Based upon Ajit Maan's groundbreaking theory of Internarrative Identity, this collection focuses upon redefining self, slave narrative, the black Caribbean diaspora, and cyberspace to explore the interconnection between identity and life experience as expressed through personal narrative.

Unconsented intimate exams on men and women are known to occur for training purposes and diagnostic reasons, mostly during gynecological surgeries but also during prostate examinations and abdominal surgeries. UIEs most often occur on anesthetized patients but have also been reported on conscious patients. Over the last 30 years, several parties—both within and external to medicine—have increasingly voiced opposition to these exams. Arguments from medical associations, legal scholars, ethicists, nurses, and some physicians have not compelled meaningful institutional change. Opposition is (...) escalating in the form of legislative bans and whistleblower reports. Aspiring to professional and scientific detachment, institutional consent policies make no distinction between intimate exams and exams on any other body part, but patients do not think of their intimate regions in a detached or neutral way and believe intimate exams call for special protections. UIEs are found to contribute to moral erosion and moral distress of medical students and compromise the sacred trust between the medical community and the general public. This paper refutes the main arguments in favor of the status quo, identifies a series of harms related to continuing the current practice, and proposes an explicit consent policy for intimate exams along with specific changes to medical school curriculum and institutional culture. Because patients are the rights-holders of their bodies, consent practices should reflect and uphold patient values which call for explicit consent for intimate exams. (shrink)

In _Politics with Beauvoir_ Lori Jo Marso treats Simone de Beauvoir's feminist theory and practice as part of her political theory, arguing that freedom is Beauvoir's central concern and that this is best apprehended through Marso's notion of the encounter. Starting with Beauvoir's political encounters with several of her key contemporaries including Hannah Arendt, Robert Brasillach, Richard Wright, Frantz Fanon, and Violette Leduc, Marso also moves beyond historical context to stage encounters between Beauvoir and others such as Chantal Akerman, (...) Lars von Trier, Rahel Varnhagen, Alison Bechdel, the Marquis de Sade, and Margarethe von Trotta. From intimate to historical, always affective though often fraught and divisive, Beauvoir's encounters, Marso shows, exemplify freedom as a shared, relational, collective practice. _Politics with Beauvoir_ gives us a new Beauvoir and a new way of thinking about politics—as embodied and coalitional. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:IntroductionLori A. Custodero and Anna NeumannIn this symposium, three scholars present the genesis, meaning, and artfulness of creative work and its realization as aesthetic experience within three educational fields. Lori A. Custodero, working out of music education, provides a perspective emanating from an aesthetic of childhood wonder and playfulness; David T. Hansen, writing out of philosophy of education, discusses how being fully present in the teaching moment leads (...) to meaningful experience; and Anna Neumann, who writes out of the field of higher education studies, represents scholars as engaged in intellectual pursuits, often framed aesthetically, and as struggling to hold on to precious time for creation. Aware of the inherent tensions in learning environments from child care centers to graduate schools, we address ways in which our research has revealed people's sustained pursuit of imagined possibilities, oftentimes amidst perceived impediments.Creative work involves imagining possibilities whereby individuals, alone and together, pose personally relevant questions and pursue fluent pathways of inquiry within the shared meanings of cultural context. At its finest, such work is artful, simultaneously responding to and emanating from immediate circumstance and past experience. It is malleable and vulnerable and compelling, fusing familiar images and surprising perceptions into new "equilibria... stable, even though moving" whereby "changes interlock and sustain one another."1 As scholars and teachers committed to learning, we strive to create and discern meaning between established understandings and emerging ideas and images. As we dance between reception and action, between insight and "onsight,"2 fully attentive to the perceived potentials in our work, we move toward synchrony, experiencing the aesthetic. The realizations that arise from experiences such as these — new or newly reconfigured words, sounds, images, movement, and ideas — express new balances of sense and feeling and, sometimes, beauty. Whether in the shared, artfully expressive vocalizations between the newborn infant and mother or in the scientist's finessing patience with elegant mathematical imagery, creative work invites a drawing together of what we know and what we struggle to know. Over time, the interplay of this work and its realization, [End Page 33] what Dewey refers to as "movement and culmination,"3 creates a momentum that serves to define lives as aesthetic.We have created this symposium as a space for considering the meanings of the aesthetic in lives — from its earliest instantiations in the experiences of infants and young children, to its developed expression in the professional (in this case, intellectual) efforts of adults pursuing scholarly careers, to its representation in teaching as intergenerational fusions of knowledge, learning, and lives. We see the aesthetic as both native and learned; as individually held and formed and felt, and as collectively created and voiced, the product of lives in intersection; as marking bounded moments in time (those instants of compelling "present-ness") and as spreading through years, well beyond bounded present-ness, perhaps as memory. Yet while striving to define the aesthetic in lives, we also strive to understand lives, individually and interactively, as lodgings for the aesthetic, as locations that give shape, form, and voice to beauty and insight, to creativity and learning. As we explore the lives in which the aesthetic finds its home, and within which it forms, we wonder about the extent to which the aesthetic may, in its turn, illuminate the strivings of those lives, including human desires to create, know, learn, understand, sense. We are then collectively concerned with the meanings of the aesthetic in lives and about the lives themselves as "moving spaces" within which the aesthetic can grow.We pursue this theme, centered on the power of the aesthetic to illuminate human lives, out of a realization that current understandings of what it means to be human — and especially what it means to learn and create — have been framed within the rubrics of the social sciences, certainly in productive ways. And yet we suggest that the artful, though powerful in its abilities to voice emotion and beauty, has not been employed as intensively as it might in efforts to understand what it means to create and learn as virtues of human existence, as perhaps the ultimate of human strivings. We hope that these symposium papers will help invigorate such... (shrink)

Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s notion of becoming-animal offers a mode of interaction that goes beyond the symbolic language and conceptual thought that are often used in the western philosophical tradition to circumscribe the limits and define the nature of an ethical engagement. They fail, however, to provide a robust account of how becoming may yield an ethical exchange between the human being and the animal other. In order for this process to generate such an outcome, it must be accompanied (...) by commitment to and care for the animal. Primatologist Barbara Smuts brings this becoming to the flesh in ways that enable a committed, caring and collaborative ethical interaction between species. (shrink)

The millennial vision quest -- Who are the changers? -- The great name debate -- How to read this book -- Magicians, manipulators, and muses -- The trouble with generalization -- History speaks -- The world of men and everyday affairs -- First things first -- Coming to your senses -- Hearing -- Smell -- Taste -- Sight -- Touch -- Emotion -- What to do with all of this information -- Activities -- Allies -- The importance of support -- (...) The ally relationship -- Who are the allies? -- Who allies are not! -- Ally-inviting conversations -- A note to you allies out there -- Strength : a warning label -- Ambivalence -- The trouble with change -- Safety first -- Building a net -- Walking against traffic -- Among other things -- Confidence and doubt -- A word about cultural ambivalence -- Structure and routine -- Morning, noon, and night -- Realistic routines -- Breaking it down -- When the heart is hurting -- When nothing seems to work -- The forest for the trees -- Living the daily life -- Stages of growth -- The stages of change -- Identifying your stage -- The stuff of myth and legend -- Haunted by the past -- The way-back-when time -- Rituals, ceremonies, and celebrations -- Setting goals -- Rules for successful goals -- Rewarding growth -- Inviting witnesses -- Obstacles to goals and growth -- Failure -- Boredom -- Giving away credit -- Reaffirming vows -- The final chapter. (shrink)

Physician religion/spirituality has the potential to influence the communication between physicians and parents of children at the end of life. In order to explore this relationship, the authors conducted two rounds of narrative interviews to examine pediatric physicians’ perspectives (N=17) of how their religious/spiritual beliefs affect end–of–life communication and care. Grounded theory informed the design and analysis of the study. As a proxy for religiosity/spirituality, physicians were classified into the following groups based on the extent to which religious/spiritual language was (...) infused into their responses: Religiously Rich Responders (RRR), Moderately Religious Responders (MRR), and Low Religious Responders (LRR). Twelve of the 17 participants (71%) were classified into the RRR or MRR groups. The majority of participants suggested that religion/spirituality played a role in their practice of medicine and communication with parents in a myriad of ways and to varying degrees. Participants used their religious/spiritual beliefs to support families’ spirituality, uphold hope, participate in prayer, and alleviate their own emotional distress emerging from their patients’ deaths. (shrink)

This article discusses the ways in which the ambiguous concept of equality has been used in the British debate regarding the financing of political election campaigns. It identifies three concepts of equality commonly used in that debate: ‘equality of arms’ between political parties, ‘equality of influence’ between citizens, and ‘equality of access’ to the so‐called ‘marketplace of ideas’. The article than discusses each of these concepts of equality in greater detail, and, in doing so, identifies four broader principles underlying the (...) use of these concepts in the election financing debate. The article concludes that, although the language of equality is used often and with great effect in the election financing debate, the concepts of equality being invoked are rarely independently valuable concepts. Instead, the concepts of equality used are valued in the election financing debate because they promote one of the four underlying principles. These principles themselves, however, involve complex questions of democracy and distributional fairness, and are not uncontroversial. I thus suggest that future debates regarding election financing could be enhanced by a more direct discussion of the merits of these underlying principles. (shrink)

In this paper, i provide an introduction to development ethics and make some observations about integral human development. i argue that although there is very little dialogue between these two traditions, they have a lot of common ground, and can helpfully inform one another. International development ethics is a largely secular field concerned with ethical reflection on the ends and means of development. i discuss four levels of ethical reflection: meta-ethical, normative, practical, or applied, and personal or integral. The first (...) three of these levels are well established in philosophical ethics. i introduce the fourth with the hope of encouraging more discussion of how individuals engaged in the theory and practice of development ethics ought to navigate the various spheres of their own lives. This last stage of ethical reflection and action can benefit greatly from work done in integral human development. Integral human development is integral in at least two ways: development is not simply economic development, but development the whole person, including social, political, creative, spiritual, etc., and development is the development of every person, whether the person is a marginalize peasant or a powerful élite. i explain why this second way of integration is both less discussed and more radical than the first. Resumen En este artículo, ofrezco una introducción a la ética del desarrollo y hago algunas observaciones sobre el desarrollo humano integral. Sostengo que, aunque hay muy poco diálogo entre estas dos tradiciones, tienen mucho terreno común y pueden ayudarse mutuamente. La ética del desarrollo internacional es un campo ampliamente secular que se ocupa de la reflexión ética sobre los fines y los medios de desarrollo. Discuto cuatro niveles de reflexión ética: meta-ético, normativo, práctico, o aplicado, y personal o integral. Los tres primeros de estos niveles están bien establecidos en la ética filosófica. Presento el cuarto con la esperanza de fomentar una mayor discusión sobre cómo los individuos involucrados en la teoría y la práctica de la ética del desarrollo deben navegar por las diversas esferas de sus propias vidas. Esta última etapa de reflexión y acción ética puede beneficiarse enormemente del trabajo realizado en el desarrollo humano integral. El desarrollo humano integral es integral en al menos dos maneras: el desarrollo no es simplemente desarrollo económico, sino el desarrollo de toda la persona, incluyendo social político, creativo, espiritual etc., y el desarrollo es el desarrollo de cada persona, sea la persona un campesino marginado o una de la ponderosa elite. Explico por qué esta segunda forma de integración es menos discutida y más radical que la primera. (shrink)

"In Entangled Empathy, scholar and activist Lori Gruen argues that rather than focusing on animal rights, we ought to work to make our relationships with animals right by empathetically responding to their needs, interests, desires, vulnerabilities, hopes, and unique perspectives. Pointing out that we are already entangled in complex and life-altering relationships with other animals, Gruen guides readers through a new way of thinking about and practicing animal ethics. Lori Gruen is Professor of Philosophy and Coordinator of Wesleyan (...) Animal Studies at Wesleyan University. She is the author of Ethics and Animals and co-editor, with Carol Adams, of Ecofeminism: Feminist Intersections with Animals and the Earth."--Back cover. (shrink)

John Cassian, an Egyptian monk in the early fifth century offers splendid wisdom and counsel regarding many spiritual disciplines. This reflection describes a personal experience of journeying with Cassian's prayer. In the most frequently quoted excerpt from his Conferences, Cassian raises up a prayer formula using Psalm 70:1 as a verse to facilitate unceasing prayer of the heart: “O God, come to my assistance; Lord, make haste to help me. “ In an unexpected and surprising way, this verse from Psalm (...) 70 comes to appear in the Liturgy of the Hours, as a preamble verse to Morning, Daytime, and Evening Prayer. Over the centuries, this simple verse from the Psalms has carried an entire prayer tradition, rooted in the spirituality of the desert. Cassian's elucidation of this verse reminds us how a formative reading of Scripture is integrally bound to the soul's progress in prayer. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Journal of Aesthetic Education 39.2 (2005) 36-57 [Access article in PDF] "Being With": The Resonant Legacy of Childhood's Creative Aesthetic Lori A. Custodero Teachers College, Columbia University Introduction...enrichment of the present for its own sake is the just heritage of childhood....1In this paper, the qualities of artistic pursuit exemplified in the musical play of children and the compositional processes of adults provide a context for exploring how (...) "being with" influences teaching and learning. Specifically I propose that "being with" music generates a sense of the aesthetic as we both transform musical materials — timbres, pitches, rhythms, phrases, harmonies — and are transformed by our experiences with them, and that "being with" others as we partake in musical activity often broadens and deepens that experience. In many ways, this is an exploration into why childhood matters, how it functions as a mirror for our adult lives as we experience and revel in the seemingly miraculous moments of aesthetic insight, where the familiar is welcomed with fresh perception and the addition of novelty is greeted as the solution to a previously unfathomable problem. It is also about why children matter, as our responses to their ways of being connect and transform us as adults. In this piece, recorded observations of children's musicality are juxtaposed with first-person accounts of adults' creative processes, revealing contributions to our understanding of artistry-in-action as it is manifested in both the musical and the pedagogical. The Aesthetic in Childhood and Adulthood To be "in the moment" is to encounter the aesthetic — fully engaged in an activity for which one's individual contributions are perceived as vital, aware of surprise relationships between seemingly disparate phenomena, and enveloped by sensory messages of color, sound, and movement meeting personal criteria for beauty. Such experiences exemplify features of artistry, an approach defined by openness to possibility and orientation toward discovery, where cues emanating from involvement in activity are clearly interpreted and utilized, and reflection is an ongoing process informing action. Characterized by a sense of wonder and ability to imagine and invent, the creative worlds of young children have provided a source of artistic genesis cited by composers, performers, psychologists, and educators.2Edith Cobb's thoughtful, groundbreaking account of the relationship between childhood and artistry, The Ecology of Imagination in Childhood, was introduced by Margaret Mead, who highlighted the work's thesis: "that in the imaginative experiences of childhood could be found the essential kernels of the highest forms of human thought."3 The legacy of childhood is universal to our existence; in acknowledging its contributions to ontological and cultural artistry, we can both connect personal histories across the [End Page 36] lifespan and identify characteristic trends across a spectrum of aesthetic rendering.4One trait common to both the child and the creative adult is a focused attentiveness to perceived affordances, that is, materials and human resources accessible in the environment. Acting upon and with these resources,children and artists become aesthetic agents as sensitivity to both experience and milieu combine to produce relevant and innovative outcomes.5 These two interactive dimensions have been described in interviews with composers I have interviewed as "being with the moment" and "being with yourself and at the same time with another" and are operating in the musical play of children, as noted in this description recorded by a mother/student: On Thanksgiving Day, we had a family gathering of sixteen people, five of whom are under the age of eight years. Three-year-old Louise is thrilled to be with her female cousins, who all dress up in ballet-type frilly costumes in order to put on a "show" for the family. Cousin Lily, now eight years old, assumes the role of pianist, while Louise, and five-year-old cousin Amy creatively dance to Lily's improvised accompaniment. Their movements are directly related to Lily's playing, in her fluidity and well as "jumps!" Here, family members serve as catalysts for creative activity — costumes and musical instruments in the environment... (shrink)

This article focuses on the effectiveness of antihomophobia discourses and explores the process of teaching and learning about heteronormativity. The author offers an interrogation of the regulatory fictions within heteronormativity and frameworks of resistance and examines attempts to move beyond established views of sexual minority students and explore the ways in which queer research has, and continues to, bring a counternarrative to staid liberal notions of reform and the well-intentioned rhetoric of diversity and difference. This analysis raises critical questions about (...) the possibility of moving beyond standard antihomophobia curricula and questions approaches such as the one-off lecture format and other condensed discussions of heteronormativity and homophobia. (shrink)

A diverse set of expert voices from the Global North and South - philosophers, economists, policy and development scholars and practitioners - explore two themes central to development ethics: agency and democracy. Established luminaries in development ethics engage with the book's themes alongside fresh voices on the way to becoming familiar figures in the field. Their essays work within diverse areas of development studies, including human security and human rights, democratic governance in theory and practice, the capability approach, gender and (...) development, and applied and theoretical critiques of the philosophical underpinnings of various accounts of development. The result is a varied and comprehensive discussion of current work in development ethics that significantly advances our understanding of theoretical and practical work of development. This book will interest students, scholars, and practitioners of global justice, human rights, international development and political philosophy. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Aesthetic Experience and Education:Themes and QuestionsDeborah Kerdeman"Being with" music. Attentive responsiveness in teaching. Scholarly learning as engagement with beauty. Three evocative images of aesthetic experience come to light in the essays by Custodero, Hansen, and Neumann. From the musical play of children conducting imaginary orchestras to the vocational aspirations of adults who gaze through telescopes or study paintings at Chicago's Art Institute, aesthetic experience spans a range of activities (...) and ages. No matter the setting or moment, aesthetic experience vitalizes our lives with meaning and joy. Why this is so and what difference this makes for education emerge as overarching concerns in this set of papers. Addressing these issues, the authors articulate a number of commonthemes and reach similar conclusions about the nature and value of aesthetic experience.I want to identify and analyze key ideas that run throughout these essays. Doing so deepens our appreciation of the authors' insights and underscores the importance of the project they undertake. I also want to examine three questions that the essays suggest but do not develop. Exploring these questions, I hope to further enrich our understanding of aesthetic experience and its place in education.First and foremost, aesthetic experience for all three authors integrates multiple ways of knowing and enables individuals to perceive connections that they might otherwise overlook. According to Custodero, aesthetic experience harmonizes imagination, physicality, and "thinking-in-action." [End Page 88] Thinking-in-action, Custodero says, while "critical and consequential," is nonverbal and nonjudgmental — unifying rather than analytic. Synthesizing bodily movement, imagination, and thought, aesthetic experience reveals "surprise relationships between seemingly disparate phenomena." The theme of integration is echoed in Neumann's description of scholarly learning as aesthetic experience. Scholarly learning does not shun feeling or lived experience, Neumann writes. This way of knowing instead is "deeply emotional and personal." Insight fuses with emotion, enabling scholars to "feel the whole picture," as David the astronomer puts it in his interview with Neumann. For Hansen, aesthetic experience connotes heightened perception, a way of being that attends to nuances of gesture that would otherwise remain invisible. "The aesthetic highlights aspects of wonder and of beauty that emerge, spontaneously and unrehearsed," Hansen explains. A form of creativity, aesthetic perception combines with moral and intellectual understanding to fully embrace "the living dynamic gestalt" of teaching and learning.Aesthetic experience thus integrates mind, body, and emotion. Hansen links aesthetic experience to moral judgment as well. Integrating various ways of knowing, aesthetic experience enables individuals to perceive and understand relationships that pulse throughout the social and natural world. Such understanding is pleasurable, the authors agree.Aesthetic experience not only is integrative. It also is interactive. Custodero's musicians interact with instruments, musical scores, and other individuals. Neumann's scholars interact with ideas and scholarly materials. Hansen's preservice teachers interact with works of art, subject matter, students, and one another. Interacting with people and things, individuals become absorbed in what they are doing. "Being with" music is howCustodero puts it. Carmen, the professor of music in Neumann's essay, says that playing music well "is like a complete focus of oneness."Being absorbed in aesthetic interaction does not discount or dissolve the ability to make decisions or direct action. Aesthetic experience rather presumes and promotes "aesthetic agency," to borrow a phrase from Custodero. "To 'be in the moment,'" Custodero writes, "is to encounter the aesthetic — fully engaged in an activity for which one's individual contributions are perceived as vital." Hansen's description of aesthetic perception combines attentiveness and responsiveness in a "dynamic combination of patience, listening, and initiative." Neumann states that scholarly learning is an experience of "deep engrossment." Such engrossment does not extinguish the self, however. In the words of David the astronomer, feeling "the whole picture... is a combination of both what you see, sort of an instinctive or primal thing, and also your knowledge of what, you know, you put together." [End Page 89]The interactive nature of aesthetic experience thus signifies a kind of "agency-in-situ." Aesthetic experience is shaped or directed by the contribution and initiative of individuals. But individuals cannot act in advance of experience or know what to do, unless they are... (shrink)

Establishing that nature has intrinsic value has been the primary goal of environmental philosophers. This goal has generated tremendous confusion. Part of the confusion stems from a conflation of two quite distinct concerns. The first concern is with establishing the moral considerability of the natural world which is captured by what I call "intrinsic value p ." The second concern attempts to address a perceived problem with the way nature has traditionally been valued, or as many environmentalists would suggest, undervalued, (...) what I call "intrinsic value v ." In this paper I argue against further development of both types of theories of the intrinsic value of nature. There are, I believe, intermediate valuations that have been almost entirely overlooked in discussions of value. Much of the confusion currently plaguing environmental ethics can be avoided by abandoning intrinsic value and refocusing environmental ethics. (shrink)

This paper has two major goals: First, I argue that Catharine MacKinnon’s and Andrea Dworkin’s anti-pornography activism was an act of public reason and their arguments public reasons arguments. Thus, MacKinnon’s argument that pornography is best understood as a practice of sex discrimination is a public reason argument—and so can be defended as grounded in liberal political principles. Political liberalism, as I defend it, can support MacKinnon’s approach to pornography as embodied in a civil rights ordinance. By way of contrast, (...) I will take up another feminist position on pornography, Drucilla Cornell’s, that differs from, and in fact is quite critical of, the MacKinnon/Dworkin anti-pornography position. My primary aim here is to show that Cornell’s arguments fail—as they stand—as public reason arguments, and thus further highlight the crucial aspects of MacKinnon’s feminist approach that are compatible with public reason, and so with liberal political principles. This is not to say that one could not provide a public reason argument for a position like Cornell’s. However, as she offers it, her position is not compatible with the norms of public reason. Second, I show why the obscenity route to the regulation of pornographic material—the traditional liberal approach—is actually antithetical to the version of political liberalism I am interested in defending. The conclusion of these arguments is that contrary to the mainstream view, liberalism is hospitable to the arguments of MacKinnon and Dworkin, and so as liberals we have not only good reason to take their arguments very seriously, but even stronger their arguments flow from fundamental liberal political values. (shrink)

What we call natural and what we call human are inseparable. We live one life. Why is Earth supposedly a mother? Cuomo suggested a historic association with the connection of woman and Earth as “providers of life, sustenance, and creativity.” Norgaard wrote that there is a “connection between women’s fertility and the fertility of the land.” Women are oriented toward relationships and interdependence whereas men approach problems with principles, reasoning, and judgments. Are these generalizations? Undoubtedly, yes. Yet it is sometimes (...) helpful to start with the general and then fuse new meanings and perspectives from such traditional beliefs. I believe the way forward.. (shrink)

Val Plumwood urged us to attend to earth others in non-dualistic ways. In this essay I suggest that such attention be promoted through what I call "engaged empathy." Engaged empathy involves critical attention to the conditions that undermine the well being or flourishing of those to whom empathy is directed and this requires moral agents to attend to things they might not have otherwise. Engaged empathy requires gaining wisdom and perspective and, importantly, motivates the empathizer to act ethically.

In the 17th century, English plague-tract writers began replicating a practice begun some decades earlier by their French and Italian counterparts: creating local histories to better describe the disease and explain how best to manage it. After the great London outbreak of 1665, however, plague deaths often went unrecorded and English tract-writing declined significantly. Without local epidemics to record or historicize, the authors became remote spectators of plague elsewhere, their own outbreaks perhaps now seemingly safe in the past. When plague (...) raged in Marseille in 1720, the disease generated fear but was in some ways a bygone event to English tract-writers. Marketing their tracts as historical accounts, a number of English authors likened the Marseille plague to the epidemics that were forming part of England's social memory. By repeatedly hailing 1665 as the last time plague had raged in London, some writers emphasized England's long plague-free status, pointing to the success of past efforts to contain the disease and also, in some cases, denying that plague could ever have been endemic in the kingdom. They did not downplay the threat that the Marseille outbreak posed should it spread; indeed, concern that plague might devastate English cities once again is at times palpable in the tracts. However, for numerous writers, plague had become an imported foreign threat, one that could be mitigated with appropriate measures, not one that arose domestically. They pointed specifically to the Ottoman Empire, describing it as disease-ridden and the source of their own plagues-historically and, potentially, in the future. In other words, 18th-century English tract-writers relegated their plague epidemics to the past by both firmly historicizing them and making the disease definitively foreign. Plague had not come to an end, but it was no longer their plague. (shrink)

In this article, the author presents findings based on her research on BlueSky, an online interactive textbased forum. She discusses BlueSky participants' online performances of gendered and raced identities. Participants interpret their own and others' identities within the context of expectations and assumptions derived from offline U.S. culture, as well as from their membership in various computer-related subcultures. Given the predominance of white men on BlueSky, such identity interpretations also rely on expectations concerning masculinity and whiteness. The author explores BlueSky (...) participants' understandings of themselves as “nerds” and considers the implications of this nerd identity for their relationship to hegemonic masculinity, especially to expectations of heterosexuality. Analyzing online identity performances in this way provides information pertaining not just to online interaction but to a better understanding of the social construction of gendered and raced identities more generally. (shrink)

Recent years have featured a leap in academic and public interest in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities and related corporate reporting. Two main themes in this literature are the exploration of management incentives to engage in and disclose this information, and of the use and value of this information to market participants. We extend the second theme by examining the interest that specific investor classes have in the use of CSR information. We rely on feminist intersectionality, which suggests that gender (...) intersects with other identities to yield different values, experiences, and opportunities that can lead to gender-based preferences for CSR information. Based upon a survey of 750 US-based retail investors, we find that female retail investors have a greater interest in the use of CSR information, relative to male retail investors. Women express greater anticipated future demand for this information than do men. Further, the magnitude of the increase from current use to anticipated future demand is greater for women than men. Age is a significant modifying factor in that the discrepancy between women of any age and older men is greater than that between women and younger men. Finally, women also exhibit greater demand for streamlining of the information flow, consistent with pressures induced by time poverty. It appears that current disclosure practices provide a less than optimal match with the needs of the information consumers that are primarily interested in using this information. This mismatch may result in a systematic disenfranchisement of female investing classes which suggests an ethical need to level the playing field. (shrink)

It is sometimes claimed that Husserl's writings provide an inspiration for considering art today. More specifically we ask here whether Husserl's description of aesthetic attitude is rich and original. The comparisons he draws between the aesthetic attitude and the phenomenological attitude always aim to clarify the phenomenological attitude and thus take it for granted that the typical features of the aesthetic attitude are well known. In this way Husserl presupposes and retrieves the teaching of Kant, although in certain working notes (...) he clarifies and intensifies the formal and reflective characteristics of Kant's description of the aesthetic judgment. (shrink)

In this paper, we explore how caretakers experience living with disabled companion animals. Drawing on interviews, as well as narratives on websites and other support groups, we examine ways in which caretakers describe the lives of animals they live with, and their various disabilties. The animals were mostly dogs, plus a few cats, with a range of physical disabilities; almost all had been rehomed, often from places specializing in homing disabled animals. Three themes emerged from analysis of these texts: first, (...) respondents drew heavily on the common narrative of disabled individuals as heroes, often noted in disability rights literature – while simultaneously drawing on, and challenging, ideas of disability as incapacity. The second theme was love and empathy. Several of our interviewees spoke of empathy being enhanced thro We discuss these caretakers' stories of animal disability in relation to both studies of human-animal relationships, and to disability rights, as well as to ideas about what constitutes care. What these narratives emphasize is a particular sense of sharing and reciprocity, felt through the body, especially when caretakers spoke of their own ill-health. They saw disability – the animals' or their own – not as limiting, but as enabling both to flourish within caring relationships. (shrink)

Real Life Bully Prevention For Real Kids addresses the pervasive problem of bullying by offering students hands-on activities. Teachers will want to use this book in their classrooms with their students as part of the school’s anti-bullying curriculum. As an added bonus, the activities reinforce English/language arts, social studies, and health education curricular goals. Counselors, therapists, and school administrators can also use the activities in large and small group instruction. Additionally, leaders of after-school programs and youth leadership programs, such as (...) scouting, dramatics classes, and religious education classes, will find the activities helpful in addressing their bully prevention programs. Each activity contains a description, goals for children, and helpful hints for adults to guide their youngsters through the program. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Ethics & the Environment 12.2 (2007) 124-125MuseSearchJournalsThis JournalContents[Access article in PDF]A Few Thoughts on the Future of Environmental PhilosophyLori GruenThe potential of Environmental Philosophy to serve as an interdisciplinary bridge seems to be as strong as ever, and focusing on ways to enhance and expand philosophical engagement in multi/inter-disciplinary environmental projects is important. Continuing to develop work on environmental justice and eco-justice both theoretically and practically is one rich (...) way to promote interdisciplinary engagement and expand the possibilities for environmental thinking more broadly. For example, environmental justice inquiry often attracts students to environmental philosophy and environmental science who would not ordinarily be interested in philosophy or science. Environmental justice issues also provide significant service-learning opportunities that can encourage students and faculty to develop more sophisticated ways of integrating theory and practice while working with local communities. Integrating service-learning projects into environmental philosophy/studies classrooms inevitably encourages the development of interdisciplinary skills that will serve faculty and students and allows for greater discussions of local environmental problems to be addressed both inside and outside the classroom.As discussions of global justice, human rights, transnational feminism, and egalitarianism continue to gain prominence in philosophy, political science, feminist studies, and law, it is important that environmental philosophers continue developing ways to contribute to the dialogue. Environmental philosophers can certainly help enliven and deepen the practical as well as theoretical significance of these discussions. The new area of "cultural environmental studies" is one place this might happen, but it is certainly possible for environmental philosophers to engage in these analyses in other contexts.Environmental philosophers have a tendency to look at large systemic issues, and as climate change becomes increasing pressing it is important not to ignore the particularity of risks and potential harms for different human communities as well as non-human animals who may be disproportionately impacted. Non-human animals are facing alarming dangers from anthropogenic environmental destruction. At the end of [End Page 124] 2006, the baiji, or Chinese river dolphin, went extinct in the polluted Yangtze River; early in 2007, the UN reported an "emergency situation for the orangutan" in Borneo and Sumatra and experts predict their extinction within the next 20 years; dramatic climate events have had increasingly worrying impacts on isolated populations, from the whooping crane to the Asian elephant; unsustainable logging continues to threaten great apes and other species in Africa as more areas are opened for the trade in bushmeat; global warming is threatening the polar bear with extinction; recreational boating is decimating the manatees; and we can expect the losses to mount. Attending to the biodiversity loss as well as animal suffering must be a priority.Lori Gruen is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Wesleyan University where she also chairs the Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program and directs the Ethics in Society Project. She has published extensively on topics in ecofeminist ethics and epistemology, environmental justice, and feminist analyses of human relations to non-human animals. She is currently writing a book exploring the complex philosophical issues raised by our relations to captive chimpanzees. E-mail: [email protected] JournalContentsTop... (shrink)

Numerous issues confront women's healthcare today, among them the medicalization of women's bodies, cosmetic genital surgery, violence against women, HIV, perinatal mental health disorders. This volume uniquely explores such difficult topics and others at the intersection of clinical practice, policy, and bioethics in women's health care through a feminist ethics lens. With in-depth discussions of issues in women's reproductive health, it also broadens scholarship by responding to a wider array of ethical challenges that many women experience in accessing health care. (...) Contributions touch on many themes previously tackled by feminist ethics, but in new, contemporary ways. Some chapters expand into new fields in the bioethics literature, such as the ethical issues related to the care of Indigenous women, uninsured refugees and immigrants, women engaged in sex work, and those with HIV at different life stages and perinatal mental health disorders. Authors seek to connect theory and practice with users of the health system by including women's voices in their research. Bringing to bear their experience in active clinical practice in medicine, nursing, and ethics, the authors contemplate new conceptual approaches to important issues in women's healthcare, and make ethical practice recommendations for those grappling with these issues. Topical and up-to-date, this book provides a valuable resource for physicians, nurses, clinical ethicists, and researchers working in some of the most critical areas of women's health and applied ethics today. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reflecting Back, Looking Forward:Ethics and the Environment at 25Lori Gruen (bio)Twenty-five years ago, when Ethics and the Environment launched, I remember having engaging conversations with the late founding editor, Victoria Davion, about just how important feminist thinking was to ethical explorations of our vexed relationships with the more than human world. She promised to promote feminist philosophical scholarship in this journal and she kept that promise. Although I'm quite (...) skeptical of "metrics" I did a search on the term "feminism" in the three prominent journals that publish on ethics and the environment and was not surprised to find that this journal contains 147 results where there are 51 in Environmental Values and just 33 in Environmental Ethics, a journal that has been publishing longer than Ethics and the Environment.Before the journal launched, Vicky, Chris Cuomo, and I spoke regularly about the value that feminist philosophical insights brought to environmental ethics. While we disagreed on a variety of issues (should the climate be central? Should we center our relationships with other animals?) and names (should we think of ourselves as "ecofeminists" or "ecological feminists"?) and had lively debates with other ecofeminists, including Carol Adams, Greta Gaard, Marti Kheel, Deborah Slicer, Val Plumwood, and Karen Warren, among others, we all shared a commitment to feminist methodology as well as recognizing the crucial need to incorporate ecofeminism into environmental ethics and praxis.Part of the reason it is important to incorporate ecofeminist insights into environmentalism is that ecofeminism builds on work in feminist philosophy that uncovers various biases that distort our knowledge and our relationships. For example, feminist epistemologies help us to see how testimony from those outside the center are undervalued or ignored. This has become painfully clear in environmental justice struggles; communities of [End Page 3] color are disproportionately impacted by exposure to toxins and are then burdened with finding "experts" who can "objectively" assess their claims. Ecofeminists have helped identify the inequity of looking to so-called objective expertise when communities are suffering. This sort of epistemic injustice is getting worse in the face of extreme weather events, in at least two ways. Many people who are impacted by hurricanes, floods, and earthquakes, are often not well positioned to navigate institutions that may be able to help, if those institutions even exist. And as sea ice melts and oceans rise, indigenous people's multi-generational wisdom is often overlooked, while their communities are simultaneously imperiled.Another reason that feminist and ecofeminist analyses are crucial for environmental philosophy is that ecofeminists can correct certain problematic frameworks that often hinder our abilities to reshape our relationships with the more than human world. Ecofeminists have long been critical of the abstract individualism that has permeated environmental ethics, including animal ethics (Adams and Gruen, 2014). This focus on abstract individualism leads to faulty analyses of our place in the natural world, as many holistic environmental philosophers have argued. Ecofeminists have also provided important challenges to holism in environmental philosophy, as the categorical "wholes" tend to occlude important differences within and between them. (Kheel, 2007). Ecofeminists have sought to contextualize ecological sensibilities to illuminate how systems of power differentially structure our relationships with each other and our environments.Vicky's commitment to incorporating feminist and ecofeminist perspectives as a central part of this journal's vision has also provided newer scholars with a venue for further development of ecofeminist thinking, as can be seen in A.E. Kings' "Intersectionality and the Changing Face of Ecofeminism" (2017) and Chaone Mallory's "What's in a Name? In Defense of Ecofeminism (Not Ecological Feminisms, Feminist Ecology, or Gender and the Environment)" (2018) published in the special tribute issue to Vicky. New thinking is always important, but in the face of global climate collapse, it is more important than ever.This journal has also been one of the go-to venues for animal ethics. In the early days of environmental ethics, there was a complex debate about what role, if any, animal ethics should play in environmental ethics. Over 35 years ago, two of the early pioneers, J. Baird Callicott (1980) and the late Marti Kheel (1985), argued in the pages of... (shrink)

This article offers a feminist perspective on public sociology that suggests that the potential risks of going public with feminist sociological research are more pervasive and serious than proponents of public sociologies have previously acknowledged. At the same time, the promise of public sociologies for furthering feminist goals has been largely untapped. Here, the authors recount their own experience with widely publicized research that, while neither unique nor typical, serves to highlight potential risks of making feminist sociological research public. Feminist (...) scholars must be made aware of these risks as feminist research, which challenges existing gender inequalities and arrangements, is especially likely to encounter negative public reaction. The authors recommend collective and conscientious attention to both the medium and the message. The perspective on public sociologies presented here can help further the goals of public sociology and holds special promise for feminist sociologists who seek effective ways to promote social change. (shrink)

Un essai récent de Rochlitz s'inscrit dans le débat actuel sur l'art contemporain en s'efforçant légitimement de rétablir le spectateur dans son droit au jugement. Ce faisant, il propose des critères de reconnaissance et d'appréciation de l'oeuvre qui prétendent, entre autres, échapper aux limites de l'esthétique kantienne qualifiée de subjectiviste. En évoquant des tentatives, analytique et phénoménologique , de traiter de l'oeuvre contemporaine, et en les confrontant aux critères avancés par Rochlitz, on cherche à mettre en évidence les échos kantiens (...) communs à toutes ces approches pour appeler à éviter les interprétations trop étroites de la troisième Critique, et montrer qu'elle nourrit le questionnement sur l'art d'aujourd'hui et peut encore ouvrir des pistes fructueuses à cet égard.A recent essay by Rochlitz contributes to the current debate about contemporary art by justifiably trying to restore the spectators in their right to judge. By so doing, he proposes, for acknowledging and appraising the works of art, standards which claim more particularly to avoid the limits of Kant's aesthetics, supposedly subjectivistic. By refering to analytic and phenomenological approaches to contemporary artworks, and by confronting these approaches to the criteria proposed by Rochlitz, the present paper is an attempt to bring to light the echoes of Kant throughout all those approaches, in order to avoid a too restrictive interpretation of the third Critique, and in order to demonstrate that the current interrogation about art still lives upon Kant, who keeps opening fruitful ways of research. (shrink)

Deeply rooted structures of racism, ableism, misogyny, ageism, and transphobia hurt great numbers of people, exposing them to intolerance, economic exclusion, and physical harm around the globe. Billions of land animals suffer and die annually in concentrated feeding operations and slaughterhouses. Our planet and all who live here are in perilous straights as the climate changes. In the face of such grievous problems, people who want to find positive ways to respond often grapple with difficult questions about how to make (...) a difference. Effective Altruism has arisen as an attempt to help answer these questions, encouraging people to give as much money as they can in the most effective ways to address human and animal suffering. But the Effective Altruists’ answers support some of the very social structures that cause suffering, undermining its efforts to “do the most good.” The Good It Promises, The Harm It Does is the first book-length critique of Effective Altruism. It brings together a diverse group of activists and scholars to explore Effective Altruism’s failure to meaningfully address forms of human and animal suffering. (shrink)

We all experience loneliness at some time in our lives and it often motivates people, consciously or otherwise, to enter treatment. Yet it is rarely explicitly addressed in psychoanalytic literature. _Loneliness and Longing_ rectifies this oversight by thoroughly exploring this painful psychological state. In this book contributors address the inner sense of loneliness – that is feeling alone even in the company of others – by drawing on different aspects of loneliness and longing. Topics covered include: loneliness in the consulting (...) room the relationship between loneliness and love the effects of social networking and the internet how loneliness changes throughout the life-cycle healing the analyst’s loneliness. _Loneliness and Longing_ draws on both theory and practice to discuss ways to help people to understand and cope with this important emotional state, encouraging them to make loneliness and longing less pervasive in their lives. This will be ideal reading for analysts, psychotherapists, and related practitioners facing the challenges of loneliness in their consulting rooms. (shrink)

Some of the central questions that have been explored by Latin American and Latinx philosophers are questions of metaphilosophy. "Metaphilosophy" refers to philosophical reflections on the nature of philosophy itself. For example, we might ask: What is the purpose of doing philosophy? How does philosophy compare and contrast with other disciplines, such as science, theology, or literature? And what is the best way of categorizing the different kinds and traditions of philosophy? These are philosophical questions about philosophy as an activity (...) and as a discipline. In this chapter, we discuss some ways that Latin American and Latinx philosophers have addressed these and other metaphilosophical issues. Our focus will be on the following questions: What are the defining characteristics of Latin American philosophy and Latinx philosophy? Do they constitute distinctive traditions of philosophy, and if so, what is especially valuable about these traditions? (shrink)

Studies have shown that a person can consciously believe that they value racial equality and desire not to perpetuate racial stigmas, but unwittingly exhibit racist attitudes and beliefs. In order to explain this discrepancy between conscious beliefs and behavior, scholars have turned their attention to unconscious racial prejudice. One approach that is gaining wide acceptance is the Implicit Bias Model, which appeals to distinct implicit and explicit cognitive processes, coupled with an account of the ways in which people unconsciously internalize (...) widespread stereotypes and stigmas. This article claims that although the Implicit Bias Model is in many respects useful, it leaves out a central aspect of unconscious racial prejudice: the underlying motivations and incentives for harboring racist attitudes and beliefs, which generate psychological resistances to knowing about or changing prejudices. A more complete account of unconscious racial prejudice can be developed by turning to theories of active ignorance, which contribute to what this article calls the Resistance Model. (shrink)

This study advances understanding of how a normative feminine beauty ideal is maintained through cultural products such as fairy tales. Using Brothers Grimm's fairy tales, the authors explore the extent and ways in which “feminine beauty” is highlighted. Next, they compare those tales that have survived with those that have not to determine whether tales that have been popularized place more emphasis on women's beauty. The findings suggest that feminine beauty is a dominant theme and that tales with heavy emphases (...) on feminine beauty are much more likely to have survived. These findings are interpreted in light of changes in women's social status over the past 150 years and the increased importance of establishing forms of normative social control to maintain a gender system. (shrink)

Academic philosophy's lack of diversity is of concern because it results in a discipline that does not adequately reflect or address the experiences, concerns, and perspectives of many people outside of the dominant demographic. In this article, I examine some of the practical and psychological challenges of entering into dialogue with thinkers whose background knowledge, culture, life experiences, and/or methodologies generate philosophical thought that is radically different from one's own. I contend that in order to build a discipline that is (...) more genuinely dialogical, academic philosophers should embrace this challenging tension between incommensurable worlds of sense. Specifically, I consider how the philosophical practice of translating foreign concepts into terms that have meaning for us might be carried out in a way that preserves radical friction. I warn of the risk of projecting our ideas onto those whose worldviews are incompatible with our own, and I offer strategies for navigating this risk. (shrink)

Issues-driven shareholder activism suggests that specific issue characteristics brought by shareholders, a group to which firms are obligated to respond, interact in a way that affects the materiality of the issue in the eyes of the modern corporation. Relevant issue characteristics include: issue type, social significance, and issue life cycle stage.

Issues-driven shareholder activism suggests that specific issue characteristics brought by shareholders, a group to which firms are obligated to respond, interact in a way that affects the materiality of the issue in the eyes of the modern corporation. Relevant issue characteristics include: issue type, social significance, and issue life cycle stage.

The idea of public reason is central to political liberalism's aim to provide an account of the possibility of a just and stable democratic society comprised of free and equal citizens who nonetheless are deeply divided over fundamental values. This commitment to the idea of public reason reflects the normative core of political liberalism which is rooted in the principle of democratic legitimacy and the idea of reciprocity among citizens. Yet both critics and defenders of political liberalism disagree over whether (...) or not the idea of public reason permits citizens to appeal to their comprehensive conceptions of the good in public deliberation over matters of basic justice. Our aim in this paper is to provide a defense of an exclusive idea of public reason, and at the same time we aim to dispel the underlying concerns of two prominent criticisms of the idea of public reason—the concern of alienation from the political process, as expressed by religiously oriented critics, and the concern over women's equality, as expressed by feminist critics. We argue that inclusive accounts of the idea of public reason are not consistent with political liberalism's core commitments. Further, we claim, inclusive accounts of the idea of public reason deepen feminist concerns. We think that, properly understood, an exclusive account of the idea of public reason can address feminist concerns about political liberalism and avoid alienating (reasonable) religious persons in an unacceptable way. Thus, we conclude that an exclusive account of the idea of public reason is our best hope for reconciliation. (shrink)

Regulatory responses to the business failures of 1998–2001 framed them as a general failure of governance and ethics rather than as firm-specific problems. Among the regulatory responses are Section 406 of Sarbanes–Oxley Act, SEC, and exchange requirements to provide a Code of Ethics. However, institutional pressures surrounding this regulation suggest the potential for symbolic responses and decoupling of response from organizational action. In this article, we examine Codes of Ethics for a stratified sample of 75 U.S. firms across five distinct (...) industries and find that content and language converge across organizations in ways undesired by the regulators, and that language is used to minimize the effects of the Code on constraining organizational behavior. There is, however, a noteworthy exception in the sections of the Codes dedicated the ethics of financial reporting. Although this material still contains legalistic boilerplate information, it does offer concrete guidance and emphatic language pertaining to the need to maintain the integrity of reporting practices. This suggests that the corporate understanding of the source of the failures is one of fraudulent financial reporting. Aside from the matter of financial reporting, the vague and stylized content of the Codes was a predicted response and constitutes a rational response to the regulation. The regulation, however, clearly states the belief that Codes should vary from firm to firm and that individual firms should determine the specific content of a Code. Aside from financial reporting matters, the observed result suggests that regulatory efforts may have failed to instigate corporate change in attitudes toward and enforcement of higher ethical standards by corporate actors. (shrink)

We all experience loneliness at some time in our lives and it often motivates people, consciously or otherwise, to enter treatment. Yet it is rarely explicitly addressed in psychoanalytic literature. Loneliness and Longing rectifies this oversight by thoroughly exploring this painful psychological state. In this book contributors address the inner sense of loneliness âe" that is feeling alone even in the company of others âe" by drawing on different aspects of loneliness and longing. Topics covered include: loneliness in the consulting (...) room the relationship between loneliness and love the effects of social networking and the internet how loneliness changes throughout the life-cycle healing the analystâe(tm)s loneliness. Loneliness and Longing draws on both theory and practice to discuss ways to help people to understand and cope with this important emotional state, encouraging them to make loneliness and longing less pervasive in their lives. This will be ideal reading for analysts, psychotherapists, and related practitioners facing the challenges of loneliness in their consulting rooms. (shrink)

Can and should political liberals recognize and otherwise support legal marriage as a matter of basic justice? In this article, we offer a general account of how political liberals should evaluate the issue of whether the legal recognition of marriage is a matter of basic justice. And, we develop and examine some public reason arguments that, given the fundamental interests of citizens, could justify various forms of legal marriage in some contexts. In particular, in certain conditions, the recognition of some (...) form of legal marriage may be the best way to protect the fundamental interests of women as citizens in freely chosen associations. Or, it may be that, in certain conditions, to secure the social conditions necessary for gays, lesbians and bisexuals to be free and equal citizens, some form of legal marriage can or should be recognized. (shrink)

The effects of lexical context on phonological processing are pervasive and there have been indications that such effects may be modulated by attention. However, attentional modulation in speech processing is neither well documented nor well understood. Experiment 1 demonstrated attentional modulation of lexical facilitation of speech sound recognition when task and critical stimuli were identical across attention conditions. We propose modulation of lexical activation as a neurophysiologically plausible computational mechanism that can account for this type of modulation. Contrary to the (...) claims of critics, this mechanism can account for attentional modulation without violating the principle of interactive processing. Simulations of the interactive TRACE model extended to include two different ways of modulating lexical activation showed that each can account for attentional modulation of lexical feedback effects. Experiment 2 tested conflicting predictions from the two implementations and provided evidence that is consistent with bias input as the mechanism of attentional control of lexical activation. (shrink)

Potential conflicts between the roles of physicians and researchers have been described at the theoretical level in the bioethics literature (Czoli, et al., 2011). Physicians and researchers are generally in mutually distinct roles, responsible for patients and participants respectively. With increasing emphasis on integration of research into clinical settings, however, the role divide is sometimes unclear. Consequently, physician–researchers must consider and negotiate salient ethical differences between clinical– and research–based obligations (Miller et al, 1998). This paper explores the subjective experiences and (...) perspectives of 30 physician–researchers working in three Canadian paediatric settings. Drawing on qualitative interviews, it identifies ethical challenges and strategies used by physician–researchers in managing dual roles. It considers whether competing obligations could have both positive and adverse consequences for both physician–researchers and patients. Finally, we discuss how empirical work, which explores the perspectives of those engaged in research and clinical practice, can lead the way to understanding and promoting best practice. (shrink)

abstractBackground: Evidence shows both a tendency for research participants to conflate research and clinical care and a limited public understanding of research. Conflation of research and care by participants is often referred to as the therapeutic misconception. Despite this evidence, few studies have explicitly asked participants, and especially minors, to explain what they think research is and how they think it differs from regular medical care. Methods: As part of a longer semistructured interview evaluating assent and parental permission for research, (...) adolescent research participants (n = 177), including adolescents with illnesses and healthy volunteers, and their parents (n = 177) were asked to describe medical research in their own words and say whether and how they thought being in medical research was different from seeing a regular doctor. Qualitative responses were coded and themes were identified through an iterative process. Results: When asked to describe medical research, the majority described research in terms of its goals of helping to advance science, develop treatments and medicines, and help others; fewer described research as having the goal of helping particular research participants, and fewer still in terms of the methods used in research. The majority of teen and parent respondents said being in research is different than seeing a regular doctor and explained this by describing different goals, different or more procedures, differences in the engagement of the doctors/researchers, and differences in logistics. Conclusions: Adolescents participating in clinical research and their parents generally describe medical research in terms of its goals of advancing science and finding new medicines and treatments, sometimes in combination with helping the enrolled individuals. The majority perceive a difference between research and regular medical care and described these differences in various ways. Further exploration is warranted about how such perceived differences matter to participants and how this understanding could be used to enhance informed consent and the overall research experience. (shrink)

Agitation is one of the most common behavioural and psychological symptoms in people living with dementia. This behaviour can cause tremendous stress and anxiety on family caregivers and healthcare providers. Direct observation of PLwD is the traditional way to measure episodes of agitation. However, this method is subjective, bias-prone and timeconsuming. Importantly, it does not predict the onset of the agitation. Therefore, there is a need to develop a continuous monitoring system that can detect and/or predict the onset of agitation. (...) In this study, a multi-modal sensor platform with video cameras, motion and door sensors, wristbands and pressure mats were set up in a hospital-based dementia behavioural care unit to develop a predictive system to identify the onset of agitation. The research team faced several barriers in the development and initiation of the study, namely addressing concerns about the study ethics, logistics and costs of study activities, device design for PLwD and limitations of its use in the hospital. In this paper, the strategies and methodologies that were implemented to address these challenges are discussed for consideration by future researchers who will conduct similar studies in a hospital setting. (shrink)

The focus of this book is to explore teachers' evolving personal epistemologies, or the beliefs we hold about the origin and development of knowledge in the context of teaching. The chapters focus on a range of conceptual frameworks about how university and field-based experiences influence the connections between teachers' personal epistemologies and teaching practice. In an earlier volume we investigated ways in which we might change preservice teachers' beliefs and teaching practice (Brownlee, Schraw and Berthelsen, 2011). While we addressed the (...) nature of teachers' personal epistemology, learning and teaching practices, and approaches for changing beliefs throughout teacher education programs, the volume did not address conceptual frameworks for the development of teacher's personal epistemologies. The book is focused on teacher educators, teachers and teacher education programmers in universities with an overall aim of highlighting how we might support students to engage in learning that is challenging and to engage in professional experiences that promote changes in teaching practice. We argue that students need to be encouraged to question their beliefs and develop increasingly sophisticated beliefs about their knowledge and their students' knowledge that facilitate learning and intellectual growth. (shrink)

It has been said that all philosophy begins with a set of concerns and a set of intuitions. With this idea in mind, we ask: Would it be helpful to understand Mexican-American philosophy as a kind of philosophy that begins with the concerns and intuitions of the Mexican-American community? On this view, what distinguishes Mexican-American philosophy is the orientation from which the philosophical investigation proceeds. Such an orientation is shaped by the experiences and relationships that are characteristic of those who (...) identify as Mexican-American. We offer a list of concerns and intuitions that we suggest are widely held by the Mexican-American community. Focusing on questions surrounding linguistic assimilation in the U.S., we illustrate how beginning from these particular starting points might alter the way we think about philosophical issues. (shrink)