Today, the earth is an interconnected globe humming with electronic transmissions-a chattering planet nestled in the provident silence of space. The ethical question is whether this is contributing to authentic human development and helping individuals and peoples to be true to their transcendent destiny. The new media are powerful tools for education, cultural enrichment, commercial activity, political participation, intercultural dialogue and understanding. They also can serve the cause of religion. Yet the new information technology needs to be informed and guided (...) by solidarity in the service of the common good bridging the digital divide within and among nations. The value-laden message of Western secular culture to people and traditional societies in many cases ill-prepared to evaluate it leads to widespread crisis, for example, in regard to marriage and family life. This technology can be a means for solving human problems, promoting the integral development of persons, creating a world governed by justice, peace, and love. It also can help men and women in their age-old search for self-understanding. Like today's world itself, the world of media, including the Internet, has been brought by Christ, inchoately yet truly, within the boundaries of the kingdom of God and placed in service to the word of salvation. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Books ReceivedThe Ambitions of Curiosity: Understanding the World in Ancient Greece and China. By G.E.R. Lloyd. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xvi + 175. Price not given.The Art of the Han Essay: Wang Fu's Ch'ien-Fu Lun. By Anne Behnke Kinney. Tempe: Center for Asian Studies, Arizona State University, 1990. Pp. xi + 154. Paper $10.00.The Autobiography of Jamgön Kongtrul: A Gem of Many Colors. By Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrön (...) Thayé and translated by Richard Barron (Chökyi Nyima). Ithaca, New York: Snow Lion Publications, 2003. Pp. xxii + 549. Price not given.Awesome Nightfall: The Life, Times, and Poetry of Saigyō. By William R. LaFleur. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. xiii + 173. Paper $14.95.Becoming the Compassion Buddha: Tantric Mahamudra for Everyday Life. By Lama Thubten Yeshe, edited by Robina Courtin, and foreword by Geshe Lhundub Sopa. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. xi + 194. Paper $14.95.Between Two Worlds East and West: An Autobiography. By J. N. Mohanty. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. ix + 134. Hardcover RS 525.00.The Chinese Face of Jesus Christ. Edited by Roman Malek, S.V.D. Sankt Augustin, Germany: Institut Monumenta Serica and China-Zentrum; and Nettetal, Germany: Steyler Verlag, 2002. Pp. 391. EUR 40.00.Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China: Plurality and Synthesis. By Volker Scheid. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002. Pp. xiv + 407. Hardcover $69.95. Paper $23.95.Confucian Feminist: Memoirs of Zeng Baosun (1893-1978). Translated and adapted by Thomas L. Kennedy. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 2002. Pp. xxi + 170. Price not given.Consciousness Studies: Cross-Cultural Perspectives. By K. Ramakrishna Rao. Jefferson (North Carolina) and London: McFarland and Company, 2002. Pp. 367. Hardcover $65.00.Constituting Communities: Theravāda Buddhism and the Religious Cultures of South and Southeast Asia. Edited by John Clifford Holt, Jacob N. Kinnard, and Jonathan S. Walters. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Pp. viii + 224. Hardcover $65.50. Paper $21.95.Developments in Indian Philosophy from Eighteenth Century Onwards: Classical and Western. By Daya Krishna. Volume X Part 1 of History of Science, Philosophy and Culture in Indian Civilization, edited by D. P. Chattopadhyaya. New [End Page 110] Delhi: Centre for Studies in Civilizations, 2001. Pp. xxiii + 417. Hardcover RS 1200.East and West: Identità e dialogo interculturale. By Giangiorgio Pasqualotto. Venezia: Marsilo Editori, 2003. Pp. 210. EUR 16.00.Effortless Action: Wu-wei as Conceptual Metaphor and Spiritual Ideal in Early China. By Edward Slingerland. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xii + 352. Price not given.Encountering Kā lī: In the Margins, at the Center, in the West. Edited by Rachel Fell McDermott and Jeffrey J. Kripal. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. Pp. xviii + 321. Hardcover $55.00, £37.95. Paper $21.95, £15.95.Encyclopedia of Chinese Philosophy. Edited by Antonio S. Cua. New York and London: Routledge, 2003. Pp. xx + 1020. Hardcover $150.00.Essays on Indian Philosophy. By J. N. Mohanty and edited by Purushottama Bilimoria. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. xxxvii + 347. Paper RS 525.00.Faith, Humor, and Paradox. By Ignacio L. Götz. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger Publishers, 2002. Pp. 136. Hardcover $61.95.Four Illusions: Candrakīrti's Advice for Travelers on the Bodhisattva Path. Translated by Karen C. Lang. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xv + 240. Price not given.The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory. By David R. Loy. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. 223. Paper $16.95.The Hidden History of The Tibetan Book of the Dead. By Bryan J. Cuevas. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xi + 328. Price not given.Huang Di nei jing su wen: Nature, Knowledge, Imagery in an Ancient Chinese Medical Text. By Paul U. Unschuld. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. Pp. xii + 520. Hardcover $75.00, £52.00.In Dewey's Wake: Unfinished Work of Pragmatic Reconstruction. Edited by William J. Gavin. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Pp. vi + 249. Hardcover $71.50. Paper $23.95.Knowledge and Freedom in Indian Philosophy. By Tara Chatterjea. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2002. Pp. xvi + 159. Hardcover... (shrink)

in a very different sense, to refer to the cultural community, or cultural structure, itself On this view, the cultural community continues to exist even when its members arc free to modify the character of the culture, should they find its traditional ...

In "Cross-cultural Communication and Cultural Variation" Yina Cao discusses the concept of "cultural variation" as an extension of the discipline of comparative literature. She argues that the concept of cultural variation explains many problems in the field of cross-cultural communication while it can also provide a unique research perspective for the phenomenon of cultural integration. By summarizing and sorting out the problems which need to be solved in "cultural variation" and the core cases of cultural variation, Cao discusses (...) the phenomenon of aphasia in the process of cultural foreignization, cultural transmission, and cultural variation and attempts to imagine a new approach in scholarship in order to explore new theoretical tools for the future of the discipline of comparative literature with the use of Cao's variation theory. (shrink)

Everett's main claim is that language is a “cultural tool“, created by hominids for communication and social cohesion. I examine the meaning of the expression “cultural tool“ in terms of the influence of language on culture (i.e. the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis) or of the influence of culture on language (Everett's hypothesis). I show that these hypotheses are not well-supported by evidence and that language and languages, rather than being “cultural tools“ as wholes are rather collections of tools used (...) in different language games, some cultural or social, some cognitive. I conclude that the coincidence between language and culture is due to the fact that both originate from human nature. (shrink)

Everett’s main claim is that language is a “cultural tool”, created by hominids for communication and social cohesion. I examine the meaning of the expression “cultural tool” in terms of the influence of language on culture or of the influence of culture on language. I show that these hypotheses are not well-supported by evidence and that language and languages, rather than being “cultural tools” as wholes are rather collections of tools used in different language games, some cultural (...) or social, some cognitive. I conclude that the coincidence between language and culture is due to the fact that both originate from human nature. (shrink)

This authored book provides an innovative and systematic account of key debates within the social psychology of knowledge, using the theory of social representations as a guide. This account is then elaborated and integrated into a conceptually coherent theoretical framework to further the social psychological dimensions of the relationship between representations, knowledge and context. Jovchelovitch highlights the social psychological components of the process of knowledge formation and their impact in the constitution of communities, culture and public spheres. Whilst this (...) exploration contributes to an understanding of the genesis, logic and function of knowledge in social life, it also shows that context is essential to understanding the dynamics of representation and emphasises the fundamental unity between the two. This book offers a significant and stimulating contribution to the field of social representations and will make essential reading for those wanting to follow this debate at thecutting edge of social, cultural and developmental psychology as well as sociology, anthropology and cultural studies. (shrink)

In this book Kymlicka attempts to confute two related criticisms of contemporary liberalism: first, that liberalism must understate the role played by communal relationships in our individual lives, and second, that liberalism cannot, without transgressing its own principles, defend the special legal protections which are often required for the continued existence of aboriginal cultures within the modern state. In responding to these critiques, Kymlicka employs the theoretical resources of the contemporary welfare-state liberalism delineated by Rawls and Dworkin.

Purpose. The article aims to comprehend the concept that has a serious anthropological meaning, – a "co-existential educational community" – which points at the real subject and object in the development of the educational reality, as well as to explicate its importance towards understanding the real way of addressing actually to the culture and its acquisition in the pedagogical process. Theoretical basis. To achieve this purpose, the method of categorical-reflexive analysis of texts and problems of real educational realities is (...) used; this allows to involve of such philosophical concepts as "sobornost", "all-unity", "culture" and distinguish their anthropological meaning. Under this approach, philosophical categories are able to appear as internal dimensions of the essence in the educational process, rather than a certain matrix, for which one or another theoretical or practical construction is adjusted. Originality. The originality of the article lies in the actualization of philosophical content in "sobornost" and "all-unity" concepts for philosophical-educational discourse and in solving the question on the real way of entering culture in the context of pedagogical communication. Conclusions. Addressing the idea of a co-existential educational community is able to oppose the widespread superficial notions of the so-called "educational environment" in the pedagogical and psychological literature and orient pedagogical theory and pedagogical practices on the real way of entering the individual into truly human forms of life. It is argued that the co-existential educational community can and should unfold not only "horizontally", but also "vertically", consciously integrating the high culture in itself as a culture of high. The authors emphasized the role of imagination in this process. Education can and should build co-existence with the culture of participants in pedagogical communication. It is with this approach that the education sector can emerge from the systemic crisis and actively oppose those trends in modern social life that increase alienation and depopulation. (shrink)

The Association for Core Texts and Courses asserts its commitment to coming together and speaking about the scientific, the political, and the artistic to live together in an enlightened fashion. ACTC's Tenth Annual Conference re-affirmed and re-examined the value of serious reading and discussion focused through core texts.

Species are ordinarily conceived of as being native or non-native to either a geographical location or an ecological community. I submit that species may also be native or non-native to human communities. I argue, by way of an analogy with varieties of domesticated and cultivated species, that this sense of nativity is grounded by the cultural relationships human communities have with species. A further analogy is drawn with the motivations of varietal nativists – who seek to protect native varieties of (...) domesticated and cultivated species for the sake of their cultural value – to argue for the consideration of the cultural value of native species in environmental policy decisions regarding invasive non-native species. (shrink)

This book seeks to generate a theoretical and a reflective framework to re-connect people with culture and spirituality. It seeks to recreate important links between these domains to provide interpretative, foundational, and ethical perspectives. It is distinctive in that it focusses on the challenges that humanity is facing at a cultural, social, moral, and spiritual level. It provides a philosophical understanding of humanity from a humanistic and multidisciplinary perspective (encompassing ethics, language, art/cinema, political, cultural and gender approaches) and offers (...) a variety of ways of how we can rethink our culture and our society for the future. (shrink)

In this article, an argument is made for extending bioethical principles to place-based community and cultural group protections when there are conflicting perspectives on reporting individual results of biomonitoring studies. Bioethical principles of beneficence, nonmaleficence, respect for autonomy, and justice can incorporate participatory decision-making and understandings of the group conditions of individual research participants, particularly for research studies with vulnerable groups. Arguments for and against biomonitoring communication to individual participants are reviewed here. Assessments of risks and benefits of biomonitoring (...) communication can be improved by considering the contextual conditions of cultural groups and place-based communities. Providing participatory decision-making with all stakeholders about biomonitoring communication can provide more fair benefits than adopting a general, prescriptive clinical standard that favors only group report-backs when clinical utility is low and the scientific understandings of low dose exposures of chemical contaminants to humans are still uncertain. (shrink)

Individual research protections provided by bioethical principles can be extended to group protections, particularly for place-based communities and cultural groups who may share a common harm or burden. In this article, an argument is made for the need to consider the group conditions of individual research subjects in the ethics of individual report-backs of human biomonitoring results. Human biomonitoring, the measuring of concentration of chemicals or their metabolites in blood, urine, breast milk, hair, and other biological samples, can provide an (...) assessment of an individual's exposure to a chemical and can integrate exposures from multiple pathways and sources. Biomonitoring studies have been increasing in the past decade for such purposes as measuring the levels of chemicals that are ingested by members of the general population and at what concentrations, to determine if exposure levels are higher in some groups vs. others, to track temporal trends to establish reference ranges for chemical exposures, and to investigate an association with health. (shrink)

A collaborative team of environmental sociologists, community psychologists, religious studies scholars, environmental studies/science researchers and engineers has been working together to design and implement new training in research ethics, culture and community-based approaches for place-based communities and cultural groups. The training is designed for short and semester-long graduate courses at several universities in the northeastern US. The team received a 3 year grant from the US National Science Foundation’s Ethics Education in Science and Engineering in 2010. This manuscript details (...) the curriculum topics developed that incorporate ethical principles, particularly for group protections/benefits within the field practices of environmental/engineering researchers. (shrink)

Context: Although the relationship between communication and culture has received significant attention among communication scholars over the past thirty or more years, there is still no satisfactory explanation as to how these two are related and how culture evolves in communication. It forces the author to turn to Niklas Luhmann’s social systems theory, which is one of the main hypotheses of how social systems emerge. Problem: Unfortunately, Luhmann’s concept of meaning is too weak to explain (...) the autopoiesis of communication. In looking for a solution, the author suggests that it is necessary to distinguish between personal sense structures and socio-cultural meanings and to introduce the concept of shared meaning to the systems-theoretical approach. The paper conceptualises “meaning” as a phenomenon that evolves in communication and defines “culture” as a pattern of structurally related meanings. Findings: (1) According to Luhmann, social systems do not consist of static objects, but of dynamic operations, and for a social system to emerge, its elements – communications – must be connected to one another. The author argues that culture equips the momentary elements of the social system – communications – with the capacity for connection, and makes the social system operationally closed, self-referential, and autopoietic. (2) The problem of adaptation does not lose its importance if we understand cognition as a “self-founding activity” of operationally closed systems but transforms into a question of whether the “reality” construed by the media favours or restricts the coping of the system in the ever changing environment. (3) From the perspective of adaptation of the social system to its internal and external environments, an important condition of the continuous process of creation of shared knowledge to which individuals orientate themselves in their activities is the existence of variations. (shrink)

Despite its importance, the linkage between genetic and cultural evolution has until now been little explored. An understanding of this linkage is needed to extend evolutionary theory so that it can deal for the first time with the phenomena of mind and human social history. We characterize the process of gene-culture coevolution, in which culture is shaped by biological imperatives while biological traits are simultaneously altered by genetic evolution in response to cultural history. A case is made from (...) both theory and evidence that genetic and cultural evolution are inseverable, and that the human mind has tended to evolve so as to bias individuals toward certain patterns of cognition and choice rather than others. With the aid of mathematical models we trace the coevolutionary circuit: The genes prescribe structure in developmental pathways that lay down endocrine and neural systems, imposing regularities in the development of cognition and behavior; these regularities translate upward into holistic patterns of culture, which can be predicted in the form of probability density distributions ; natural selection acts within human history to favor certain epigenetic rules over others; and the selection alters the frequencies of the underlying genes. The effects of genetic and cultural changes reverberate throughout the circuit and are consequently tested with the passage of each life cycle. In addition to modeling gene-culture coevolution, we apply methods from island biogeography and information theory to examine the cultural capacity of the genes, the factors determining the magnitude of cultural diversity, and the possible reasons for the uniqueness of the human achievement. (shrink)

Recent debates on linguistic diversity inevitably raise questions about the value of languages. This paper deals with two descriptions of language’s value that play a prominent role in those debates: language considered as a means of communication and a cultural heritage. Its purpose is explanatory, providing an account of how languages are assessed in each of these descriptions. Moreover, the paper will also pay attention to the rhetorical uses of such value descriptions in the discourses on linguistic diversity, considering (...) the intrinsic value given to language as a cultural heritage. (shrink)

Explores some steps toward non-assimilative encounters in the "global village.".

An explication of the phenomenological sensibilities found in the work of Gloria Anzaldúa and other Latina feminist philosophers offers insight into the problem of bringing philosophy into greater relevance beyond academic and scholarly worlds. This greater relevance entails clear and direct contact with the immediacy of our communicative relationships with others, both inside and outside the academy, and allows for an interrogation of the totalizing perceptions that are at work within normative processes of epistemological legitimation. As a result of this (...) interrogation, it is possible to cultivate perceptual capacities related to culture that intervene in the normatively tacit cultural dispositions that often limit the possibilities of understanding. (shrink)

The author submits that while Nancy's tendency to make Occidentalist remarks cannot be denied, it is antithetical to his own conception of community that may be forged through literature. Nancy's conception actually provides a basis to critique not only Occidentalism, but any view that blinds us to the significance of cultural differences. For Nancy genuine community can only be achieved in the exposure of the other as a singular individual marked by unique cultural, historical, and existential experiences. His approach reminds (...) us that it is impossible to achieve genuine community unless we recognize and respect not only cultural differences, but differences of all kinds. It is possible, in fact, that despite some of Nancy's untenable remarks suggesting a precedence of the Occident, his concept of literary communism must be understood as a non-, or perhaps better, post-Western form of community. (shrink)

This study aimed to investigate the role of religious and cultural education in solving radicalism conflicts that occurred in the Sibolga community in Indonesia. The method used in this research was qualitative with the type of grounded research. This study involved educational stakeholders and traditional as well as cultural leaders as informants in collecting data. These informants were chosen by using a purposive sampling technique. The data obtained in this study were qualitative data that were analysed descriptively by applying the (...) data triangulation technique. This study’s results indicated that two elements were used as steps to resolve the radicalism conflict that occurred in the Sibolga community in Indonesia. The two elements were educational elements and cultural elements. The educational element played a role in building the students’ character and creating tolerance among religious communities to maintain unity and integrity among citizens. Cultural elements acted as controllers of differences in society with all customs that were binding in society. Contribution: This article contributes to the completion of solutions for the many perpetrators of religious radicalism involving students. The role of religious and cultural education as a resolution of radicalism conflicts. In fact, the conflict resolution steps taken through these two elements had been successfully implemented in the Sibolga community, Indonesia, as one of the areas affected by radicalism. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to test whether personal commitment to community was related to political involvement in two cultural contexts: Italy and the USA. Participants were 566 adolescents (48.2% males) aged 14–19 years (M = 16 years; SD = 1.29): 311 Italians and 255 Americans. Participants filled out a self-report questionnaire. Analyses of variance revealed that American high school students reported higher levels of personal commitment to community than did their Italian peers and that many forms of political (...) involvement were significantly more common among American adolescents. Structural equation modeling analyses revealed that personal commitment to community was strongly and positively associated with involvement in political activities in both adolescent samples. Thus, fostering personal commitments to community could potentially lead youth to political engagement. (shrink)

Journal of Mass Media Ethics, Volume 26, Issue 4, Page 332-337, October-December.

It has become increasingly clear that social learning and culture occur much more broadly, and in a wider variety of animal communities, than initially believed. Recent research has expanded the list to include insects, fishes, elephants, and cetaceans. Such diversity allows scientists to expand the scope of potential research questions, which can help form a more complete understanding of animal culture than any single species can provide on its own. It is crucial to understand how culture and (...) social learning present in different communities, as well as what influences community structure and culture may have on one another, so that the results across these different studies may most effectively inform one another. This review presents an overview of social learning in species across a spectrum of community structures, providing the necessary infrastructure to allow a comparison of studies that will help move the field of animal culture forward. (shrink)