigates the role of Sufi networks in keeping Durban's ‘Zanzibari’ community of African Muslims together and developing their response to social change and political developments from the 1950s to the post-apartheid period. It focuses on the importance of religion in giving meaning to notions of community, and discusses the importance of the Makua language in maintaining links with northern Mozambique and framing understandings of Islam. The transmission of ritual practices of the Rifaiyya, Qadiriyya, and Shadhiliyya Sufi brotherhoods is highlighted, as is the significance of Maputo as a node for such linkages. The article discusses change over time in notions of cosmopolitanism, diaspora, and belonging, and examines new types of interactions after 1994 between people identifying themselves as Amakhuwa in Durban and Mozambique.

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