scholarly journals “I Don’t Know, I’m Just the Interpreter”: A first approach to the role of healthcare interpreters beyond bilingual medical encounters

Author(s):  
Cristina Álvaro Aranda

Researchers have long been preoccupied with the issue of role in healthcare interpreting. However, most studies approach this construct in the course of medical consultations, leaving somewhat unattended other spaces and activities in which interpreters also participate. This paper aims to contribute to a better understanding of the healthcare interpreters’ role in these areas. Drawing on participant observation, I examined the roles played by five interpreters at a hospital in Madrid for five months in activities different to provider-patient interactions (e.g. waiting with patients). Seven key roles were identified outside medical consultations: intercultural and moral mediator, patient advocate, institutional navigator, healthcare ambassador, information miner and companion/conversation partner. A key finding is that most events in which interpreters participate occur outside medical consultations, which makes it essential to shift the attention to the roles played in these alternative spaces. Understanding the role of healthcare interpreters in different activities within the realm of healthcare scenarios is essential to construct an accurate vision of what being just an interpreter really means.

Author(s):  
Sunil Bhatia

This chapter documents the ethnographic context in which the interviews and participant observation were conducted for the study presented in this book. It also situates the study within the context of narrative inquiry and develops arguments about the role of self-reflexivity in doing ethnography at “home” and producing qualitative forms of knowledge that are based on personal, experiential, and cultural narratives. It is argued that there is significant interest in the adoption of interpretive methods or qualitative research in psychology. The qualitative approaches in psychology present a provocative and complex vision of how the key concepts related to describing and interpreting cultural codes, social practices, and lived experience of others are suffused with both poetical and political elements of culture. The epistemological and ontological assumptions undergirding qualitative research reflect multiple “practices of inquiry” and methodologies that have different orientations, assumptions, values, ideologies, and criterion of excellence.


2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 1017-1019
Author(s):  
Richard Wassersug

For a patient to be effective as a “patient representative” within a health-related organization, work and more than just accepting an honorific title is required. I argue that for a patient to be most effective as a patient representative requires different types of background knowledge and commitment than being a “patient advocate”. Patients need to be cautious about how, when, and where they take on an official role of either an “advocate” or “representative”, if they truly want to be a positive influence on health outcomes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 484-499
Author(s):  
Helen Traill

The question of what community comes to mean has taken on increasing significance in sociological debates and beyond, as an increasingly politicised term and the focus of new theorisations. In this context, it is increasingly necessary to ask what is meant when community is invoked. Building on recent work that positions community as a practice and an ever-present facet of human sociality, this article argues that it is necessary to consider the powerful work that community as an idea does in shaping everyday communal practices, through designating collective space and creating behavioural expectations. To do so, the article draws on participant observation and interviews from a community gardening site in Glasgow that was part of a broader research project investigating the everyday life of communality within growing spaces. This demonstrates the successes but also the difficulties of carving out communal space, and the work done by community organisations to enact it. The article draws on contemporary community theory, but also on ideas from Davina Cooper about the role of ideation in social life. It argues for a conceptual approach to communality that does not situate it as a social form or seek it in everyday practice, but instead considers the vacillation between the ideation and practices of community: illustrated here in a designated community place. In so doing, this approach calls into focus the frictions and boundaries produced in that process, and questions the limits of organisational inclusivity.


Facilities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 38 (3/4) ◽  
pp. 298-315
Author(s):  
Luisa Errichiello ◽  
Tommasina Pianese

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify the main features of smart work centers (SWCs) and show how these innovative offices would support the implementation of smart working and related changes in workspaces (“bricks”), technologies (“bytes”) and organizational practices (“behaviors”). Design/methodology/approach In this study, scientific literature is combined with white papers and business reports and visits to 14 workplaces, including offices designed as SWCs, co-working spaces, one telecenter, one accelerator and one fab lab. Primary data were collected through interviews with managers and users and non-participant observation, whereas secondary data included web-sites, brochures, presentations, press releases and official documents. Findings The authors developed research propositions about how the design of spaces and the availability of technology within SWCs would support the “bricks” and “bytes” levers of smart working. More importantly, the authors assumed that this new type of workplace would sustain changes in employees’ behaviors and managers’ practices, thus helping to overcome several challenges traditionally associated with remote working. Research limitations/implications The exploratory nature of the research only provides preliminary information about the role of SWCs within smart working programs. Additional qualitative and quantitative empirical investigation is required. Practical implications This study provides valuable knowledge about how the design of corporate offices can be leveraged to sustain the implementation of smart working. Originality/value This study advances knowledge on workplaces by focusing on an innovative design of traditional offices (SWC). It also lays the foundations for future investigation aimed at testing the developed propositions.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 6578
Author(s):  
Alon Gelbman

The complexity of modern tourism and hospitality management because of competition in the destination market, and especially in urban tourism destinations, has created a demand for creativity and innovation. To satisfy heightened tourist expectations for a specialized experience, hospitality organizations emphasize local culture characteristics and the urban community. The purpose of this paper is to examine how an urban hospitality organization emphasizes community and social values in its hostels, and how the tourist experience is adapted to each city’s culture and atmosphere (Nazareth, Jerusalem, and Tel Aviv). The theoretical framework is based on the link connecting urban hospitality with the tourist experience, and how tourism innovation and creativity is managed, during this age of competition and specialization. The qualitative methodology includes participant observation, document review, and in-depth interviews. The findings of this study add a new dimension to the existing knowledge, namely the role of creativity and innovation in helping the management of an urban hospitality organization to shape the tourist experience. The study developed a new unique model for “implementing innovation in urban hospitality management” which describes the framework of connections and interactions between the various sustainable community based and social aspects. The novelty of this research model lies in the emphasis on how management uses innovation and creativity to brand the whole chain so as to realize the vision and values it wishes to promote. This also entails a system of sub-positioning that aligns the vision and values with the distinctive culture of each city and with each local community’s nature and traditions.


2014 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 449-466 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaimie McMullen ◽  
Hans van der Mars ◽  
Julie A. Jahn

The purpose of this study is to describe the experiences of physical education teacher education (PETE) majors enrolled in an internship course that provided them with authentic experiences promoting and facilitating a before-school physical activity (PA) program and to examine the associated implications for PETE programs within the Comprehensive School Physical Activity (CSPAP) framework. In this study, five PETE majors were recruited to participate. Data were collected from several sources including participant observation, interviews, systematic observation, and document analysis. The results show that preservice physical educators struggled with PA promotion as a consequence of perceptions of early programmatic success, feelings of nervousness and influences of their existing beliefs about the role of the physical educator. Therefore, when considering the role of the physical educator relative to a CSPAP, PETE programs should consider making adjustments to their curricula to include experiences that allow preservice teachers to practice skills associated with out-of-class PA promotion.


Author(s):  
Julia Wesely ◽  
Adriana Allen ◽  
Lorena Zárate ◽  
María Silvia Emanuelli

Re-thinking dominant epistemological assumptions of the urban in the global South implies recognising the role of grassroots networks in challenging epistemic injustices through the co-production of multiple saberes and haceres for more just and inclusive cities. This paper examines the pedagogies of such networks by focusing on the experiences nurtured within Habitat International Coalition in Latin America (HIC-AL), identified as a ‘School of Grassroots Urbanism’ (Escuela de Urbanismo Popular). Although HIC-AL follows foremost activist rather than educational objectives, members of HIC-AL identify and value their practices as a ‘School’, whose diverse pedagogic logics and epistemological arguments are examined in this paper. The analysis builds upon a series of in-depth interviews, document reviews and participant observation with HIC-AL member organisations and allied grassroots networks. The discussion explores how the values and principles emanating from a long history of popular education and popular urbanism in the region are articulated through situated pedagogies of resistance and transformation, which in turn enable generative learning from and for the social production of habitat.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 27-50
Author(s):  
Saroj Pokharel ◽  
Dipak Tharu ◽  
Yagya Murti Pandey

The study aims to investigate the role of livelihood diversification and social capital for the households’ movement, and also to explore the identity and bond of social capital and livelihood diversification to achieve an improved lifestyle. Human relations significantly create a network society, impalpable resource of community, shared values and trust which we draw upon in our daily lives. Livelihood diversification is a community-practised strategy for managing economic and income diversity in poverty reduction. It has highly emphasized income and well-being to diversify livelihood. It also turns the likely norms and networks with the households from exploiting new economic opportunities even in the future. This study responds to why people are migrating from the surrounding and the long distance of Kathmandu, and largely dependent on direct cash incomes from informal activities. It used qualitative approaches such as ethnography, case studies, participant observation, etc. to study the relationship between households and social capital level and livelihood diversification. Hence, the effects of social capital and livelihood diversification were found protecting households’ income. The major findings also show the social supportive network index which has significant effects on the households’ ability to learn a new livelihood. Income generations similarly affect the household capacity to secure a home and the socio-economic condition of households. This study can be advantageous for making both local and urban policy to diversify household livelihoods and social capital as well as applicable for new researchers in social sciences. Most importantly, it helps readers perceive new ways of promoting livelihood diversification and social capital and as a whole social advancement in Central Nepal.


2017 ◽  
Vol 70 (3) ◽  
pp. 504-510 ◽  
Author(s):  
Solange Meira de Sousa ◽  
Elizabeth Bernardino ◽  
Karla Crozeta ◽  
Aida Maris Peres ◽  
Maria Ribeiro Lacerda

ABSTRACT Objective: to understand the role of the nurse in the collegiate management model of a teaching hospital, in the integrality of care perspective. Method: a single case study with multiple units of analysis, with the theoretical proposition "integrality of care is a result of the care offered to the user by multiple professionals, including the nurse". Data were obtained in a functional unit of a teaching hospital through interviews with 13 nurses in a non-participant observation and document analysis. Results: from the analytical categories emerged subcategories that allowed understanding that the nurse promotes integrality of care through nursing management, team work and integration of services. Final considerations: the theoretical proposition was confirmed and it was verified that the nursing management focus on attending to health care needs and is a strategy to provide integrality of care.


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