scholarly journals Religion, theology and the social sciences in a society in transition

2004 ◽  
Vol 60 (1/2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Etienne De Villiers
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Religious Studies ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
The Social ◽  
Societal Changes ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Point Of Departure

The societal changes introduced with the advent of the new political dispensation in South Africa in 1994 brought with them serious consequences for the different religions and for the academic disciplines devoted to the study of religion. This includes disciplines such as theology and religious studies, as well as those social sciences with an academic interest in religion as influential societal factor. The second part of the article presents a brief survey of the impact of these societal changes on religion, particularly the Christian religion, and the academic disciplines of theology, religious studies and the social sciences. An outline of the position and role of religion and the academic disciplines of theology, religious studies and the social sciences in the apartheid society from which South Africa is evolving, is used as point of departure in the first part of the article. The third part of the article ventures beyond mere description of the position and role of religion and the different academic disciplines involved with the study of religion. It aims to make out a case that in the New South Africa religion and academic disciplines exclusively devoted to the study of religion, such as theology, need the social sciences.

The problem of periodization of the history of religion

1997 ◽  
pp. 3-8
Author(s):  
Borys Lobovyk
Keyword(s):  
Religious Studies ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Religious Development ◽  
History Of Religion ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Role Of Religion

An important problem of religious studies, the history of religion as a branch of knowledge is the periodization process of the development of religious phenomenon. It is precisely here, as in focus, that the question of the essence and meaning of the religious development of the human being of the world, the origin of beliefs and cult, the reasons for the changes in them, the place and role of religion in the social and spiritual process, etc., are converging.

Financialization in South Africa

2021 ◽  
pp. 1012-1030
Author(s):  
Ewa Karwowski
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
South Africa ◽  
Financial Markets ◽  
South African ◽  
Emerging Economies ◽  
Global South ◽  
Value Chains ◽  
Financial Centre ◽  
The Social

Financialization has become a popular concept across the social sciences, usually defined as the increasing role of financial motives, financial markets, financial actors, and financial institutions in the operation of the domestic and international economies. Financialization researchers highlight the detrimental consequences of an excessively large and powerful financial sector on economy and society. In South Africa, financialization has been shaped by its colonial and apartheid past, especially the strong links of South African corporations and banks to the international financial centre of London. Low growth and investment, an outcome of the finance-led accumulation regime, have also resulted in the continuity of extreme inequality and high levels of unemployment. In the Global South, financialization mainly affects emerging economies since they possess relatively developed financial markets in comparison to poorer countries. South Africa is the only African economy for which there is a substantial financialization literature. In comparison to other emerging economies, South Africa is relatively strongly financialized as stock market capitalization is extremely high, making Johannesburg one of the top financial centres in the Global South. Furthermore, financial inflows into the country are comparatively large, JSE-listed companies are well integrated into global value chains and household debt is high.

scholarly journals Cold War Sewing Machines: Production and Consumption in 1950s China and Japan

2016 ◽  
Vol 75 (3) ◽  
pp. 755-783 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonia Finnane
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Cold War ◽  
English Language ◽  
Chinese Women ◽  
Acting Out ◽  
Production And Consumption ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Point Of Departure

With the “consumption turn” in the humanities and the social sciences, a phenomenon evident in English-language scholarship from the 1980s onward, production ceased to command the attention it had once received from historians. A recent (2012) study of the sewing machine in modern Japan by Harvard historian Andrew Gordon demonstrates the effects: what could feasibly have been published under the title “Making Machinists” was instead marketed as “Fabricating Consumers.” What does it mean to talk about consumers in 1950s Japan, a time and place of hard work, thrift, and restraint? For Gordon an important premise was the role of women in the postwar economy. This provides a point of departure from which to explore the ideologies and practices of production and consumption across the Cold War dividing line between “consumerist” and “productionist” regimes in East Asia. The Cold War was a time of sharp differences between the two societies, but also a time of shared preoccupations with productivity and national growth. In their different political contexts, Japanese and Chinese women were acting out many of the same roles.

scholarly journals Citizenship and Religious Freedoms in Post-Revolutionary Egypt

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (7) ◽  
pp. 516
Author(s):  
Mohamed Fahmy Menza
Keyword(s):  
Open Door ◽  
Citizenship Rights ◽  
The Social ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
State Actors ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Changing Role ◽  
Modern Nation State

The majority of the social and political forces that spearheaded and actively participated in the 2011 and 2013 waves of uprisings catapulted the demands to reestablish ‘citizenship’ as one of the main foundations of a new social contract aiming at redefining state–society relations in a new Egypt. Meanwhile, the concept of citizenship has been increasingly featured in the discourse and practice of a wide variety of state actors and institutions. In fact, Egypt’s experiences with the modern nation-state project concerning the conceptualization of citizenship, and the subsequent implications on religious freedoms and the role of religion in the polity at large, has gone through various ebbs and flows since the beginning of the 20th century. The concept of citizenship as such has faced a plethora of challenges and has been affected by the socioeconomic and political trajectories of state–society relations during the Nasser, Sadat, Mubarak, and, most recently, Sissi regimes. Dilemmas of geographical disparities and uneven access to resources and services, in addition to issues of discrimination against ethnic and religious minorities such as Coptic Christians, Shiites, Nubians, Bedouins, or on the basis of gender, are among the main accompanying features of the neoliberal order that was introduced and then consolidated first by Sadat’s Open Door and then Mubarak’s state-withdrawal policies, respectively. To what extent did the conception and practice of citizenship rights and religious freedoms—as defined by state and non-state actors—change after the demise of the Mubarak regime? In addition, what is the role of the Egyptian civil society vis-a-vis the state in this process of conceptualizing and/or practicing citizenship rights and religious freedoms in the new Egypt? Focusing on the aforementioned questions, this paper aims at shedding some light on the changing role of religion in the Egyptian polity post 2011, while also highlighting the impact of the sociopolitical and economic ramifications witnessed within the society on the scope of religious liberties and citizenship rights as a whole.

scholarly journals Bourdieu: El impacto de una palabra en la investigación de las juventudes / Bourdieu: The impact of a word on youth research

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (25) ◽  
pp. 170-178
Author(s):  
Ernesto Israel Santillán-Anguiano ◽  
Emilia Cristina González-Machado
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Text Analysis ◽  
Pierre Bourdieu ◽  
The Social ◽  
Youth Research ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Impact ◽  
School Space

Este trabajo ofrece una serie de reflexiones sobre el texto La juventud no es más que una palabra presentada por Pierre Bourdieu en 1978. El principal objetivo de este documento es hacer evidente la vigencia de las ideas del sociólogo francés respecto a la construcción del concepto de juventud como categoría en las ciencias sociales. Para ello, se realizó un análisis de textos para profundizar las ideas asociadas a las desigualdades, el capital cultural, el habitus y el papel del espacio escolar. Como resultados más relevantes se pueden mencionar que: 1) La definición de la juventud es producto de la lucha intergeneracional y por lo tanto arbitraria; 2) el habitus juvenil garantiza la permanencia de la estructura social; 3) el capital cultural incorporado de los jóvenes se encuentra garantizado por el tiempo liberado; 4) el espacio escolar es un campo de privilegios que naturaliza las condiciones de ser joven. This work offers some reflections on the text Youth’ is Just a Word presented by Pierre Bourdieu in 1978. The objective of this document is to make evident the validity of the ideas of the French sociologist regarding the construction of the concept of youth as a category in the social sciences. For this, a text analysis was carried out to deepen the ideas associated with inequalities, cultural capital, habitus and the role of school space. As the most relevant results, it can be mentioned that: 1) The definition of youth is the product of intergenerational struggle and therefore arbitrary; 2) juvenile habitus guarantees the permanence of the social structure; 3) the incorporated cultural capital of young people is guaranteed by time released; 4) the school space is a field of privileges that naturalizes the conditions of being young.

scholarly journals How Troubling is our Inheritance - A review of genetics and race in the social sciences

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip N. Cohen
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Social Behavior ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Popular Book ◽  
The Social ◽  
Evolutionary View ◽  
Relative Status ◽  
Point Of Departure

This article addresses the argument that there is variation between races in the biological basis for social behavior. The article uses Nicholas Wade’s popular book, A Troublesome Inheritance, as the point of departure for a discussion of attendant issues, including the extent to which human races can be definitively demarcated biologically, the extent to which genetics is related to contemporary definitions of race, and the role of natural selection as a possible mechanism for change in modern societies. My critical review of the theory and evidence for an evolutionary view of racial determinism finds that genetics does not explain the relative status and well-being of today’s racially identified groups or their broader societies.

scholarly journals Evaluation of social marketing objectives: A case study of the effectiveness of operation gcin’amanzi in soweto, South Africa

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 517-528
Author(s):  
Maxwell Agabu Phiri ◽  
Degracia Khumalo
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Social Marketing ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
The Public ◽  
Lack Of Information ◽  
The Social ◽  
Basic Services ◽  
The Impact

This study was aimed at investigating the effectiveness of the social marketing goal in the implementation of Operation Gcin’amanzi (OGM) in Mofolo North, Soweto, South Africa. The paper is based on a quantitative in nature, although qualitative data was collected to confirm and clarify issues identified in the survey questionnaire. A process-based research approach was pursued in order to measure the impact of social marketing as a phenomenon that has been explored in changing consumer behaviour for the public good. Due to unsuccessful telephone calls to the Johannesburg Water’s communication centre (JW) there is a lack of information from them on specific studies or surveys conducted specifically on OGM since its inception. It is anticipated that the findings from this study will add value to the knowledge in the public sector by elevating the significant role of social marketing in the delivery of basic services projects. These projects are complex in nature as issues of equity, access and the impact on development have to be considered, unlike in traditional marketing approaches where it is the benefit and satisfaction of an individual consumer that is key.

Religion and belief in university teaching and learning

2020 ◽  
pp. 103-112
Author(s):  
Adam Dinham ◽  
Alp Arat ◽  
Martha Shaw
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Sexual Orientation ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Religious Studies ◽  
University Teaching ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Cultural Legacy ◽  
The Social ◽  
Role Of Religion

This chapter addresses the role of religion and belief in university teaching and learning. In some subjects, of course, religion is simply a topic of relevance, as in history and in religious studies itself. In others, it is a cultural legacy to be decoded and understood. In others again, it embodies the opposite of the rational, scientific method that predominates in higher education, and in relation to which practically all other disciplines have cut their teeth. As such, it is an utter irrelevance. In some cases, this produces hostility against all religious ideas. This is likely to feel painful for some students, who can feel uncomfortable when hearing lecturers be rude or offensive about their beliefs or about belief in general. In the social sciences, unlike race, gender, or sexual orientation, religion has rarely been a variable. The question of the place of religion and belief in university disciplines was explored in the project Reimagining Religion and Belief for Policy and Practice. The study analysed nine arts, humanities, and social science disciplines, including anthropology, cultural studies, geography, philosophy, religious studies, social policy, social work, sociology, and theology.

The Social Economy and Role of Government in South Africa

2019 ◽  
pp. 943-955
Author(s):  
O. E. Okeke-Uzodike ◽  
Mogie Subban
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Social Economy ◽  
The South ◽  
Global Recession ◽  
Regulatory Frameworks ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The Impact

Social economy, as a relatively new concept, is considered the ‘third sector' of the economy in government discourse. It plays significant roles in socio-economic and political spheres of any nation. Emphasis on social economy has been as a result of the global recession which caused economic depression in several countries all over the world. In South Africa, the impact of the economic recession has reflected mostly in increased unemployment and poverty levels resulting in maximization of discrepancies between the rich and poor with inequalities, creating disenabling environments for foreign investments. These social problems have called for an examination of the role of the social economy in liberating the South African economy from its current dire state. This chapter on tracing the developmental agenda of the South African government, will examine how the social economy has fed into the National Development Plan and the impact of implementation of government policies and regulatory frameworks to ensure achievement of various national imperatives aligned to the Millennium Development Goals in the context of the social economy. The authors state that whilst there is a growing trend towards the social economy in the current context of government, multi-faceted effects of poverty needs to be targeted through robust entrepreneurial opportunities for growth and development of the economy.

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