Notes from the dome

A condensed story of how I came to understand how I understand, a perpetual struggle of identity and difference, a deconstruction of the taken-for-granted. An imagination which eventually comes to rest in the sculpture Mappa Mundi Universalis, a glass tetrahedron held together by an updated version of Peirce's trinity of signs: the dialectical symbol (/) of internal relations; the icon of the semiotic fraction line (––); the logical index (=) of ontological transformations. Three projection screens specially prepared to capture the projected messages of religion, the arts, and the sciences. From beginning to end an illustration of Shakespeare's saying that “as imagination bodies forth, the poet's pen gives to airy nothing a local habitation and a name.” Cusanus's Intellectus undressed. In addition, a double self-portrait of David Harvey and myself. Face to face, every day a new wrinkle. A palimpsest of layered meanings, the octogenarians revealing truths about themselves rather than inventing stories about others. Not an ideological manifesto but a Mallarméan Coup de dés. Such is the tain of the mirror, such are the representative figures of a generation still surviving. The precariat waiting in the wings.

Telling the Story of Space. Between Design and Construction

Philosophy has always examined subjectivity in terms of its relationship with time, but less frequently has it engaged with the theme of space; however, as soon as it begins to do this, it runs into questions that remain very much open. Paul Ricoeur only moved onto considering the topic of space after having reflected at length on time and the temporality inhabited by subjectivity. Making space a topic means not only thinking about the extension of the one's own body as a lived body but also reflecting on that physical space in which "the other comes closer and where the close becomes other" and in which the encounter of identity and difference creates continuous short circuits, especially in the increasingly congested western metropolises. Starting from the "unexpected application" of the narrative dimension to architecture, Ricoeur goes on to develop an interesting reflection on space built and space inhabited.

Talking about human formation at the interface with identity and difference

This paper want to discuss and to present reflections on human formation, on the matter of identity and difference, in a school curriculum that seeks not only professional training for the capitalist labor market, but also the socialization and subjectivation of the individual. This is a bibliographical study, a dialogue with the concepts of Cestari (2014), Severino (2006), Biesta (2012) and Silva, (2001; 2014). The provocations established in this work are not intended to elicit ready-made solutions, but rather to point out reflections on the educational objectives regarding the formation of the being, permeated by identity and difference. What is proposed in this space is to provoke cogitations that enable everyone involved in education to think and rethink their actions and practices at educational matter.

Same and Other: from Plato to Kierkegaard. A reading of a metaphysical thesis in an existencial key

Aim. In his Kierkegaardian studies Jean Wahl states that there is a fundamental convergence between Plato and Søren Kierkegaard focused on the notions of identity and difference. Wahl suggests a sort of transposition of platonic metaphysics into the sphere of personal subjectivity. This paper intends to explain this passage from the same to the other from Plato to Kierkegaard. Concept. The article explains the passage from the same to the other from Plato to Kierkegaard. In both authors, the categories of being or not being, identity and difference, unity and multiplicity, becoming and rest explain the dynamic nature of the real. Results and conclusion. In both authors, the categories mensioned above explain the dynamic nature of the real. But while Plato applies these categories to the inteligibile word, Kierkegaard applies them to individual freedom, which supports reality as a whole. Cognitive value. Both searches lead to a single speculative answer and culminate in the same metaphysical categorisation, which applies analogously to everything real. Indeed, being and non-being, identity and difference, oneness and otherness, rest and becoming, explain the dialectic, intensive and relational dynamism of entia. At the same time, they essentially determine the power of human existence, infinitely possible and forever depending on the absolute.

Female Surfers Riding the Crest of a ‘New Wave’ of Irish National Identity

With surfing debuting at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics (postponed from summer 2020 due to the COVID 19 global pandemic) it is timely to consider surfing and the national identifications women in Ireland may have with this sport. As Lee Bush states, ‘with so little scholarship on surfing women, descriptive studies are needed as a foundation for launching future interpretive and critical studies.’[1] Twelve women who surf in Ireland spoke about the links their surfing may or may not have with their national identity. Previous academic inquiry on links between national identity and sport on the island of Ireland has almost exclusively focused on men’s experiences of team sports and issues of ‘Irishness’.[2] ‘Irishness’ is globally recognised and stereotypically linked to traditional and indigenous Irish sports such as Gaelic football and a range of other cultural activities. Research into women’s sport participation has largely been restricted to the study of soccer in the Republic of Ireland,[3] and gendered evaluations of various lifestyle and health surveys.[4] Katie Liston, a key researcher in sport and gender relations in Ireland, highlights that ‘there seems to be an increasing diversity in the kinds of activities in which people participate in’,[5] and that there is a shift towards ‘lifestyle’ activities for adults as diversity increases in young people’s participation in sports and leisure activities. Against the backdrop of Liston’s work, this article delves deeper into data collected as part of a wider research project, discussing whether or not women who surf in Ireland do so as part of a process designed to construct and reflect their national identities related to this arguably ‘postmodern’[6] ‘lifestyle sport’,[7] in which Ireland will be represented on the Olympic stage for the first time in 2021. [1] Lee Bush, ‘Creating Our Own Lineup: Identities and Shared Cultural Norms of Surfing Women in a U.S. East Coast Community’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 45, no. 3 (2016): 290–318. https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0891241614556346, 262. [2] See the work of Alan Bairner, John Sugden, David Hassan and Mike Cronin for a broad range of work in this area. [3] See for example Katie Liston, ‘Women's Soccer in the Republic of Ireland: Some Preliminary Sociological Comments’, Soccer & Society 7, no. 2 (2006b): 364 – 384. Also see Ann Bourke, ‘Women’s Soccer in the Republic of Ireland: Past Events and Future Prospects’, in Soccer, Women, Sexual Liberation: Kicking Off a New Era ed. Fan Hong and J.A. Mangan (London: Frank Cass, 2004): 162–82. [4] Katie Liston, ‘A Question of Sport’ in Contemporary Ireland: A Sociological Map ed. Sara O'Sullivan (Dublin: University College Dublin Press, 2007), 159-180. [5] Liston, ‘A Question of Sport’, 161. [6] The idea of lifestyle sport as postmodern sport is discussed in Belinda Wheaton, ed., Understanding Lifestyle Sports: Consumption, Identity and Difference (London: Routledge, 2004). Also see: Lincoln Allison, Amateurism in Sport: An Analysis and a Defence (London: Frank Cass, 2001); R. Rinehart, ‘Emerging Arriving Sport: Alternatives to Formal Sport’ in Handbook of Sports Studies ed. Jay Coakley and Eric Dunning (London: Sage, 2000), 504-519. [7] The term is used by two leading researchers in the field. See Wheaton, Understanding Lifestyle; Rinehart, ‘Emerging Arriving’.

Comparative Creoles: Race, Identity, and Difference Between Louisiana and its Caribbean Counterparts

This essay places Louisiana Creole culture and identity into comparative perspective with the evolution of Creole identity and créolité in Haiti and the French Antilles. While Haitian and Antillean intellectuals wrestled at the crossroads of French and African culture over the course of the twentieth century, the leading intellectuals of Louisiana’s Creole society were more likely to embrace French language and culture than to work self-consciously to integrate African influences into their understanding of themselves. A similar kind of cultural reckoning did not occur among Louisiana Creole writers and intellectuals until late in the twentieth century. The essay uses a comparative approach to examine the factors that have led to Louisiana taking such a different approach to Creole identity and cultural expression and considers how the community may evolve in the years to come. Cet essai situe la culture et l’identité créoles louisianaises dans une perspective comparée avec l’évolution de l’identité créole et de la créolité en Haïti et aux Antilles françaises. Lorsque des intellectuels haïtiens et antillais travaillaient au carrefour des cultures française et africaine au parcours du vingtième siècle, les intellectuels du chef de file de la société créole de la Louisiane tendaient plus à engager la langue et la culture françaises que de chercher à intégrer consciemment les influences africaines dans leur conception identitaire. Ce n’est que plus tard dans le vingtième siècle que nous témoignons d’une reconnaissance culturelle similaire chez les écrivains et les intellectuels de la Louisiane créole. Cet essai aborde de manière comparée les éléments qui contribuaient à une approche si différente à l’identité et l’expression culturelle créoles en Louisiane et considère comment la communauté pourraient évoluer à l’avenir.