A Critical Assessment of Turkish Islamic Feminism: A Simone de Beauvoirian Perspective

From the early years of the Turkish Republic to the end of the 1990s, the individuals who constitute the Turkish Islamic feminist movement have been the ‘other’ to Kemalist secular women. In the mid-2000s, having found a solution to the ‘headscarf question’, Muslim women started to express their demands, ranging from equal opportunities in education to the transformation of patriarchal structures and the reconstruction of female identity. The article’s main objective is to develop arguments for how dilemmas can be transcended in the process of identity-building. The main hypothesis put forward is that the participants in the Turkish Islamic feminist movement, who could turn their dilemmas into advantages if they managed to establish their relationship with the ‘other’ in line with the universal secular values of equality and freedom, will achieve their existential freedom only to the extent that they are able to act from an existential perspective.

Existentialist Perspective: A Study of Bharati Mukherjee’s Fiction The Holder of the World

The present study explores and analyses the existential perspective in Bharati Mukherjee’s novel The Holder of the World; she tries to represent the fluid nature of immigrants due to frequent dislocations and relocations, which facilitate the characters to transform and assimilate into a new environment. The protagonist, Hannah Easton, discards nostalgic feelings and celebrates the latest opportunities in a liberal environment. Being a fearless, brave, and bold, spirited woman, she chooses her ways of life freely and accepts the consequences frankly. Bharati Mukherjee, one of the path breaking Indian American novelists and short story writers, has constantly made efforts to voice the immigrant experience of women. Hannah initially suffers from cultural shock, but being resourceful establishes her authentic existence by understanding the new environment utilising her full potential via free choices.

Entre Mead e Heidegger: a interioridade desdobrada e a formaçâo humana

Entre Mead e Heidegger: a interioridade desdobrada e a formaçâo humana Resumo: O artigo visa aproximar a abordagem da psicologia social de Mead e a perspectiva fenomenológico-existencial de Martin Heidegger da noção de interioridade desdobrada. Tal aproximação permite sustentar que há uma radical e inseparável reciprocidade entre homem/mulher e mundo. A radicalidade de tal reciprocidade suplanta a dicotomia interioridade e exterioridade, reaproximando o corpo do tempo, lugar mesmo da abertura existencial humana. Apresenta-se a noção de “self” como processo e a mente como resposta comportamental interativa com vistas a relacioná-la ao modo de ser-no-mundo. Também, uma breve incursão à psicologia de viés fenomenológico-existencial, buscando articular o interacionismo de Mead e a analítica existencial de Heidegger e suas implicações para o campo da formação humana.Palavras-chave: Self. Dasein. Interioridade desdobrada. Formação humana Between Mead and Heidegger: the unfolded interiority and the human formation Abstract: The article aims to approximate Mead's approach to social psychology and Martin Heidegger's phenomenological-existential perspective to the notion of unfolded interiority. Such an approach allows us to maintain that there is a radical and inseparable reciprocity between man / woman and the world. The radicality of such reciprocity supersedes the dichotomy interiority and exteriority, bringing the body of time closer together, the very place of human existential openness. The notion of “self” as a process and the mind as an interactive behavioral response is presented in order to relate it to the way of being in the world. Also, a brief foray into existential-phenomenological psychology, seeking to articulate Mead's interactionism and Heidegger's existential analytics and their implications for the field of human formationKeywords: Self. Dasein. Unfolded interiority. Human Formation. Entre Mead y Heidegger: la interioridad desarrollada y la formación humana Resumen: El artículo tiene como objetivo aproximar el enfoque de Mead a la psicología social y la perspectiva fenomenológica-existencial de Martin Heidegger a la noción desplegada de interioridad. Tal enfoque nos permite mantener que existe una reciprocidad radical e inseparable entre el hombre / mujer y el mundo. La radicalidad de tal reciprocidad suplanta la dicotomía de interioridad y exterioridad, devolviendo al cuerpo al tiempo, el lugar de la apertura existencial humana. La noción de "yo" se presenta como un proceso y la mente como una respuesta interactiva de comportamiento para relacionarlo con la forma de ser-en-el-mundo. Además, una breve incursión en la psicología del sesgo fenomenológico-existencial, buscando articular el interaccionismo de Mead y el análisis existencial de Heidegger y sus implicaciones para el campo de la formación humana.Palabras clave: auto. Dasein Interioridad desplegada. Formación humana Data de registro: 27/07/2020Data de aceite: 08/12/2020

From Climate Anxiety to Climate Action: An Existential Perspective on Climate Change Concerns Within Psychotherapy

With the growing body of knowledge climate change stands out as one of the most important contemporary problems. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change confirms the urgent necessity to reduce greenhouse gases emission, as the window to address the problem is becoming narrow. Rising temperatures and bushfires, melting glaciers and droughts make the acceleration of climate change evident, and citizens around the globe are increasingly worried about the magnitude of the problem. In this article, we propose an existential perspective on climate change-related concerns. Although environmental worries are legitimate, they sometimes cause severe anxiety and distress so aggravated as to be discussed within the framework of psychotherapy. In the course of this research, we examine the experiences of 10 Swedish psychotherapy clients addressing their climate concerns within treatment. We engage them into in-depth conversations about the experience of climate anxiety and inquire about the individual pathways toward recovery. Moreover, we propose the existential perspective as a tool to understand such experiences. We aim to address all existential concerns, as described in Ernesto Spinelli’s themes of existence framework: death anxiety, spatiality, temporality, meaning, relatedness, authenticity, freedom, and responsibility. All of the above are present in participants’ reports of climate anxiety. In conclusion, we emphasize the value of introducing existential perspective to practitioners working with clients experiencing climate distress.

Immigration

It is important to recognize and understand the psychology of being an immigrant from a psychodynamic and existential perspective. Immigration is about attachment, separation, and re-attachment, and therefore touches some of the deepest part of human existence. During the psychiatric or psychological evaluation of patients with migrant background, the caregiver asks a series of questions about their experience and socio-demographic details that have a quantitative nature. In this chapter, the focus is on the question of the quality of being an immigrant from a phenomenological perspective and from conscious and unconscious levels during the process of migration from arrival to acculturation. Working in the field of transcultural psychiatry is not just about learning about different cultures, but also about grasping the quality of being immigrant and the process of immigration. This can contribute to empathy towards the patient, which will improve the therapeutic efficacy.

Existential foundations of social responsibility

Issues of vicarious, collective and other types of responsibility become more urgent under the growing global interconnectedness and interdependence. Since most actors are collective ones, we need a theoretical study of the grounds for social responsibility and its essential features as represented in diverse manifestations. The article considers social responsibility in terms of the existential-phenomenological approach developed by M.M. Bakhtin, J.-P. Sartre, M.K. Mamardashvili, H. Arendt, H. Blumer, etc. Social responsibility is a type of responsibility; therefore, the author searches for the most fundamental grounds of this phenomenon. This search allows to reveal the paradox of responsibility and to highlight the spatial-temporal boundariness as its most important structure that provides co-being (joint existence) with others. Everyone interplays the inner sociality when interpreting acts (deeds) are always performed in front of the Other (including I as the Other for oneself). Thus, the Other plays the key role in making responsible choices. In the existential perspective, individual responsibility serves as a necessary basis for all other forms of responsibility including vicarious, collective and social. The author presents examples of different life situations to explain the choice of such criteria as the internal unity of the group focused on the common purpose shared by all participants, and the strive for completeness for the sake of the Other without infringing the being of external others.

Reformed identity revisited: Proposals in the spirit of Ecclesia Semper Reformanda est

This article commences by reflecting on the evolving nature of traditions. In order to pass the continual test of plausibility and authenticity, traditions need to be flexible enough to incorporate new insights into its core intellectual matrix. Implausible elements need to be re-articulated or dispensed with. This rationale is subsequently applied to the reformed tradition who considers the necessity to continually reform itself (Ecclesia Semper Reformanda est) as a fundamental aspect of the tradition. Recently, various tenets of the reformed faith have come under scrutiny. These include the reformed faith’s understanding of God’s relation to creation; its view of human uniqueness; its understanding of original sin and the transmission of sin; and its supposed sola Scriptura approach to ethics. This article addresses these critiques by proposing that reformed theology incorporates the notion of creation as a gift in its thinking; that it dispenses with attempts to provide a historical narrative on the origin and transmission of sin and rather approach the theme from an existential perspective; and that it works towards an ethics that is scripturally based but ecclesiastically shaped.