This article sets out to examine the role of teacher research and enquiry in the professional development of teachers. The context derives from the initiative of the Scottish Executive to enhance the status and working conditions of teachers. We consider the extent to which continuing professional development activities arising out of the Chartered Teacher Programme encourage teachers to value research, equip them to become research-minded and support them to engage in research and enquiry in their own (...) professional contexts. (shrink)

The special issue collects a selection of papers presented during the Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries 2013 conference. This is a series of conferences organized by the International Association for Ethics and Information Technology , a professional organization formed in 2001 and which gathers experts in information and computer ethics prompting interdisciplinary research and discussions on ethical problems related to design and deployment of information and communication technologies . During the past two decades, CEPE conferences have been a focal point (...) for the research concerning crucial topics , such as privacy , online trust , online identity , value-sensitive design , cyber-warfare , along with education and professional ethics (Buchanan .. (shrink)

The currently fashionable professional ideal of reflective practice has focused on how good teaching might be informed by theoretical (invariably social scientific) enquiry and has been commonly construed as a matter of the effective application of theory. This paper rejects technicist assumptions underpinning the idea of applied theory, tracing them to confusion between two different sorts of practical deliberation, phronesis and techne. Understanding professional reflection primarily in term of phronesis calls into doubt both the precise role of (...) genuine theoretical studies in professional reflection and the very status as theoretical of the sort of the principled understanding and deliberation required for the wise conduct of education. (shrink)

This essay offers an interrogation of Leadership-as-Practice in the context of MacIntyre’s Three Rival Versions of Moral Inquiry. LAP is a constructionist leadership approach that rationalizes leadership as the co-creation of embodied leadership practices in organizations, and we argue that its theoretical and philosophical foundations are best aligned with a genealogist version of moral enquiry. We contend that LAP’s theoretical assumptions and implications place it in opposition to traditionalist and encyclopaedist moral philosophies and that application of LAP without an (...) appreciation for our argument poses challenges for practitioners as it diminishes their ability to learn from opposing perspectives. We argue for an appreciation of diverse moral viewpoints and discouragement of coercive moral practices from any competing perspective. While the philosophy undergirding LAP may encourage moral relativism and possible conflicts in principled beliefs, we offer LAP may strengthen organizational members cognitively and emotionally, bringing greater long-term benefit for the organization. (shrink)

The currently fashionable professional ideal of reflective practice has focused on how good teaching might be informed by theoretical (invariably social scientific) enquiry and has been commonly construed as a matter of the effective application of theory. This paper rejects technicist assumptions underpinning the idea of applied theory, tracing them to confusion between two different sorts of practical deliberation, phronesis and techne. Understanding professional reflection primarily in term of phronesis calls into doubt both the precise role of (...) genuine theoretical studies in professional reflection and the very status as theoretical of the sort of the principled understanding and deliberation required for the wise conduct of education. (shrink)

In poor and remote areas, teachers frequently encounter serious ongoing challenges and experience teacher exhaustion due to the uneven distribution of resource supply, and a shortage of professional support. Maintaining teachers’ professional wellbeing in an unfavorable teaching environment has become a major challenge. The current study explores teachers’ professional wellbeing in the context of a five-month-long professional development program designed for teachers in areas of deep poverty in China. This study adopted the method of narrative (...) class='Hi'>enquiry and collected diaries written before and after the program from 46 primary school English teachers. Based on the manually analyzed data, it was found that teachers’ overall wellbeing at work was enhanced in terms of their professional meaning, engagement, and achievement. The systematic analysis of the diaries helped to better understand how the program exerted such an effect on teachers’ learning experiences and their wellbeing. (shrink)

Two kinds of philosophical questions are raised by the current public debate about climate change; epistemic questions (Whom should I believe? Is climate science a genuine science?), and ethical questions (Who should bear the burden? Must I sacrifice if others do not?). Although the former have been central to this debate, professional philosophers have dealt almost exclusively with the latter. This book is the first to address both the epistemic and ethical questions raised by the climate change debate and (...) examine the relationship between them. (shrink)

Despite the ongoing consideration of the ethical nature of human resource management (HRM), little research has been conducted on how morality and ethics are represented in the discourse, activities and lived experiences of human resource (HR) professionals. In this paper, we connect the thinking and lived experiences of HR professionals to an alternative ethics, rooted in the work of Bauman (Modernity and the Holocaust, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1989; Theory, Culture and Society 7:5-38, 1990; Postmodern Ethics, Blackwell, Oxford, 1991; Approaches to (...) Social Enquiry, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1993; Life in Fragments, Blackwell, Oxford, 1995) and Levinas (Otherwise than Being, or, Beyond Essence, Duquesne University Press, Pittsburgh, PA, 1998). We argue that the study of HRM and ethics should be contextualized within the discourses used, the practices and activities of HR professionals. Through the analysis of interview data from 40 predominantly Canadian HR practitioners and managers we experiment with Bauman's notion of 'moral impulse' to help us understand how HRM is both a product and perpetuator of moral neutralization in organizations. We suggest that HRM as it is practiced is concerned with distancing, depersonalizing, and dissembling, and acts in support of the 'moral' requirements of business, not of people. However, we also recognize that HR practitioners and managers are often confronted with and conflicted by actions and decisions that they are required to take, therefore opening possibilities and hope for an alternative ethical HRM. (shrink)

Herein, I clarify my concern regarding Raelin’s Leadership-as-Practice and argue that inconsistent moral philosophies undermine the veracity of leadership theory, especially more recent democratic, shared, collective, and practice oriented theories; that this problem seems to be proliferating in the social sciences, and that this is especially concerning in socio-psychologically oriented theories. I contend that the moral foundations of L-A-P remain philosophically disquieting, unless it is understood as excluding moral agents other than those of a genealogical tradition, and that such exclusionary (...) consequences in practice may lead to moral disengagement, which might then lead to cognitive dissonance and even self-harm. (shrink)

Our aim was to employ a critical analytic lens to explicate the role of nursing research in supporting the notion of caring realities. To do this, we used case exemplars to illustrate the infusion of such discourses. The first exemplar examines the fundamental concept of caring: using Florence Nightingale's Notes on Nursing, the case study surfaces caring as originally grounded in ritualized practice and subsequently describes its transmutation, via competing discourses, to a more holistic concept. It is argued that in (...) the many and varied attempts to define the dynamic concept of care, caring has now become paradoxically, a more fragmented concept despite attempts to render it more holistic and inclusive. In the second exemplar, one of the authors draws on her personal experience of the gap between theory and practice, so pronounced that it pushed the author to revisit the concept of evidence‐based practice and nursing education. In our third and final exemplar, we refer to the absence of knowledge and practice generated through natural enquiry and curiosity, an absence which has led to production of corporate led rhetoric. Drawing together the central arguments of the three exemplars, we reflect on the influential role of nursing research in enabling the deconstruction of taken for granted assumptions such as caring, evidence‐based practice and empowerment; assumptions which have been generated by discourses riddled with confusion and alienation from the reality of practice and the natural spirit of professional enquiry. (shrink)

“Hot seating” is a form of creative drama in which the participants play themselves but imagine themselves in someone else’s position, some taking the role of interrogators and others the role of persons in the “hot seat”. This paper documents the case of marketing students who dramatised an ethics enquiry supposedly held under the auspices of a professional marketing association to investigate breaches in its code of professional conduct. Interpretive research, in the form of a cartoon test, (...) was employed to examine the contribution of the educational drama activity to student perceptions of learning within a role-playing experientially-based marketing unit at an Australian University. Findings reveal that students preferred the hot-seating exercise to conventional teaching methods in terms of enjoyment, “real-life” experience, new understandings of both marketing and ethics, and their motivation to learn more about marketing ethics implications for themselves, customers and the profession. Strategically, the convention was found to involve the students emotionally and intellectually with some intensity, while revealing that some students may be fearful of the drama or even over-stimulated by the sometimes tense and powerful environment.This pedagogical approach was also seen to be particularly suitable for instruction for the delicate, contentious and personal issues often raised by ethics. (shrink)

This philosophical enquiry considers the impact of a global world view and technology on the meaning of being human. The global vision increases our awareness of the common bond between all humans, while technology tends to separate us from an understanding of ourselves as human persons. We review some advances in connecting as community within our world, and many examples of technological changes. This review is not exhaustive. The focus is to understand enough changes to think through the possibility (...) of healthcare professionals becoming cyborgs, human–machine units that are subsequently neither human and nor machine. It is seen that human technology interfaces are a different way of interacting but do not change what it is to be human in our rational capacities of providing meaningful speech and freely chosen actions. In the highly technical environment of the ICU, expert nurses work in harmony with both the technical equipment and the patient. We used Heidegger to consider the nature of equipment, and Descartes to explore unique human capacities. Aristotle, Wallace, Sokolowski, and Clarke provide a summary of humanity as substantial and relational. (shrink)

This exploratory enquiry seeks to examine the largely unexplored potential of semiotics for intercultural training and education. The proposed three-partdiscussion describes the process by which semiotic theoretical principles were selected and progressively refined into an applied model which was then pilotedthrough a 2007 research initiative entitled Tools for Cultural Development. The case study involved six groups of French and Australian trainees from both theacademic and professional sectors, in collaboration with university, government and community partners. The first part of (...) the article summarizes a review of theliterature on approaches to cultural competence training. The study then outlines the transcoding process by which the stated objectives of intercultural educationwere reformulated in semiotic terms, particularly in reference to cultural semiotics on which the theoretical core of the applied model was subsequently based.Relevant principles from other semiotic schools as well as similar theoretical and methodological stances in the social sciences reinforced the established body of theory for the training design. The third part of the study discusses the process by which semiotic principles were further defined as skill-based outcomes and goals for workshop implementation. This pragmatic defining process facilitated development of questionnaires and surveys, thereby allowing participants to evaluate the training experience by examining their perceptions about the workshop outcomes at the beginning and end of the sessions. This article presents the quantitative results of the evaluation and, in discussing the gains and limits of data obtained, provides the context for a follow-up article on the qualitative findingsof the study. (shrink)

This exploratory enquiry seeks to examine the largely unexplored potential of semiotics for intercultural training and education. The proposed three-partdiscussion describes the process by which semiotic theoretical principles were selected and progressively refined into an applied model which was then pilotedthrough a 2007 research initiative entitled Tools for Cultural Development. The case study involved six groups of French and Australian trainees from both theacademic and professional sectors, in collaboration with university, government and community partners. The first part of (...) the article summarizes a review of theliterature on approaches to cultural competence training. The study then outlines the transcoding process by which the stated objectives of intercultural educationwere reformulated in semiotic terms, particularly in reference to cultural semiotics on which the theoretical core of the applied model was subsequently based.Relevant principles from other semiotic schools as well as similar theoretical and methodological stances in the social sciences reinforced the established body of theory for the training design. The third part of the study discusses the process by which semiotic principles were further defined as skill-based outcomes and goals for workshop implementation. This pragmatic defining process facilitated development of questionnaires and surveys, thereby allowing participants to evaluate the training experience by examining their perceptions about the workshop outcomes at the beginning and end of the sessions. This article presents the quantitative results of the evaluation and, in discussing the gains and limits of data obtained, provides the context for a follow-up article on the qualitative findingsof the study. (shrink)

All developed human beings possess a practical mastery of a vast range of concepts, including such basic structural notions as those of identity, truth, existence, material objects, mental states, space, and time; but a practical mastery does not entail theoretical understanding. It is that understanding which philosophy seeks to achieve. In this book, one of the most distinguished of living philosophers, assuming no previous knowledge of the subject on the part of the reader, sets out to explain and illustrate a (...) certain conception of the nature of analytical philosophy. Strawson draws on his many years of teaching at Oxford University, during which he refined and developed what he regards as the most productive route to understanding the fundamental structure of human thinking. Among the distinctive features of his exposition are the displacement of an older, reductive conception of philosophical method in favor of elucidating the interconnections between the complex but irreducible notions which form the basic structure of our thinking; and the demonstration that the three traditionally distinguished departments of metaphysics, epistemology, and logic are but three aspects of one unified enquiry. Strawson has produced an elegant work that will be invaluable to students and stimulating for professional philosophers and general readers alike. (shrink)

This paper explores the effects of enacting a collaborative and enquiry based model of teacher professionalism in the UK. Based on work with Chartered Teachers in Scotland, it indicates that the barriers to changing the basis of teacher professionalism are complex and multi-faceted because of the contested nature of teachers' work identities. Chartered Teacher status is achieved by qualification against an occupational standard which positions those who attain it as leading teachers, exerting a significant influence with their colleagues to (...) improve the quality of teaching and learning in schools. This paper looks at some of the conceptual and practical difficulties faced by Chartered Teachers as they try to enact what this new 'status' means. It argues that those with an interest in the professional development of teachers need to position themselves as knowing agents in the complex systemic and political aspects of changing practice in schools. (shrink)

Despite the ongoing consideration of the ethical nature of human resource management (HRM), little research has been conducted on how morality and ethics are represented in the discourse, activities and lived experiences of human resource (HR) professionals. In this paper, we connect the thinking and lived experiences of HR professionals to an alternative ethics, rooted in the work of Bauman (Modernity and the Holocaust, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1989; Theory, Culture and Society 7:5–38, 1990; Postmodern Ethics, Blackwell, Oxford, 1991; Approaches to (...) Social Enquiry, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1993; Life in Fragments, Blackwell, Oxford, 1995) and Levinas (Otherwise than Being, or, Beyond Essence, Duquesne University Press, Pittsburgh, PA, 1998). We argue that the study of HRM and ethics should be contextualized within the discourses used, the practices and activities of HR professionals. Through the analysis of interview data from 40 predominantly Canadian HR practitioners and managers we experiment with Bauman’s notion of ‘moral impulse’ to help us understand how HRM is both a product and perpetuator of moral neutralization in organizations. We suggest that HRM as it is practiced is concerned with distancing, depersonalizing, and dissembling, and acts in support of the ‘moral’ requirements of business, not of people. However, we also recognize that HR practitioners and managers are often confronted with and conflicted by actions and decisions that they are required to take, therefore opening possibilities and hope for an alternative ethical HRM. (shrink)

French science of the period between 1793 and 1830 is now a major focus of study. The large body of work produced since the nineteenth century, particularly in the field of institutional history, has provided the background for important attempts in the last ten or fifteen years to apply tools of sociological analysis to this field of enquiry. Particularly important have been theories of professionalization and institutionalization. It is the purpose of this paper to examine the consequences of the (...) use of such models in relation to this specific historical context. In particular, I shall suggest that such questions as the importance of institutions in the conduct of science, and the extent to which science became a profession or remained a vocation, may be better understood once the world of French science has been situated in a wider political and intellectual context. An article, however, can do no more than suggest new perspectives, and must leave to more extended treatments the work of amplification and correction. Briefly, however, this paper will argue for a view of science at this period as locked in a conflict between the ambiguous demands of the political world on the one hand, and on the other pressures on individuals and groups within the vocation of science to conform to an ideology which viewed science as completelynon-political. (shrink)

What is the purpose of political theoretical endeavour and what methods should the early 21st-century political theorist employ? These questions – which touch on issues which go to the very heart of the vocation of political theory – have become increasingly contentious in recent years. The period since the late 1980s has been one in which theorists have increasingly disagreed not only about conventional matters of normative contention but also about the means by which to seek to resolve them. This (...) article examines a central tension that has characterized that general methodological disagreement, namely the place of empirical inquiry within the repertoire of the professional political theorist. Having carefully examined the contentions of an eclectic range of contributors to the debate, including G.A. Cohen, Alasdair MacIntyre and David Miller, this article argues that efforts either wholly to separate empirical investigation from normative enquiry or to bind the two ever-closer together are fraught with difficulties. It concludes by contending that political theorists ought to take aspects of the empirical political and social sciences extremely seriously while avoiding the temptation to have their normative agenda dictated to them by the contingent pressures of the here and now. (shrink)

Thanks to all the people who responded to my enquiry about the status of the Continuum Hypothesis. This is a really fascinating subject, which I could waste far too much time on. The following is a summary of some aspects of the feeling I got for the problems. This will be old hat to set theorists, and no doubt there are a couple of embarrassing misunderstandings, but it might be of some interest to non professionals.

Causation is a central topic in many areas of philosophy. In metaphysics, philosophers want to know what causation is, and how it is related to laws of nature, probability, action, and freedom of the will. In epistemology, philosophers investigate how causal claims can be inferred from statistical data, and how causation is related to perception, knowledge and explanation. In the philosophy of mind, philosophers want to know whether and how the mind can be said to have causal efficacy, and in (...) ethics, whether there is a moral distinction between acts and omissions and whether the moral value of an act can be judged according to its consequences. And causation is a contested concept in other fields of enquiry, such as biology, physics, and the law. This book provides an in-depth and comprehensive overview of these and other topics, as well as the history of the causation debate from the ancient Greeks to the logical empiricists. The chapters provide surveys of contemporary debates, while often also advancing novel and controversial claims; and each includes a comprehensive bibliography and suggestions for further reading. The book is thus the most comprehensive source of information about causation currently available, and will be invaluable for upper-level undergraduates through to professional philosophers. (shrink)

The Covid-19 pandemic is a tragedy for those who have been hard hit worldwide. At the same time, it is also a test of concepts and practices of what good care is and requires, and how quality of care can be accounted for. In this paper, we present our Care-Ethical Model of Quality Enquiry and apply it to the case of residential care for older people in the Netherlands during the Covid-19 pandemic. Instead of thinking about care in healthcare (...) and social welfare as a set of separate care acts, we think about care as a complex practice of relational caring, crossed by other practices. Instead of thinking about professional caregivers as functionaries obeying external rules, we think about them as practically wise professionals. Instead of thinking about developing external quality criteria and systems, we think about cultivating reflective quality awareness. Instead of abstracting from societal forces that make care possible but also limit it, we acknowledge them and find ways to deal with them. Based on these critical insights, the CEMQUE model can be helpful to describe, interrogate, evaluate, and improve existing care practices. It has four entries: the care receiver considered from their humanness, the caregiver considered from their solicitude, the care facility considered from its habitability and the societal, institutional and scholarly context considered from the perspective of the good life, justice and decency. The crux is enabling all these different entries with all their different aspects to be taken into account. In Corona times this turns out to be more crucial than ever. (shrink)

This theme issue has the founding ambition of landscaping Data Ethics as a new branch of ethics that studies and evaluates moral problems related to data (including generation, recording, curation, processing, dissemination, sharing, and use), algorithms (including AI, artificial agents, machine learning, and robots), and corresponding practices (including responsible innovation, programming, hacking, and professional codes), in order to formulate and support morally good solutions (e.g. right conducts or right values). Data Ethics builds on the foundation provided by Computer and (...) Information Ethics but, at the same time, it refines the approach endorsed so far in this research field, by shifting the Level of Abstraction of ethical enquiries, from being information-centric to being data-centric. This shift brings into focus the different moral dimensions of all kinds of data, even the data that never translate directly into information but can be used to support actions or generate behaviours, for example. It highlights the need for ethical analyses to concentrate on the content and nature of computational operations — the interactions among hardware, software, and data — rather than on the variety of digital technologies that enables them. And it emphasises the complexity of the ethical challenges posed by Data Science. Because of such complexity, Data Ethics should be developed from the start as a macroethics, that is, as an overall framework that avoids narrow, ad hoc approaches and addresses the ethical impact and implications of Data Science and its applications within a consistent, holistic, and inclusive framework. Only as a macroethics Data Ethics will provide the solutions that can maximise the value of Data Science for our societies, for all of us, and for our environments. (shrink)

Aristotle’s philosophical insights into ethics, wisdom and practice have drawn the attention of scholars. In the current professional context where ethics are often compromised, this debate assumes a necessary urgency. This subject is highly relevant to business schools, given the general neglect of this quality in executive management development. Our research involved an analysis of contemporary literature on phronesis in the management scholarship, practice and teaching domains. Our definition of phronesis identifies themes and paradoxes distilled from this literature. Stories (...) are by nature multi-layered and paradoxical, embracing ambiguity and contradiction, so we incorporate narrative as essential to our enquiry. While it appears to be easily grasped, phronesis is complex, nuanced and paradoxical, seen as an unorganised set of characteristics in the management scholarship domain. We argue that the neglect of phronesis in modernity flows from the challenging nature of developing it, itself the consequence of its indistinctness. It calls for Einstein’s words “I would give my life for the simplicity on the other side of complexity”. This article argues that developing this virtue as a form of practical wisdom, should be an integral part of executive management development if we are to cultivate morally responsible leadership. A typology of managerial phronesis will encourage contextually appropriate leadership excellence based on the virtue-attributes of managers-as-scholars. The typology we propose is based on a Grounded Theory synthesis of relevant literature. We adopt a phenomenological stance. Through incorporating Grounded Theory second order themes, we offer a grainier understanding of the qualities of managerial phronesis. (shrink)

This Korean study replicated a previously published American study. The conceptual framework and method combined ethical enquiry and phenomenology. The research questions were: (1) What is nursing students’ experience of ethical problems involving nursing practice? and, (2) What is nursing students’ experience of using an ethical decision-making model? The participants were 97 senior baccalaureate nursing students, each of whom described one ethical problem and chose to use one of five ethical decision-making models. From 97 ethical problems, five content categories (...) emerged, the largest being health professionals (69%). The basic nature of the ethical problems was the students’ experience of conflict, resolution and rationale. Using an ethical decision-making model helped 94% of the students. A comparison of the Korean and American results yields important implications for nursing ethics education, practice and research. (shrink)

Shared decision-making involves health professionals and patients/clients working together to achieve true person-centred health care. However, this goal is infrequently realized, and most barriers are unknown. Discussion between philosophers, clinicians, and researchers can assist in confronting the epistemic and moral basis of health care, with benefits to all. The aim of this paper is to describe what shared decision-making is, discuss its necessary conditions, and develop a definition that can be used in practice to support excellence in maternity care. Discussion (...) between the authors, with backgrounds in philosophy, clinical maternity care, health care management, and maternity care research, assisted the team to confront established norms in maternity care and challenge the epistemic and moral basis of decision-making for caesarean section. The team concluded that shared decision-making must start in pregnancy and continue throughout labour and birth, with equality in discourse facilitated by the clinician. Clinicians have a duty of care for the adequacy of women's knowledge, which can only be fulfilled when relevant knowledge is offered freely and when personal beliefs and biases that may impinge on decision-making (defeaters) are disclosed. Informed consent is not shared decision-making. Key barriers include existing cultural norms of “the doctor knows best” and “patient acquiescence” that prevent defeaters being acknowledged and discussed and can lead to legal challenges, overuse of medical intervention and, in some areas, obstetric violence. Shared decision-making in maternity care can thus be defined as an enquiry by clinician and expectant woman aimed at deciding upon a course of care or none, which takes the form of a dialogue within which the clinician fulfils their duty of care to the client's knowledge by making available their complete knowledge (based on all types of evidence) and expertise, including an exposition of any relevant and recognized potential defeaters. Research to develop measurement tools is required. (shrink)

Digital media presents an array of interesting challenges adapting new modes of collaborative, online communication to traditional writing and literary practices at the practical and theoretical levels. For centuries, popular concepts of the modern author, regardless of genre, have emphasized writing as a solo exercise in human communication, while the act of reading remains associated with solitude and individual privacy. "The Community and the Algorithm: A Digital Interactive Poetics" explores important cultural changes in these relationships thanks to the rapid development (...) of digital internet technologies allowing near-instantaneous, synchronous, multimedia interaction across the globe. The radical shift in how we author and consume media as an online, electronic transmission effectively resituates the writing process across the liberal arts as less a solitary act of individual enquiry and reflection, and more an ongoing, collaborative process of creative interaction within a multimedia environment or network. Contributions in this anthology demonstrate a robust history and equally diverse contemporary approach to multimedia interaction for literary and artistic ends. Central to all media formats, computation is explored throughout this volume to critically examine how algorithmic procedures in writing help bring forward many key concepts to building creative communities in a digital environment. Each chapter in this book accordingly introduces readers to various new collaborative experiments using a broad range of different digital media formats, including VR, Natural Language Generation (NLG), and metagaming tools. This book will appeal broadly to students, instructors, and independent artists working in the digital arts, while its emphasis on social interactivity will interest theorists and teachers working in theatre, social media, and cyberpsychology. Its secondary focus on computation and media programming as a site of artistic experimentation will also interest programmers and web designers at various professional levels. (shrink)

This distinctively interdisciplinary approach to the subject encompasses filmmaking, psychoanalysis, philosophy and popular culture and offers a unique insight into documentary film practice from a psychoanalytic perspective. At the heart of the enquiry is belief that ‘transference-love’ is present in the documentary encounter. With a focus on testimony-driven film and a foreword by Michael Renov, who calls this book 'a radical and compelling account', _Psychoanalysis and Ethics in Documentary Film _covers a range of topics including: Four fundamental concepts of (...) psychoanalysis and documentary film A review of documentary film practice A personal account of the author’s relationship with a subject of her own work A thorough interrogation of the ethics of documentary Ideal for film studies scholars, psychoanalysts, psychotherapists and psychotherapeutically engaged professionals, as well as filmmakers, culture studies students and anyone interested in the process of documentary-making and contemporary culture, this work offers a unique approach. (shrink)

By compiling an experimental method combining both dialectic and rhetoric, 'Dialectic, Rhetoric and Contrast: The Infinite Middle of Meaning' demonstrates how singular meanings can be rendered in a spectrum of 12 repeating concepts that are in a continuum, gradated and symmetrical. The ability to arrange meaning into this pattern opens enquiry into its ontology, and presents meaning as closer to the sensation of colours or musical notes than the bivalent oppositions depicted in classical logic. However, the experiment does not (...) assert that this pattern suggests some sort of constant or absolute principle; instead, it theorises on the ways in which meaning can be considered to be recursive. To explain this, the book explores the concept of contrast itself. No exactitude on the precise existence of contrast can ever be struck because the answer varies infinitely depending upon the scale of measurement used to gauge the meeting point. This characteristic of contrast helps to define a whole new dimension from which sensation, meaning, cognition and consciousness can be analogised to the infinite forms between forms. At a time when the widest consensus in philosophy is the exhaustion of its central themes, the significance of such a hypothesis provides fresh impetus to revise some of the key meanings and concepts underpinning contemporary thought. To do this, the method explores the opposing themes of idealism and realism that run throughout western philosophy from Plato to the Speculative turn. This book will be of interest to professional academic audiences in the humanities and social sciences, from graduates to senior scholars. It will also be an interesting read to anyone wishing to keep abreast of developments in continental philosophy, epistemology, metaphysics, and the sociology of knowledge. (shrink)

In this highly original and thought-provoking work the late Miller Mair puts forward his ideas for a new psychology. First published in 1989, he deals with issues of fundamental importance to the future of a psychology guided by genuine enquiry and concern rather than mere professional self-interest. Crossing and re-crossing boundaries between psychology, psychotherapy and philosophy, and between ‘science’ and ‘art’, he demonstrates the linkages between the personal and the impersonal, subject and object, inside and outside, with a (...) daring not previously risked by anyone working in the area. Dr Mair stresses the importance of a poetic approach in psychology and psychotherapy, and the need to explore and understand the nature of psychology through an imaginative freedom of language. He emphasizes that a poetic awareness and attentiveness is fundamental to any pursuit of understanding of ourselves or others. This is a very personal book, concerned with _personal knowledge_, but it is meant for anyone who seeks to understand themselves and others, and what is involved in coming to such understanding. Focusing on ordinary human experience, and moving towards literary and artistic modes of expression, the author invites you to enter in, follow what _you_ think and feel, as he proposes a radical revision of much that is accepted in psychology and in psychotherapy. (shrink)

The Joy of Not Knowing takes every aspect of the curriculum and of school life and transforms it into a personalised, meaningful and enjoyable experience for all. It offers readers an innovative, theoretical and practical guide to establish a values-based, enquiry-led and challenge-rich learning to learn approach to teaching and learning and to school leadership. This thought-provoking guide provides the reader with a wealth of whole-class, easy-to-implement, malleable, practical ideas and case studies that can be personalised to the vision (...) of each setting, age-group and curriculum. It brings together, as a whole-school framework, the strategies that have been shown to have the greatest impact on practitioner's professional fulfilment and on children's life chances, love of learning, intrinsic motivation and enthusiasm for wanting to know. The Joy of Not Knowing: enables schools to launch the academic year with a bespoke JONK Learning to Learn Week that enables every student to succeed; develops philosophical, creative and critical problem-solving and multi-lingual thinking skills; establishes collaborative cultures of thinking, learning and leadership; Informs practice through active action research; incorporates a values-led democratic approach to school life; nurtures school-pupil-family-community partnerships. Designed for school leaders and practitioners at all levels and across all ages, this practical guide shows how all students can thrive and develop the dispositions of successful lifelong learners and global citizens. (shrink)

This critical notice argues for the existence of a new trend in bioethics, a complex and dynamic field of philosophical enquiry that goes beyond applied ethics and professional deontological codes. This trend supplements their traditionally “minimalist” ethics—and its concern with harm, rights or justice—with “inflationary” positions open to an integration of medicine with the humanities. By comparing and contrasting the views of two quite different philosophers, Diego Gracia and Alfred Tauber, and placing them within the theoretical background delineated (...) by George Khushf, I argue that the main contribution of this “inflationary bioethics” is an understanding of health and disease as intrinsically normative concepts, which in turn brings about a blurring of the distinction between facts and values. By refusing to construe the distinction as a dichotomy, a post-positivist philosophy of medicine must become more epistemological in order to help us clarify concepts in which the evaluative and the factual are impossible to separate. As a result, the “language of principles” in standard bioethics is being substituted by a more encompassing “language of values”; health and disease are increasingly understood as biopsychosocial phenomena; and the field is open to a process of moralization that challenges traditional models of patient autonomy and physician responsibility. (shrink)

In recent years the engagement between the environmental 'agenda' and mainstream political theory has become increasingly widespread and profound. Each has affected the other in palpable and important ways, and it makes increasingly less sense for political theorists in either camp to ignore what the other is doing. This book draws together the threads of this interconnecting enquiry in order to assess its status and meaning. Dobson and Eckersley, two renowned scholars in this field, have commissioned an internationally recognised (...) group of political theory scholars to think through the challenge that political ecology presents to political theory. Looking at fourteen familiar political ideologies and concepts such as liberalism, conservatism, justice, and democracy, the contributors question how they are re-shaped, distorted or transformed from an environmental perspective. Lively, accessible and authoritative, this book will appeal to professional scholars and students alike. (shrink)

Using a conceptual framework and method combining ethical enquiry and phenomenology, we asked 73 senior baccalaureate nursing students to answer two questions: (1) What is nursing students’ experience of an ethical problem involving nursing practice? and (2) What is nursing students’ experience of using an ethical decision-making model? Each student described one ethical problem, from which emerged five content categories, the largest being that involving health professionals (44%). The basic nature of the ethical problems consisted of the nursing students’ (...) experience of conflict, resolution and rationale; 85% of the students stated that using an ethical decision-making model was helpful. Although additional research is needed, these findings have important implications for nursing ethics education and practice. (shrink)

'Thinking Through Dance' explores important philosophical questions raised in and by dance. Its themes include the embodiment and personhood of dancers; issues of dance work ontology and performance identity; how dance is perceived and understood; the relevance of philosophy to dance as an artform; and whether dance itself, or its associated practices, are themselves philosophical in any significant sense. Individual essays draw on different philosophical traditions, including analytic, phenomenological and poststructuralist, and the primary focus is on theatre dance in the (...) Western tradition, although the issues discussed have a much broader sweep. The volume poses fundamental questions about what it means to be or witness a dancer moving, about the nature of choreography, dance works and performances, and about the interest and value of a dialogue between philosophy and dance. The philosophy of dance is a burgeoning field of enquiry and this volume seeks to represent something of the breadth of international research currently underway. It draws together contributors who are professional philosophers, dance scholars and dance practitioners, from Britain, continental Europe, the USA and South Africa. As the first anthology of essays about philosophy and dance to be published in English for some time, the aim is to provoke debate and develop the existing reflection on dance, but in new and invigorating directions. The Editors: The editors are colleagues at University of Roehampton, London: Jenny Bunker teaches aesthetics on the philosophy programme of the Department of Humanities; Anna Pakes and Bonnie Rowell are from the Department of Dance, and have a longstanding interest in the application of analytic philosophy to dance, as well as the intersections between this and other philosophical traditions and dance studies. (shrink)

These contributions, although undoubtedly philosophically relevant, are not in themselves philosophical. This is as it should be. I do not wish to imply that their unphilosophical character is a deficiency. They are legitimate and necessary enquiries, undertaken within a special field, although often ranging beyond a narrowly specialist interest. They display, in their best examples, the concrete working out and application of some or other theory, often programmatically stated, sometimes implied, or simply taken for granted. But there is little or (...) no enquiry into the principles of the critical and interpretative activity as such, so as to bring some order and consistency into the profusion of frequently incompatible theoretical assumptions. The rich but confused situation in Germany has not even produced an I. A. Richards to shock people, and there has been no growth of schools or theories of criticism. The need for clarification of the criteria employed in the critical endeavour is not often recognized. We find even in the more constructive proposals a striking vagueness of terminology, a noticeable and often embarrassing tendency to completely wild speculation. It is evident from the professional journals that "meta-critical" discussions and controversies are comparatively rare. (shrink)

L’objet de l’article est de discuter de méthodes d’observation et d’interprétation des arbitrages résidentiels de salariés face à la flexibilité de leur emploi. Après avoir montré les limites de l’investigation quantitative sur cette question, la réflexion s’appuiera sur les résultats d’une enquête qualitative auprès de salariés confrontés, en 2000, à la fermeture de leur usine et à sa délocalisation à 200 km de leur domicile. Dans ce type de situations, ce n’est pas la seule mobilité résidentielle suscitée par l’emploi qu’il (...) s’agit d’étudier mais bien les arbitrages entre, à la fois, mobilité et non-mobilité. Cette posture rend ainsi possible l’identification du caractère multidimensionnel de ces choix : les logiques professionnelles n’expliquent pas tout, les logiques familiales et résidentielles jouent un rôle important dans le refus de déménager ou l’aménagement d’un système de double résidence. Cette approche permet d’appréhender en quoi ces décisions reproduisent, voire aggravent les inégalités sociales, tout en incluant les possibilités de stratégies résidentielles et spatiales.Based on the results from a qualitative enquiry of employees faced with the closure of their industrial plant, in 2000, and its further relocation 200 km away, this paper provides an approach to residential choices in a context of professional uncertainty and economic constraints. In this type of situations, it is not only residential mobility which is at stake but also the choice between mobility and non-mobility. This method also enables the analysis of the multidimensional characteristic of these choices : professional considerations alone do not explain everything, family life and residential considerations play a role in choosing « residential anchoring » or dual residence. This approach shows how the choices made reproduce or even worsen social unequalities, whilst including spatial and residential strategies. (shrink)

While sport has been practised since pre-historic times, it is a relatively new subject of systematic philosophical enquiry. Indeed, the philosophy of sport as an academic sub-field dates back only to the 1970s. Yet, in this short time, it has grown into a vibrant area of philosophical research that promises both to deepen our understanding of sport and to inform sports practice. Recent controversies at the elite and professional level have highlighted the ethical dimensions of sport in particular. (...) Lance Armstrong’s use of performance-enhancing drugs raised new issues in the ethics of cheating, middle-distance runner Caster Semenya has challenged prevailing rules around sex classification in sport, and Oscar Pistorius’s prosthesis has problematized the distinction between able-bodied and disabled sport. While philosophical analysis may help to achieve a deeper understanding of sport, such analysis may also illuminate problems of philosophy beyond sport, ranging from the nature of skill to the ethics of altruism. -/- This entry proceeds in three sections. Section 1 introduces the philosophy of sport with particular emphasis on the history of systematic philosophical thinking about sport. Section 2 examines the nature and value of sport, and it considers the main normative theories of sport developed in the literature. Section 3 addresses a cluster of topics that are central to the philosophy of sport, including: sportsmanship; cheating; performance enhancement; violent and dangerous sport; sex, gender, and race; fans and spectators; disability sport; and the aesthetics of sport. (shrink)

This practical book is designed to help school leaders develop a sustainable culture of learning across the curriculum. It offers a personal insight into how one school embraced a range of dialogic and analytical tools to create an environment in which all stakeholders were inspired to evaluate and innovate. Each chapter tackles one piece of the 'jigsaw' that makes up a successful school environment, considering topics such as Attitudes for Learning, Coaching for learning and Love of Learning. Utilising theory, case (...) studies and activities, it illustrates how the reader can realistically and practically increase student attainment in their own school setting. This book will help leaders: Develop a supportive and encouraging leadership style that will create a cycle of self-improvement and self-efficacy for all ; Adapt the curriculum to focus on progress and engagement ; Use the Philosophy 4 Children strategies to promote deeper thinking and enquiry, increasing the rate of school improvement through a system of enquiry based staff professional development Using an inner city primary school as a working example, this book will be a source of inspiration and encouragement for school leaders, teachers and school advisors looking to cultivate and embed a love of learning into their school. (shrink)

Philosophy and ethics in medicine is an interesting and often fascinating topic of enquiry, however uptake amongst medical students is highly variable and it is often regarded as a nonessential component of the medical curriculum. Medical students themselves are often overwhelmed by the demands of medical study, and cite high rates of burnout. This paper describes a novel intervention provided at Western Sydney University as part of the Professional Development curriculum, which provided three broad tutorial interventions in their (...) first clinical year. The tutorials gave an overview regarding philosophy theory, but are specifically designed to encourage resilience amongst students. The tutorials were highly regarded and represent a novel way of engaging young doctors. It is suggested that orienting philosophy teaching towards issues immediately relevant to training doctors can greatly improve student acceptability. (shrink)

This study examines Australian tax agents' perceptions of the ethical environment in which they practice, within the context of an income tax system based on self-assessment principles. The research identifies and ranks an inventory of ethical issues in terms of perceived frequency of occurrence and importance to Western Australian tax agents. In addition, the extent and influence of ethical concerns in the profession are evaluated.The study has determined that the most frequently cited ethical issue is the failure to make reasonable (...) enquiries where information or documentation provided by a client appears to be inaccurate or incomplete. The most important ethical problem is a failure to ensure confidentiality with regard to privileged client information. When the frequency of occurrence and importance means are compared, inadequate technical competence, failure to make reasonable enquiries/conduct research, continuing to act for a client where there is incorrect information, and conflicts in distinguishing between tax planning and tax avoidance emerge as the high frequency/high importance issues. Although acknowledging the potential for unethical actions in tax practice, Western Australian tax agents consider that they carry out their professional activities within an ethical environment. (shrink)

In this paper it is suggested that Freud's 'tally argument' (Grunbaum 1984) is not best interpreted as a risky claim concerning the efficacy of psychoanalytic therapy, but as a risky claim concerning the implications of theoretical psychoanalytic explanations of the efficacy of psychoanalytic therapy. Despite the fact that Freud never empirically established that these implications hold, the 'tally argument' does draw attention to a critical distinction that is too often neglected in contemporary empirical studies of psychoanalysis and other forms of (...) psychotherapy: between empirical evaluations of the efficacy of psychotherapy and empirical evaluations of theoretical explanations of the efficacy of psychotherapy, and the different forms of comparative enquiry relevant to each. It is argued that the contemporary neglect of this critical distinction, in conjunction with the common negative conception of placebo control treatments in psychotherapy research, has led to the epistemic impoverishment of experimental studies of the various professional psychotherapies. In consequence, although there is good empirical evidence for the efficacy of psychoanalysis and other forms of professional psychotherapy, there is no good empirical evidence for theoretical psychoanalytic explanations of the efficacy of psychoanalysis, or for traditional theoretical explanations of the efficacy of other forms of professional psychotherapy. (shrink)

The recent upsurge of interest, political and professional, in the notion of spiritual education would appear to have been accompanied by no greater clarity in our understanding of teaching, learning and development in the spiritual domain; indeed, most official and other literature on the spiritual aspects of schooling seems blissfully unaware of much need for rigorous analysis regarding a domain of usage which licenses different and not clearly consistent conceptions of spiritual experience and enquiry. While attempting to give (...) more precise expression to these competing views, this paper proceeds to argue for the greater coherence of one particular conception over its likely rivals. (shrink)

The recent upsurge of interest, political and professional, in the notion of spiritual education would appear to have been accompanied by no greater clarity in our understanding of teaching, learning and development in the spiritual domain; indeed, most official and other literature on the spiritual aspects of schooling seems blissfully unaware of much need for rigorous analysis regarding a domain of usage which licenses different and not clearly consistent conceptions of spiritual experience and enquiry. While attempting to give (...) more precise expression to these competing views, this paper proceeds to argue for the greater coherence of one particular conception over its likely rivals. (shrink)

This handbook explores the ways biomedicine and pop culture interact while simultaneously introducing the reader with the tools and ideas behind this new field of enquiry. From comic books to health professionals, from the arts to genetics, from sci-fi to medical education, from TV series to ethics, it offers different entry points to an exciting and central aspect of contemporary culture: how and what we learn about scientific knowledge and its representation in pop culture. Divided into three sections the (...) handbook surveys the basics, the micro-, and the macroaspects of this interaction between specialized knowledge and cultural production: After the introduction of basic concepts of and approaches to the topic from a variety of disciplines, the respective theories and methods are applied in specific case studies. The final section is concerned with larger social and historical trends of the use of biomedical knowledge in popular culture. Presenting over twenty-five original articles from international scholars with different disciplinary backgrounds, this handbook introduces the topic of pop culture and biomedicine to both new and mature researchers alike. The articles, all complete with a rich source of further references, are aimed at being a sincere entry point to researchers and academic educators interested in this somewhat unexplored field of culture and biomedicine. (shrink)

Reflection is widely recognised as an invaluable tool in health care, providing fresh insights which enable practitioners to develop their own practice and improve the quality of their care. This book introduces the practitioner to the concept of 'Guided reflection', an innovative research process in which the practitioner is assisted by a mentor (or 'guide') in a process of self-enquiry, development, and learning through reflection, in order to become fully effective. Guided reflection is grounded in individual practice, and can (...) provide deeply meaningful insights into self-development and professional care. The process results in a relexive narrative, which highlights key issues for enhancing health care practice and professional care. This book uses a collection of such narratives from everyday clinical practice in nursing, health visiting and midwifery to demonstrate the theory and practicalities of guided reflection and narrative construction. These narratives portray the values inherent in caring, highlight key issues in clinical practice, reveal the factors that constrain the quest to realise practice, and examine the ways practitioners work towards overcoming these constraints. (shrink)

This is the first description of the questions that clinicians ask a department of clinical law, relating to the legal rules applicable to the care of their patients.ObjectivesTo describe in detail the demography of clinical legal enquiries made by clinicians of all professions concerning the care of their patients. To collate and categorise the varieties of enquiry, to identify phenotypic patterns. To provide colleges, regulators, commissioners, educators and the NHS with an insight into hitherto undescribed subject matter, better to (...) understand and respond to this aspect of clinical practice.DesignProspective collection of all clinical legal referrals recorded in writing over 12 years by a department of clinical law.SettingAn English Tertiary Hospital NHS Trust.ParticipantsClinical staff of the regulated professions, all seeking to have their clinical legal enquiries answered.Main outcome measuresThe description of the demography of clinical law.Results1251 written records were identified and reviewed. These were divided into nine broad clinical legal subject areas (domains): mental disorders, parents and children, incapacity, consent for treatment, disclosure of private information, other statutory, regulated practice, professional practice, clinical practice. Within these, 149 clinical legal phenotypes were identified to which each case could be assigned.ConclusionsAmong a broad range of enquiries, recognisable clinical legal phenotypes exist and have for the first time been described and categorised. These are clinical situations which clinicians need to be able to recognise and equipped to deal with. Doing so will likely facilitate timely and better treatment. (shrink)

Inspired by Theodore Schatzki’s ‘societist’ approach—in which he advocates a notion of ‘site ontologies’—in this article, we outline our theory of practice architectures and ecologies of practices. Drawing on case studies of four Australian primary schools, we examine how practices of leading relate to other educational practices: professional learning, teaching, student learning, and researching and reflecting. We find ‘leading’ not only in the work of principals and other formal leadership positions, but also in the activities of teachers and students. (...) We show that changing leading practices requires changing more than the professional practice knowledge of individuals; it also requires changing the practice architectures in sites where leading and its interconnected practices are conducted. In order to study practices of leading, we adopt a philosophical-empirical enquiry approach, i.e. we conduct our research as a conversation between practice philosophy and theory and the empirical cases of leading we study. We study practices in the mode of research within practice traditions, sometimes described as ‘practical philosophy’, as a contribution to the self-reflective transformation of the practices we are studying. (shrink)

The paper by Mand et al raises important questions about the predictive genetic testing of children. They focus on those claims made by professionals that are open to empirical enquiry and give too little weight to those claims that do not require empirical support. The authors remind us that some commentators oppose empirical enquiry because of the concern that gathering evidence of the consequences of such testing may itself be harmful or unethical. They respond by asserting that the (...) relevant research questions are ‘eminently testable’ but fail to discuss the challenges of such research, including the questions of timescale, consent or the nature of the data whose collection (they assert) would resolve the perceived difficulties with the genetic testing of children. They conclude that empirical research is required without resolving the weighty arguments against predictive testing of young children or explaining how the evidence they wish to collect could overcome the force of the arguments that favour caution. (shrink)

Lesson observation is frequently used in teacher induction programmes to support newly-qualified teachers in their reflection and classroom enquiry. This article uses an elaboration of Peirce’s abduction to illustrate how the post-observation conversation supports a teacher’s reflection on her teaching, and in particular, her teaching of language to young children. It shows that abduction involves an expert-like intuition, where the interaction and co-enquiry with the advisor was crucial. The analytical framework used is based on six modes of abductive (...) reasoning or inference that deal with potential or possibility, three modes of induction dealing with actuality, and one mode of deduction focusing on rules and regulations. In a context of lifelong learning, with emphasis on teacher learning across the professional lifespan, the article shows how newly-qualified teachers can be supported in using abductive reasoning and engage in worthwhile classroom enquiry. The article contributes to edusemiotics, a recently developed direction in educational theory that explores the philosophical specifics of semiotics in educational contexts. (shrink)