scholarly journals Waking Up From "Conjecture" As Well As From "Dream"

Author(s):  
Bruno Latour

As every ethnographer knows, in addition to the many blunders every one of us commits in the course of our fieldwork, there exist also graver mistakes when we sense a mistaken regime of reality granted to an entity. It is at those moments, usually the most revealing in the course of our inquiries, when we try to repair broken relations by some innovative move to define the status of the contrasting realities that have been open to misinterpretation. During the last quarter century I have attempted, quite systematically, to increase the number of templates by which the so-called Moderns account for themselves; not, to be sure, in their official representation (they remain staunch adepts of the Object-Subject Operating System and will swear that they are obedient naturalists), but by looking for the many occasions where they express dissatisfaction with such an official view of themselves. What I think I have documented are the protestations by many different people that a skewed template is being used to account for the mode of existence of the agencies that are most attached to them.

Author(s):  
Thomas Neville Bonner

The years around 1830, as just described, were a turning point in the movement to create a more systematic and uniform approach to the training of doctors. For the next quarter-century, a battle royal raged in the transatlantic countries between those seeking to create a common standard of medical training for all practitioners and those who defended the many-tiered systems of preparing healers that prevailed in most of them. At stake were such important issues as the care of the rural populations, largely unserved by university-trained physicians, the ever larger role claimed for science and academic study in educating doctors, the place of organized medical groups in decision making about professional training, and the role to be played by government in setting standards of medical education. In Great Britain, the conflict over change centered on the efforts of reformers, mainly liberal Whigs, apothecary-surgeons, and Scottish teachers and practitioners, to gain a larger measure of recognition for the rights of general practitioners to ply their trade freely throughout the nation. Ranged against them were the royal colleges, the traditional universities, and other defenders of the status quo. Particularly sensitive in Britain was the entrenched power of the royal colleges of medicine and surgery— “the most conservative bodies in the medical world,” S. W. F. Holloway called them—which continued to defend the importance of a liberal, gentlemanly education for medicine, as well as their right to approve the qualifications for practice of all other practitioners except apothecaries. Members of the Royal College of Physicians of London, the most elite of all the British medical bodies, were divided by class into a small number of fellows, almost all graduates of Oxford and Cambridge, and a larger number of licentiates, who, though permitted to practice, took no part in serious policy discussions and could not even use such college facilities as the library or the museum. “The Fellows,” claimed a petition signed by forty-nine London physicians in 1833, “have usurped all the corporate power, offices, privileges, and emoluments attached to the College.”


2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-85
Author(s):  
Robert P. Sellers

The meaning of the death of Jesus on the cross has been interpreted differently from the first century until today. Of the many theories proposed throughout Christian history, the dominant understanding, especially among evangelical Protestants since the Reformation and perhaps dating from Anselm of Canterbury in the eleventh century, has been the penal-substitutionary view of atonement. Christ died to pay the penalty for human sin, so humanity can receive forgiveness by trusting in the efficacy of Jesus’s death on its behalf. This explanation is an objective theory that is “Godward focused,” understanding the work of Christ as a divine plan to satisfy what God requires: expiation for human sin. Other competing theories, however, reject this idea and propose more subjective views that are “humanward focused.” This article considers the reality of different, imperfect perspectives about matters as complex as the interpretation of God. It connects the writer’s affirmation of the plurality of religious experience with his having lived a quarter century in the multifaith milieu of Java. It touches on specific opposing theories of atonement, endorsing as more useful in our interreligious world the subjective approaches to understanding the cross. It advocates an intriguing argument for the plurality of end goals, or “salvations,” among the world’s religions. Finally, it uses the less dominant models of martyr motif and the moral example theory to investigate how the concept of atonement might be understood in the context of four major world religions other than Christianity, suggesting that acknowledgment of the legitimacy of different approaches to the Divine is a distinctly “Christian” way to live in a diverse world.


1983 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 167-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
John W. Burton

AbstractIf my discernment of the thought that underlies his study of Nuer religion is not entirely misconstrued, then one can assert a logical consistency between Collingwood's methodology for history and Evans-Pritchard's for ethnography. It is worthwhile, in that light, to consider the fact that "at one time Evans-Pritchard contemplated writing Collingwood's biography" (Beidelman 1974:559). One commentator, (Kuper 1980:118) typifies this methodology as "postwar idealism" and suggests that the major works he published in the later decades of his presence at Oxford demonstrate the "sterility" of his methodology and theory. Still others have hinted that his entry into the Catholic Church was later reflected in his depiction of Nuer religous life. These are remarkable assertions, when one takes the time to reflect on the many ways in which his own approach and writings have so profoundly influenced the direction of anthropological enquiry in his own country and abroad. The fact is, one can no longer write ethnography in lieu of a solid understanding of the historical circumstances which have resulted in the contemporary 'ethnographic present'. At the same time, practitioners of the discipline have addressed from almost every angle the proposition that all ethnography is indeed a good part confession-that we write what we are able to see. That is precisely the quality of the work that will guarantee the status of Nuer religion as a classic. The methods of history and anthropology can only become more similar. Anyone who holds an absence of definition or presumed repugnance toward theory as criticisms of his contributions, has truly lost the forest for the trees. It is all the more remarkable that his methodological and theoretical advances in the anthropological study of religion are to be found not in his answers, but in the questions he raised.10


2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcyliena H. Morgan

This essay considers some of the insight we have gathered about language, feminism, racism and power. In many respects, it celebrates the linguistic power of the many theories about how Black women navigate intersectionality where racism and sexism intermingle, suggesting that our analyses should always recognise that a lethal combination of factors are in play. Black women, in particular, actively insist on forms of language and discourse that both represent and create their world through words, expressions and verbal routines that are created within and outside of the African American speech community to confront injustice. One example involves the verb ‘play,’ which I argue often functions as a power statement or ‘powermove’ that demands respect while presenting a threat to the status quo. This use of ‘play’ is the opposite of inconsequential games of play or joking.


Author(s):  
Christian D. Washburn

This chapter considers two important ecumenical councils of the Church in the modern era: Trent (1545–63) and Vatican I (1869–70). The chapter examines in detail the key teachings of each council. The reform decrees of Trent will only be discussed in so far as they touch upon dogmatic decrees. In the case of Trent the chapter identifies the key documents from the many sessions of the council over its twenty-year history, offering a clear guide to ways in which its teachings on revelation, grace, and justification offered a precise Catholic response to the emergent theologies of Protestantism. Vatican I’s key teachings on revelation, the knowledge of God, and the status of the papacy are similarly treated.


1998 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 185-189 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara R Bergmann

The achievements (or lack thereof) of the AEA's Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession (CSWEP) are compared to those of analogous committees in three of our sister disciplines. In psychology, sociology, and history, committees of women professionals advocated and facilitated radical changes in the disciplines' treatment of issues involving gender. They also fought effectively for a far bigger role for women professionals in their disciplines. In the economics profession, the treatment of women's issues and the marginalization of women professionals remain problematic, despite the quarter century of CSWEP's existence.


2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pieraugusto Panzalis ◽  
Andrea Deiana ◽  
Sarah Caronni ◽  
Augusto Navone

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are acknowledged globally as effective tools for the protection and management of the marine environment; however, to get effective results it is necessary to set up a proper and continuous mapping of the marine territory, in order to gain detailed knowledge of its different aspects. Therefore, the implementation and maintenance of a modern GIS (Geographic Information System) has become an indispensable task for the MPA of Tavolara - Punta Coda Cavallo to collect, aggregate, classify, and track the conducted mapping activities. Between 2011 and 2012 the sea bottom of the MPA was surveyed using different methods: by means of a multi-beam echo sounder and of a side scan sonar, as well as conducting fast scientific scuba divings with re-breathers and underwater position system technologies. High resolution geodatasets, characterized by a significantly high quality in representing and describing the sea bottom and its habitats, were produced in both feature (scale up to 1:1.250) and raster formats (up to 30cm/pixel for sonar images and 1m/pixel for bathymetry) and they currently constitute the basis of the MPA's GIS, including its 3D applications and its web map services for desktop and mobile devices (iPhone & Android). To update the above described geodatasets during time, acquiring new data on the conservation targets considered in monitoring activities, among which the status of P. oceanica meadows is of the most important ones, a long term mapping plan was realized on the basis of an innovative methodology elaborated by the MPA considering both the wideness of the area and the limited funds available at present. The whole MPA was divided in territorial units by means of a regular grid of square cells having a 100m side with the logic of starting the mapping activities from the mainly important areas and then to spread the surveys up to fill the whole mosaic. All the new data acquired with this methodology could then be mixed, compared and indexed within the same cell and/or in the many already available geodatases, starting from those dated 2006 having a regular grid with square cells of 500m per side.


1997 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 105-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Pimentel ◽  
X. Huang ◽  
A. Codova ◽  
M. Pimentel

The food situation worldwide is becoming critical. At present, more than 2 billion humans are malnourished and experience unhealthy living conditions (FAO, 1992a,b; Neisheim, 1993; McMichael, 1993; Maberly, 1994; Bouis, 1995). The number of humans who also are diseased is the largest number ever, and about 40,000 children die each day from disease and malnutrition (Kutzner, 1991; Tribe, 1994).  The many problems that are now evident emphasize the urgent need to reassess the status of environmental resources. Based on the evidence, definitive plans must be developed to improve environmental management now and for the future. Of major importance is the limiting and slow reduction of human numbers to better balance the carrying capacity of the earth's natural resources. 


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Nina Helen Finigan

<p>Environmental sustainability is becoming an increasingly essential component of modern life. The contemporary museums’ role as public educators, and as guardians of tangible and intangible culture, places them in a unique position to address the various issues surrounding environmental sustainability, from climate change, to bio-diversity loss, to conservation. There is increasing momentum behind the idea that museums should not only engage with environmental sustainability, but that they indeed have a responsibility to. Although museums throughout New Zealand are addressing environmental sustainability, there is currently no thorough examination of how they are doing this. Therefore, the aim of this dissertation was so find out the current state of environmental sustainability in New Zealand museums, and specifically how staff are approaching it. Through engaging in a case study of Te Manawa Museum, Gallery and Science Centre, Palmerston North, and specifically the environmentally themed exhibition Te Awa/The River: Heart of the Manawatu, this dissertation analyses and discusses the realities of addressing institutional environmental sustainability. While the previous literature surrounding this topic has addressed the many reasons why museums should engage with environmental sustainability, this dissertation has expanded on this by analysing and discussing the realities of addressing environmental sustainability from a staff perspective. Through interviews with five Te Manawa staff members, this dissertation has revealed that while museum professionals agree that engagement with environmental sustainability should become part of bottom line holistic sustainable development, the status of museums as trusted democratic institutions can place them in a conflicted space ‘in-between’ when dealing with polarising issues such as the environment. This is particularly relevant to the discussion around new-museological theory, and the importance of local context and reflexive community engagement, where the community essentially help drive museological direction and content.</p>


2014 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 315-330 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle C. Brennan ◽  
Alison J. Cotgrave

Purpose – Despite the surge of interest in construction sustainability and the many Government initiatives encouraging reform in the UK construction industry (CI), the prevalence of sustainable development (SD) in the industry is still largely lagging behind that of other industries. Given the amount of focus and activity identified nationally in this area, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the reasons why this is not being translated into action and to seek counsel from industry professionals as to how they believe change can be achieved with a particular focus on how they believe higher education institutions (HEIs) can contribute. Design/methodology/approach – An explorative, qualitative study using three focus groups was of construction professionals. Findings – Despite a lack of action, many in industry support sustainability and actively attempt to engage in sustainable practices but a number of barriers preclude successful implementation. Government initiatives are having a positive impact, with participants believing that both Government and HEIs are imperative in driving the sustainability agenda forward. Research limitations/implications – Whilst limited in scale, this paper highlights the current state of the CI in relation to SD and evidences that progress is being made albeit slowly. The findings may help both Government and HEIs alongside industry in achieving how this can be overcome. Originality/value – Previous research in this area has generally adopted a quantitative approach. Adopting a qualitative approach provides a more in depth view as to why the status quo remains with regards to SD in the CI.


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