Traversing Doctoral Borderlands : Black doctoral students’ experiences of identity construction in South Africa

Doctoral studies are described as a process of formation and becoming. This is an in-between space between unknowing and knowing, within and without the ivory tower of academia. In this in-between space the doctoral candidate takes the role of a novice and apprentice unlearning the student/unknowing past and learning to become a professional in academia. This project utilises the borderlands theory to understand the experiences of doctoral students as they undergo the process of becoming and intellectual identity formation. Whilst ‘journey’ and other metaphors that have been used to understand doctoral student experiences capture the process of becoming as a progression through the liminal stages – proposal, literature review, context, writing, reading etc. These stages presuppose temporality of being leading to stasis/completion. I argue that such conceptualisation of doctoral studies, although useful, depict one side of the story and provide a limited, monolithic, and homogenising understanding of the spatial configurations of doctoral space and intellectual identity formation. The dominant discourses of doctoral conceived and perceived space, liminal stages and understanding of doctoral student experiences, mask the more latent and intimate liminal stages of intellectual identity formation. Drawing from borderlands theory, I firstly argue for a holistic approach to understanding the spatiality of doctorate studies. Secondly, I argue that liminality is an everyday process integral to human existence where one is always in a state of ideological transition. An important state of liminality is the awareness of ‘Self’ in perpetual motion, caught between two worlds dominated/dominator and two ideologies of oppression/resistance. If this side of liminality is not made visible, institutional spaces, such as the doctorate, privileged with the power to disseminate and position onto-epistemologies as universal can be used to reproduce and reinforce exclusionary onto-epistemologies that subsequently impact intellectual identity formation. Using Lefebvre’s (1991) rhythmanalysis method, I use student experiences not as mere data for analysis, but as an act of envisioning, reinventing and coknowledge production to propose borderlands as a new metaphor to study doctoral spatial realities and the experiences of the students that traverse through it.

Ngenger tradition and ideology transformation in inter-cultural communication

In Tempurejo, Ngawi, between the 1960s and 1970s, many Ponorogo residents chose to ngenger. Ngenger is living and working sincerely, not paying to a household of someone whose position is much higher in dignity, degree, and education. Children who come to ngenger the background are poor and have the ideology of the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) mass organization or abangan. After finishing ngenger, the majority turned into Muhammadiyah activists and developed Muhammadiyah in Ponorogo. From the above problems, this study intends to reveal, First, the process of planting Muhammadiyah ideology. Secondly, there is an ideological transformation. This research was conducted in Ngawi and Ponorogo with qualitative descriptive methods. In-depth interviews, observation, and documentation of extracted data. The study results are the regeneration process carried out first; they see Muhammadiyah as an open, modern, professional organization. Second, families are open-minded and not doctrine. Third, the exemplary of educators and community leaders who have sincerity, the spirit of struggle, and the principle of the emphasis on the importance of Islamic da'wah. The ideological transition from originally an abangan Islam and NU to Muhammadiyah was because as long as the ngenger were introduced to Muhammadiyah organizations that were tolerant, open, modern, professional, and egalitarian.

The “Techno-Turn” of China’s Official Discourse on Nationalism

This article explores a recent tendency in the official Chinese discourse on nationalism—the government more actively employs Chinese achievements in science and technology to boost national pride and regime legitimacy. This “techno-turn” focuses on China’s construction of megaprojects, its active role in international techno-economic business, and its development of cutting-edge scientific research and technologies. This transition in the official discourse on nationalism contains several rationales along material, policy, and ideological dimensions, and uses sophisticated propaganda tactics. It also faces constraints and challenges—some derived from conflicts with reality, and others derived from internal logical imbalances. The turn marks a new stage in the development of contemporary Chinese nationalism, in which official nationalism absorbs elements from popular nationalism. This ideological transition may influence both Chinese domestic and international politics—it may lead to China’s more confident engagement in international affairs, but may also generate uncertainties in relations between China and the West.

Modern Urban Planning and Dissonant Heritage: The Case of San Polo

SummaryThe aim of the article is to understand to what extent modern mass housing estates, built in the decades following the Second World War with new construction methods and under the influence of innovative planning ideas and egalitarian philosophy, are currently facing a process of decline. In particular, the research is committed to understand how such innovative urban structures rapidly evolved into stigmatized places of residence and sources of dissonant heritage. The work focuses on the case of San Polo, a neighbourhood of Brescia, in Italy, designed by architect, planner and historian Leonardo Benevolo, who had the opportunity in the northern Italian city to experiment and implement his architectural views in the sphere of “public urbanization”. It is possible to claim that Benevolo’s theoretical approach and architectural practice excellently represented the golden age of modern housing in postwar Europe, when the connection between progressive political views and egalitarian urban planning was apparently perfect. Nevertheless, after the political and economic transition that characterized western Europe since the 1980s, mass housing quickly became a residual issue in the public discourse and entered in a spiral of decline. San Polo was no exception: problems – especially in its iconic tower blocks – soon emerged, and overall optimistic expectations were frustrated by the reality of physical, social and economic decline. This study is therefore committed to understand to what extent San Polo is a case of dissonant heritage in the urban context. While it is clear that the heritage of San Polo is the heritage of a precise historical phase and represents particular ideas in architecture and planning, on the other hand it must be stressed that the ideological transition of recent decades made its values and its messages obsolete and that socio-economic segregation negatively affected the reputation of the neighbourhood and its inhabitants had to face a process of stigmatization that found echo in official and journalistic discourse.

Ideology as Narrative

Chapter 2 considers what happens at the sharp turn in the road when a narrative does not just lend meaning and organization to the group but isolates it from healthy public discourse; an adversarial turn that occurs when the group’s narrative becomes a closed and rigid ideology. The chapter outlines the telltale signs of the ideological transition and describes some key features that can be uncovered through narrative analysis. It goes on to discuss how the closedness of a narrative is closely related to the insularity of the group. Finally, text from climate skeptical blogs and op-eds are examined and the narrative approach to analyzing ideology is illustrated.

Ciclos políticos hegemónicos: implicaciones para la gobernanza internacional

El hegemón es un actor fundamental en la gobernanza internacional. No obstante, mientras que el comercio, poder y guerra han sido temas ampliamente abordados desde los estudios sobre hegemonía en las Relaciones Internacionales, se ha avanzado poco en análisis de las ideas que orientan el comportamiento del hegemón. La hipótesis aquí planteada es que las hegemonías recorren a lo largo de su existencia cinco fases (emergencia, despliegue, apogeo, declive y extinción) y, durante cada una de ellas, el Estado hegemónico asume ideologías específicas que orientan su comportamiento internacional, lo cual se traduce en la promoción de ciertas políticas internacionales, así como de alianzas y organizaciones internacionales con vocaciones específicas. Sin embargo, en la medida que evoluciona su poder nacional y el hegemón transita de una fase a otra, éste tiende a cambiar ideológicamente, abandonando ideas previas y asumiendo otras nuevas. Si bien dicha transición ideológica es pragmática -en función de las necesidades de su poder nacional- este cambio resulta discordante y criticable por otros actores del sistema. Este documento se compone de dos grandes partes: en la primera se establecen las cinco fases de un ciclo hegemónico y, luego, se exponen las ideologías que orientan el comportamiento del Estado hegemónico en ellas; la segunda parte se orienta a comprobar empíricamente las transiciones ideológicas durante las hegemonías neerlandesa, británica y estadounidense. Abstract: The hegemon is a fundamental actor in international governance. However, while trade, power and war have been topics widely discussed from studies on hegemony in International Relations, little progress has been made in analyzing the ideas that guide the behavior of the hegemon. The hypothesis proposed here is that the hegemonies pass through five phases during their existence (emergence, deployment, apogee, decline and extinction) and, during each of them, the hegemonic State assumes specific ideologies that guide its international behavior. However, as the national power evolves, and the hegemon moves from one phase to another, it tends to change ideologically, abandoning previous ideas and assuming new ones. Although this ideological transition is pragmatic - depending on the power needs of the hegemon- this change results discordant and is criticized by other actors in the system. To demonstrate this, the following document is composed of two major parts: the first presents the five phases of a hegemonic cycle and, along with it, the ideologies that guide the behavior of the hegemonic State; the second part aims to empirically verify the ideological transitions during the hegemonies that have existed: the Dutch, the British and the American. Keywords: Hegemony, hegemonic political cycles, ideology, national power, hegemonic interregnum. Recebido em: Agosto/2018. Aprovado em: Dezembro/2018.

Ideological shift and employees’ relationships: evidence from Ukraine

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the employees’ identities shift in Ukraine based on the relational model theory. The paper concentrates on the role which culture and history play in the use of relational models in firms on different organizational levels. Design/methodology/approach The proposed hypotheses were tested by multivariate analysis of variance and covariance tests with the data from 99 surveys of Ukrainian firms describing 219 intraorganizational relationships. Findings The results showed that culture and history play a significant role for the preference of a certain relational model. Position in the organization and gender influence the choice of the relational model. Research limitations/implications The sample of only Ukrainian employees restricts generalizability of the results. This study applies relational models theory in business domain and provides an alternative explanation of employees’ identities shift due to cultural differences and ideological past. Relational models are investigated on different organizational levels shedding light on models of relationships employees prefer in different settings. Practical implications Managers working in international settings should pay more attention to patterns of relationships in the target country since they are not freely chosen but partially predestined by the cultural background and the historical and ideological past. Relationships in firms are path dependent, whereby employees inherit models from their peers to apply them to their subordinates. Ukrainian female and male employees have different preferences concerning relational models. Originality/value This study is unique in that it applies an anthropological theory to relationships on different organizational levels and tests it in a business domain of a country in an ideological transition.