Conclusion

2020 ◽  
pp. 140-150
Author(s):  
Simone Delerme
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
The Social ◽  
Ethnoracial Identity

The conclusion summarizes the contributions of the Greater Orlando case study and addresses the role of Latinos in challenging the south’s historic black-white racial binary. The chapter argues that the ethnographic fieldwork provides evidence of the social construction of a distinct Hispanic race and addresses the complexity of ethnoracial identity categorizations by examining the racialization of Hispanics and how they self-idenify.

“Great Men,” Law, and the Social Construction of Technology

2018 ◽  
Vol 43 (03) ◽  
pp. 1093-1112
Author(s):  
Kara W. Swanson
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Social Construction Of Technology ◽  
Origin Stories ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Law ◽  
Cultural Power ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
Truth Finding

Is Alexander Graham Bell's fame owed to law and lawyers? Two recent histories argue that some popular tales of invention originated with lawyers and judges as part of patent litigation battles (Stathis Arapostathis and Graeme Gooday, Patently Contestable: Electrical Technologies and Inventor Identities on Trial in Britain[2013]; Christopher Beauchamp, Invented by Law: Alexander Graham Bell and the Patent That Changed America[2015]). Bringing law into the historical project of understanding the social construction of technology, the authors unsettle “great man” narratives of invention. A tale of a recent patent war is a case study in the persistence of such narratives, highlighting the uses of legal storytelling (Ronald K. Fierstein, A Triumph of Genius: Edwin Land, Polaroid, and the Kodak Patent War[2015]). Together, these works invite consideration of the cultural power possessed by invention origin stories, the role of narratives in law and history, and the judicial performance of truth finding in Anglo-American law.

scholarly journals Decision Theory as Practice: Crafting Rationality in Organizations

2010 ◽  
Vol 31 (11) ◽  
pp. 1531-1566 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laure Cabantous ◽  
Jean-Pascal Gond ◽  
Michael Johnson-Cramer
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Decision Theory ◽  
Decision Analysis ◽  
Rational Choice ◽  
Rational Choice Theory ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Wide Range

This paper explores the underlying practices whereby rationality — as defined in rational choice theory — is achieved within organizations. The qualitative coding of 58 case study reports produced by decision analysts, working in a wide range of settings, highlights how organizational actors can make decisions in accord with the axioms of rational choice theory. Our findings describe the emergence of ‘decision-analysis’ as a field and reveal the complex and fragile socio-technical infrastructure underlying the craft of rationality, the central role of calculability, and the various forms of bricolage that decision analysts deploy to make rational decisions happen. Overall, this research explores the social construction of rationality and identifies the practices sustaining the performativity of rational choice theory within organizations.

scholarly journals Rethinking the Social Construction of Technology through ‘Following the Actors’: A Reappraisal of Technological Frames

2009 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 36-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Prell
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Case Study Research ◽  
Technology Design ◽  
Social Construction Of Technology ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Technological Frames ◽  
General Terms ◽  
The Social

In this paper, I summarize case study research on an information system called Connected Kids. This case study was guided by an approach to technology studies called the ‘Social construction of technology’ or SCOT Pinch and Bijker (1984). In discussing Connected Kids, I illustrate many of SCOT's main tenents, e.g. the various social interactions that surround and influence technology design. As the paper progresses, however, I focus on one concept in particular, that being SCOT's notion of a ‘technological frame,’ which is used as a catch-all concept for handling the structural influences in technology design. My discussion and illustration of this concept shows that – whilst technological frames help an analyst understand, in general terms, the role structure(s) play in shaping technology – the ‘heterogeneity’ of technological frames can cloak the more obvious, and potentially most influential, forces at work in technology design. In the case of Connected kids, the role of resources, and which actors had access to these resources, was critical in pointing Connected Kids down a particular trajectory. Further, this discovery emerged from listening carefully to respondents’ comments on the role of resources in their community. These comments, and my own observations on how resource-access propelled certain actors into a leadership position, led to my developing an alternative method for analyzing technological frames. The implications of this analysis are then discussed within the context of SCOT and technology studies more generally.

The invisibility of violence

2005 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 583-602 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vicky Bishop ◽  
Marek Korczynski ◽  
Laurie Cohen
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Formal Organization ◽  
Front Line ◽  
Policies And Procedures ◽  
The Social ◽  
Interpretive Approach ◽  
Line Context ◽  
High Level

This article explores the social construction of violence within the front-line context of job centres in the Employment Service (ES). The issue of violence within organizations is typically approached using positivistic methods. In contrast, this article deepens understandings of violence in organizations by using an interpretive approach. Through an analysis of data generated through an in-depth case study, this article argues that although ES front-liners experienced much of customer behaviour as violent, this high level of violence was systematically denied by the organization. In effect, the formal organization constructed violence in such a way that it was rendered invisible. This article examines not only how management, formal policies and procedures construct violence as invisible, but also the role of the staff themselves as active agents in the social construction of violence out of the workplace.

Endangered Butterflies and their Non-Native Host Plants: Examining Shifting Values of Belonging in Restoration

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Robert M. Anderson ◽  
Amy M. Lambert
Keyword(s):  
Ecological Restoration ◽  
Native Species ◽  
Puget Sound ◽  
A Value ◽  
The Social ◽  
Remote Island ◽  
Scientific Truth ◽  
Native Host

The island marble butterfly (Euchloe ausonides insulanus), thought to be extinct throughout the 20th century until re-discovered on a single remote island in Puget Sound in 1998, has become the focus of a concerted protection effort to prevent its extinction. However, efforts to “restore” island marble habitat conflict with efforts to “restore” the prairie ecosystem where it lives, because of the butterfly’s use of a non-native “weedy” host plant. Through a case study of the island marble project, we examine the practice of ecological restoration as the enactment of particular norms that define which species are understood to belong in the place being restored. We contextualize this case study within ongoing debates over the value of “native” species, indicative of deep-seated uncertainties and anxieties about the role of human intervention to alter or manage landscapes and ecosystems, in the time commonly described as the “Anthropocene.” We interpret the question of “what plants and animals belong in a particular place?” as not a question of scientific truth, but a value-laden construct of environmental management in practice, and we argue for deeper reflexivity on the part of environmental scientists and managers about the social values that inform ecological restoration.

Experience of Ethnographic Fieldwork in an English Benedictine Monastery

2011 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 221-235 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Irvine
Keyword(s):  
Social World ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Fieldwork Experience ◽  
The Social ◽  
Peripheral Participation

What is the role of imitation in ethnographic fieldwork, and what are its limits? This article explores what it means to participate in a particular fieldsite; a Catholic English Benedictine monastery. A discussion of the importance of hospitality in the life of the monastery shows how the guest becomes a point of contact between the community and the wider society within which that community exists. The peripheral participation of the ethnographer as monastic guest is not about becoming incorporated, but about creating a space within which knowledge can be communicated. By focusing on the process of re-learning in the monastery – in particular, relearning how to experience silence and work – I discuss some of the ways in which the fieldwork experience helped me to reassess the social world to which I would return.

THE ROLE OF LOCAL SOCIAL INSTITUTION IN COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT IN BANDUNG REGENCY, INDONESIA

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Helly Ocktilia
Keyword(s):  
Leadership Style ◽  
Social Institution ◽  
Community Empowerment ◽  
Board Members ◽  
Supportive Leadership ◽  
Community Institutions ◽  
The Social ◽  
Descriptive Method

This study aims to gain a deeper understanding of the existence of the local social organization in conducting community empowerment. The experiment was conducted at Community Empowerment Institution (In Indonesia it is referred to as Lembaga Pemberdayaan Masyarakat/LPM). LPM Cibeunying as one of the local social institution in Bandung regency. Aspects reviewed in the study include the style of leadership, processes, and stages of community empowerment, as well as the LPM network. The research method used is a case study with the descriptive method and qualitative approach. Data collection was conducted against five informants consisting of the Chairman and LPM’s Board members, village officials, and community leaders. The results show that the dominant leadership style is participative, in addition to that, a supportive leadership style and directive leadership style are also used in certain situations. The empowerment process carried out per the stages of the empowerment process is identifying and assessing the potential of the region, problems, and opportunities-chances; arranging a participative activity plan; implementing the activity plan; and monitoring and evaluating the process and results of activities. The social networking of LPM leads to a social network of power in which LPM can influence the behavior of communities and community institutions in utilizing and managing community empowerment programs. From the research, it can be concluded that the model of community empowerment implemented by LPM Cibeunying Village is enabling, empowering, and protecting.

From converts to cooperation: Protestant internationalism, US missionaries and Indian Christians and ‘Professional’ social work between Boston and Bombay (c. 1920–1950)

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Michael Phillipp Brunner
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
North America ◽  
Social Gospel ◽  
Local Conditions ◽  
Historical Approach ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Concerns ◽  
High Phase

Abstract The 1920s and 30s were a high phase of liberal missionary internationalism driven especially by American-led visions of the Social Gospel. As the missionary consensus shifted from proselytization to social concerns, the indigenization of missions and the role of the ‘younger churches’ outside of Europe and North America was brought into focus. This article shows how Protestant internationalism pursued a ‘Christian Sociology’ in dialogue with the field’s academic and professional form. Through the case study of settlement sociology and social work schemes by the American Marathi Mission (AMM) in Bombay, the article highlights the intricacies of applying internationalist visions in the field and asks how they were contested and shaped by local conditions and processes. Challenging a simplistic ‘secularization’ narrative, the article then argues that it was the liberal, anti-imperialist drive of the missionary discourse that eventually facilitated an American ‘professional imperialism’ in the development of secular social work in India. Adding local dynamics to the analysis of an internationalist discourse benefits the understanding of both Protestant internationalism and the genesis of Indian social work and shows the value of an integrated global micro-historical approach.

scholarly journals Using Social Media in Tourist Sentiment Analysis: A Case Study of Andalusia during the Covid-19 Pandemic

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 3836
Author(s):  
David Flores-Ruiz ◽  
Adolfo Elizondo-Salto ◽  
María de la O. Barroso-González
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Sentiment Analysis ◽  
Cost Savings ◽  
Mass Scale ◽  
Tourism Sector ◽  
The Social ◽  
Analytical Tools ◽  
Media Data

This paper explores the role of social media in tourist sentiment analysis. To do this, it describes previous studies that have carried out tourist sentiment analysis using social media data, before analyzing changes in tourists’ sentiments and behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the case study, which focuses on Andalusia, the changes experienced by the tourism sector in the southern Spanish region as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic are assessed using the Andalusian Tourism Situation Survey (ECTA). This information is then compared with data obtained from a sentiment analysis based on the social network Twitter. On the basis of this comparative analysis, the paper concludes that it is possible to identify and classify tourists’ perceptions using sentiment analysis on a mass scale with the help of statistical software (RStudio and Knime). The sentiment analysis using Twitter data correlates with and is supplemented by information from the ECTA survey, with both analyses showing that tourists placed greater value on safety and preferred to travel individually to nearby, less crowded destinations since the pandemic began. Of the two analytical tools, sentiment analysis can be carried out on social media on a continuous basis and offers cost savings.

scholarly journals What matters? The role of values in transformations toward sustainability: a case study of coffee production in Burundi

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milda Nordbø Rosenberg
Keyword(s):  
Vital Role ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
New Materialism ◽  
Discursive Practices ◽  
Coffee Production ◽  
Ethnographic Fieldwork ◽  
Dynamic Relations ◽  
Participatory Observation

AbstractThis paper examines the role of values in transformations toward sustainability. Values, generally defined as what people deem to matter, are increasingly gaining interest in and outside of academia. For example, sustainability aligns with specific values such as dignity, equality, safety, and harmony for people and nature. However, current approaches to values are mind-matter dualistic, and therefore failing to honor the inherently dynamic relations of socio-ecological systems. Drawing on new materialism, I explore values as part of the relations that make this world and propose to consider values as material-discursive practices. Ethnographic fieldwork was done in 2017 with coffee producers in Burundi who aimed to transform production by caring for the coffee and people that grow it. Based on interviews and participatory observation, I present how values were integral to transforming the relational aspects of coffee production. In this study, values of togetherness, care, dignity, and faith were dominant and were found to reconfigure the socio-ecological system of coffee production. I argue that values are inseparable from, and hence co-productive of, the material world that we experience and play a vital role in sustainability transformations.

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