Journal articles on the topic 'Mayas – Organisation'

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1

RASCH, ELISABET DUEHOLM. "Quetzaltenango's First Mayan Mayor: Transforming Political Culture and the Politics of Belonging?" Journal of Latin American Studies 43, no. 1 (February 2011): 121–49. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0022216x10001811.

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AbstractAgainst the backdrop of ethnic political mobilisation in Latin America, this article examines how, as Quetzaltenango's first Mayan mayor, Rigoberto Quemé Chay transformed two interrelated dimensions of citizenship: political culture and the politics of belonging. It analyses the way in which citizenship is constituted at three levels. The first is within Xel-jú as an indigenous political organisation whose practices contrast withladinoways of doing politics. The second is in relation to internal divisions between the militant indigenous line and the intercultural group. The third is within Xel-jú as a city-centred, middle-class-oriented indigenous organisation rather than a rural, indigenous community organisation. This article argues that transformations in citizenship are limited by the political, economic and ethnic context, and that overlapping systems of repression still prevent the participation of marginalised groups in Quetzaltenango.
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Sinha, Alolika, Bibhuti Prasad Lahkar, and Syed Ainul Hussain. "Current population status of the endangered Hog Deer Axis porcinus (Mammalia: Cetartiodactyla: Cervidae) in the Terai grasslands: a study following political unrest in Manas National Park, India ­." Journal of Threatened Taxa 11, no. 13 (October 26, 2019): 14655–62. http://dx.doi.org/10.11609/jott.5037.11.13.14655-14662.

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The Endangered Hog Deer Axis porcinus has experienced drastic population declines throughout its geographical range. There is limited knowledge of its current population status, particularly from northeastern India. In this study the population density of Hog Deer was assessed in Manas National Park, which was a deer stronghold prior to the armed conflict that lasted for almost two decades, resulting in depressed deer populations. With the cessation of conflict, efforts were invested by both government and conservation organisations for the recovery and conservation of charismatic fauna in the park. Studies on Hog Deer populations, however, were lacking and thus reliable information on current status is unavailable. Current population status and threats faced by Hog Deer were assessed to aid informed conservation decisions. Distance sampling techniques (line transects) were applied in the grassland habitat during the dry season of two consecutive years. The estimated Hog Deer density was 18.22±3.32 km-2. The potential threats to Hog Deer identified in Manas include habitat loss, habitat degradation due to spread of invasive plant species, illegal hunting, and other anthropogenic disturbances. Our study suggests that the Hog Deer population, though reviving, needs immediate conservation attention.
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Bilecen, Tuncay. "Political Participation in Alevi Diaspora in the UK." BORDER CROSSING 6, no. 2 (October 17, 2016): 372–85. http://dx.doi.org/10.33182/bc.v6i2.502.

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Within migration flows from Turkey to Eurpoe it can be postulated that the UK has proportionally received more politically motivated migrants than other European destinations. The political migration from Turkey to the UK is marked with the catastrophic events that uprooted people such as 1971 coup d’état, 1978 massacres of Alevis in Maras and 1980 military coup d’état and is known to have peaked with the civil war in the 1990s in the Eastern provinces of Turkey. Hence the majority of the migrants from Turkey in the UK are Kurdish Alevis from eastern provinces such as Maras, Sivas, Kayseri and Tunceli. This research was conducted between September 2014 and September 2015. 60 individuals from Turkish speaking communities were recruited and semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted. Interviews were transcribed and then analysed using tools of thematic data analysis. The findings indicated stronger interest in politics and higher level of political participation by Kurdish and Alevi participants. Hence this paper offers a detailedanalysis of political interest and political participation of Kurdish/Alevi community living in London. Three key areas are: i) how they organize themselves under the umbrella of British Alevi Federation; ii) their relationship with civil society organisations and ethnic economy, iii) their activities in order to create public interest and opinion in relation to what is happening in Turkey.
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Schönleben, Manfred, Joachim Mentschel, and Luboš Střelec. "Potentials to breed for improved fibre digestibility in temperate Czech maize (Zea mays L.) germplasm." Czech Journal of Genetics and Plant Breeding 56, No. 4 (October 19, 2020): 133–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.17221/11/2020-cjgpb.

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Cell wall digestibility is an important quality trait of modern silage maize cultivars. The symbiotic relationship between microbes and ruminant livestock enables the efficient upcycling of otherwise for human consumption unsuitable rumen digestible fibre or cell wall components into highly nutritious milk and meat. Before entering the Czech National List of Plant Varieties, new silage maize germplasm is extensively tested for different cell wall digestibility parameters. Recently published, the undigestible neutral detergent fibre (uNDF) cell wall digestibility approach promises even greater practical relevance. The aim of our study was, therefore, to assess the potential of the uNDF method, compared with current standard procedures, using a vast set of official Czech plant variety trial evaluations and Czech silage analyses from the 2018 cropping season. The uNDF method yielded a twice as high phenotypic standard deviation, compared with the current standard approaches. This is good news for plant breeders, official variety testing organisations, and farm professionals alike, enabeling faster variety improvement and simpler variety selection. On the other hand, due to the low differentiation potential, we discourage the use of the absolute lignin content when selecting for digestible silage maize varieties. Since between the digestibility traits enzymatic soluble organic substance (ELOS) and cellulase digestibility (DCS), a Pearson correlation close to one was observed, the substitution of one of these analytics by the uNDF method, may render valuable additional information in a highly economical manner.
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Dominguez-Rodriguez, Alejandro, Karla Dzul-Rosado, Rosa Olimpia Castellanos-Vargas, Sergio Sanz Gómez, Paulina Erika Herdoiza-Arroyo, Yolanda de Jesús Hernández Delgado, Juan Ancona-Manzanilla, et al. "Design and evaluation of a mobile-based intervention for Maya adults during the COVID-19 pandemic." Revista Latinoamericana de Psicología 55 (2023): 202–11. http://dx.doi.org/10.14349/rlp.2023.v55.22.

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Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a direct impact on mental health. International organisations have emphasised the vulnerability of indigenous people. Digital Mental Health approaches deliver online therapy as an evidence-based, effective, and accessible treatment option for common mental health problems. However, the evidence regarding these approaches is limited in indigenous populations. The objective of this study is to describe the design, development, and evaluation of the efficacy of a self-applied online intervention regarding the psychological symptoms of depression, anxiety, and fear of COVID-19 in a sample of the Maya population. Method: A prospective longitudinal quantitative study was designed, where a single group was measured before and after receiving the online intervention. This study took place from April to September 2021 and consisted of six sessions delivered via WhatsApp in Spanish and Mayan. Results: The initial assessment was implemented with 82 participants who were evaluated using the Patient Health Questionnaire, Scale for Generalised Anxiety Disorder and the Fear of COVID-19 Scale; 18 participants remained in the intervention for the post-assessment. Statistical differences were observed in PRE and POST measures of depression and anxiety, but not in fear of COVID-19. Conclusions: This study produced positive results for the first online mental health intervention implemented in the Latin American indigenous population. Future studies might consider developing similar interventions for other indigenous communities in Latin America.
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6

van den Bos, Jackie, Felicity Meakins, and Cassandra Algy. "Searching for “Agent Zero”." Language Ecology 1, no. 1 (June 29, 2017): 4–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/le.1.1.02van.

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Abstract Gurindji Kriol, a mixed language spoken in northern Australia, combines a Kriol VP with a Gurindji NP, including case suffixes (Meakins 2011a). The Gurindji-derived case suffixes have undergone a number of changes in Gurindji Kriol, for example the ergative suffix -ngku/-tu now marks nominative case (Meakins 2011b, 2015). This study explores a new innovation in case morphology among Gurindji Kriol-speaking children: the use of -ngku/-tu to mark possessors as well as subjects, i.e. the emergence of a relative case system. Although rare in Australian languages, syncretism between agents and possessors is not uncommon cross-linguistically, reported in Caucasian Eskimo-Aleut, Mixe-Zoquean and Yucatecan-Mayan languages (Allen 1964; Blake 1994; Palancar 2002). In the case of Gurindji Kriol, the relative case system found its origins in allomorphic reduction which led to syncretism between ergative and dative case forms. This syncretism was shaped by the syntactic grouping of subjects and possessors as dependents of verbs and possessums, respectively. Although partial syncretism between ergative and dative case is not unusual in Australian languages historically, it has gone to completion in Gurindji Kriol and can be observed in two other instances of rapid linguistic change in Australia: Ngiyambaa (Donaldson 1980) and Dyirbal (Schmidt 1985). The re-organisation of the case system can be traced back to a small group of second-generation Gurindji Kriol speakers at Nitjpurru (Pigeon Hole) and this change has since been transmitted laterally through familial connections to other children at Daguragu. There are also indications that it has begun propagating to other children at Kalkaringi and is now being acquired by the next generation of Gurindji Kriol speakers.
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7

Singh, Mohini, Ravindra Singh Yadav, Smriti Pandey, and Rahul Kumar Verma. "A PHYSIOLOGICAL STATUS OF APANA VATA IN GARBHA NISHKRAMANA (PARTURITION) – REVIEW ARTICLE." August - September 2023 p7, no. 6 (September 20, 2023): 549–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.46607/iamj08p7062023.

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The aim of Ayurveda science is to keep healthy people well and heal sick people. Ayurveda, the science of life, is based on the fundamental theory called the Tridosha theory. Tridosha is derived from the Sanskrit word’s Tri and Dosha, which mean three vitiated factors. These three Doshas operate on a variety of scales, including the cellular, individual system, and organisational levels. Given that it begins and controls all functions, Vata has the greatest influence on these three Doshas. It is also in charge of all kinds of movements. All Dhatus and Malas, including Pitta and Kapha are ineffective, like a lame person. When Vata is active, it moves regarding. They were transported away from their place by the active Vata. Vata stimulates the digestive fire, assists in the absorption of the Dohas and the removal of the excretory products, and is the cause of pleasure and fearlessness. Vata moves via all gross and microscopic pathways, determines how an embryo develops, and is a sign of persistent life. The five different kinds of Vata Doshas are Prana, Udana, Samana, Vyana, and Apana. The elimination of these substances - Samirana (flatus), Sakrit (faeces), Mutra (urine), Sukra (semen), Garbha (foetus) Nishkramana and Artava (menstrual fluid) Nishkramana is significantly influenced by Apana Vata. Pregnancy is a stunning segment of each woman’s life. Parturition is the principal occasion in a woman’s life. So, the higher information about its idea in Ayurveda as well as in modern science may be very essential.
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8

Nuruddin, Nuruddin. "Mobile Phones Technolgy for Memorising the Qur’an: An Islamic Student Perspective." eL-HIKMAH: Jurnal Kajian dan Penelitian Pendidikan Islam 17, no. 2 (December 31, 2023): 122–34. http://dx.doi.org/10.20414/elhikmah.v17i2.9000.

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The proliferation of digital information is a pressing need that requires effective skills for all individuals, including university students. Easy access to various social media platforms has enabled the formation of friendship networks involving individuals from all over the world, which often leads to over-involvement and neglect of other activities. This study is a descriptive study that aims to describe the activities of students who memorise the Qur'an. The data collection method used was a questionnaire, while data analysis was conducted using a descriptive data analysis approach. The study results revealed that students who memorise the Qur'an more frequently access social media applications, with YouTube being the most accessed platform. Some of the obstacles that students face in the process of memorising the Qur'an involve factors such as laziness and boredom, weak memory, inconsistency, romantic distractions, difficulties in time management, influence from friends, busyness in organisations, and the influence of mobile phone use. In addition, social media applications such as YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok were identified as factors inhibiting the Qur’anic memorisation process. Abstrak: Perkembangan informasi digital menjadi kebutuhan mendesak yang memerlukan kemampuan efektif bagi semua individu, termasuk mahasiswa. Akses yang mudah ke berbagai platform media sosial telah memungkinkan terbentuknya jaringan pertemanan yang melibatkan individu dari seluruh dunia, yang sering kali menyebabkan keterlibatan yang berlebihan dan pengabaian terhadap aktivitas lain. Penelitian ini merupakan penelitian deskriptif yang bertujuan untuk menggambarkan aktivitas mahasiswa penghafal Al-Qur'an. Metode pengumpulan data yang digunakan adalah kuesioner, sementara analisis data dilakukan dengan menggunakan pendekatan analisis data deskriptif. Hasil studi mengungkapkan bahwa mahasiswa penghafal Al-Qur'an lebih sering mengakses aplikasi media sosial, dengan YouTube menjadi platform yang paling banyak diakses. Beberapa hambatan yang dihadapi mahasiswa dalam proses menghafal Al-Qur'an melibatkan faktor-faktor seperti rasa malas dan bosan, daya ingat yang lemah, ketidakkonsistenan, gangguan asmara, kesulitan dalam manajemen waktu, pengaruh dari teman-teman, kesibukan dalam organisasi, dan pengaruh penggunaan ponsel. Selain itu, aplikasi media sosial seperti YouTube, Instagram, dan TikTok diidentifikasi sebagai faktor penghambat proses menghafal Al-Qur'an.
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9

Gomes Sobrinho, Themístocles Raphael, Kerly Araújo Jardim, and Valdenira Ferreira dos Santos. "O Geossistema como Proposta Metodológica Aplicada a Planície Costeira do Amapá: Cabo Norte, Brasil / The geosystem as a methodological proposal applied to the coastal plain of Amapá: Cabo Norte, Brazil." Caderno de Geografia 29, no. 57 (April 25, 2019): 526–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.5752/p.2318-2962.2019v29n57p526-546.

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O Geossistema, como método de análise integrado dos sistemas ambientais, surgiu como ferramenta capaz de suprir, em parte, a necessidade humana de compreender e descrever os processos naturais responsáveis pela organização elementar existente em cada paisagem. O estudo em Geossistema, aplicado ao ambiente litorâneo, pode apresentar um nível de análise de maior complexidade, se comparado ao continente, em função da origem dos elementos e processos dinâmicos existentes em suas paisagens peculiares. Este nível de complexidade é percebido ao longo da Planície Costeira do Amapá (PCA), onde a fisiologia da paisagem deriva principalmente de uma dinâmica geológica, geomorfológica e climática de longo e curto período. O presente trabalho teve como objetivo principal a compartimentação da Região Natural do Cabo Norte, em paisagens síntese, através do método geossistêmico proposto por Bertrand (1968). Os resultados alcançados identificaram três Geossistemas (Ambiente de Sedimentação Paleofluvial e Lacustre, Ambiente de Sedimentação Estuarina, Ambiente de Sedimentação Costeiro e Marinho) que posteriormente foram submetidos ao Índice Qualitativo de Sensibilidade Ambiental adaptado de BRASIL (2004). Como produto foram gerados os mapas de compartimentação da paisagem (Geossistemas) e sensibilidade ao impacto de derramamento de óleo na Região Natural do Cabo Norte. Palavras-chave: Geossistema, paisagem, planície, sensibilidade, Cabo Norte. Abstract The geosystem, as a method of integrated environmental systems analysis, emerged as a tool capable of supplying, in part, the human need to understand and describe natural processes responsible for the elementary organisation exists in each landscape. The study on geosystem, applied to the coastal environment, can present a more sophisticated analysis level, compared to the mainland, according to the origin of the elements and dynamic processes in their peculiar landscapes. This level of complexity is realised along the coastal plain of Amapá (PCA), where the landscape mainly derived from the physiology of a geological, geomorphological and climatic dynamics of long and short period. The present work had as main objective the compartmentalisation of the natural region of the North Cape, in landscapes synthesis, through the geosistemic method proposed by Bertrand (1968). The results identified three geosystems (Paleofluvial and Lacustrine Sedimentation environment, Estuarine Sedimentation environment, Coastal Sedimentation and marine environment) which subsequently underwent a qualitative Index of Environmental sensitivity adapted from BRASIL (2004). As product subdivision maps were generated from the landscape (geosystem) and sensitivity to the impact of the oil spill in the region of North Cape. Keywords: geosystem, landscape, plains, sensitivity, North Cape.
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Garrido López, Carlos. "El dilema de la democracia en el interior de los partidos." Teoría y Realidad Constitucional, no. 40 (January 17, 2018): 317. http://dx.doi.org/10.5944/trc.40.2017.20915.

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Los partidos siguen siendo instrumentos indispensables de la democracia de masas, pero su deriva organizativa ha de ser frenada a fin de asegurar en sus fuentes la libertad del proceso político. Ante el fracaso de la aurroregulación urge la intervención legal. El legislador debe reequilibrar el poder en el interior de los partidos, preservando las condiciones para el ejercicio democrático y abriendo cauces efectivos de participación y rendición de cuentas en su seno. La reforma de la LOPP resulta inaplazable, siguiendo en algunos aspectos el modelo de la Parteiengesetz y, en otros temas, como la designación de los candidatos electorales, adoptando las experiencias comparadas más consolidadas, como la detallada regulación contenida en las leyes electorales alemana y finlandesa, o las experiencias más innovadoras, como la generalización de primarias abiertas reguladas por ley llevada a cabo en varios países. Así lo defiende parte de la doctrina. Y así lo ha demandado también la sociedad civil, desde que la indignación que cristalizó el 15 de mayo de 2011 sirviera de catalizador de diversas demandas de regeneración democrática. Este trabajo se centra en el estudio de estas propuestas, tras analizar las carencias de la exangüe disciplina legal de los partidos y su funcionamiento interno escasamente democrático.Political parties remain indispensable instruments of mass democracy, but their organisational drift needs to be stopped in order to ensure freedom of participation in the political process. In view of the failure of self-regulation, there is a pressing need for legal intervention. The legislator must re-establish the balance of power inside political parties, preserving conditions for democratic governance and opening up practical channels for internal participation and accountability. Reform of the Organic Law on Political Parties (LOPP) cannot be postponed any longer, in some aspects by following the model of the Parteiengesetz, and in other matters, such as the selection of electoral candidates, by either adopting the most firmly established compared experiences, such as the detailed regulation of the selection process included in German and Finnish electoral laws, or more innovative experiences, such as the general implementation of open primary elections regulated by law, as adopted by many countries. That is how part of legal doctrine defends it. And that is how civil society has also demanded it, since the outrage that crystallised on 15th May 2011 served as a catalyst for various demands for democratic regeneration. This study focuses on the analysis of these proposals, after analysing the shortcomings of the weak legal discipline of political parties and their barely democratic internal functioning.
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11

Vajda, Kinga. "Az idősek nappali ellátása és az aktív idősödés lehetséges kapcsolata - Problémák,nehézségek, jó gyakorlatok a COVID-19 járvány tükrében." Magyar Gerontológia 13 (December 29, 2021): 135–38. http://dx.doi.org/10.47225/mg/13/kulonszam/10621.

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Bevezetés, problémafelvetésAz idősek korcsoportjának drasztikus növekedése komoly kérdéseket vet fel a különböző rendszerek, mint például gazdasági, egészségügyi vagy szociális ellátórendszer minőségi biztosításával és hatékony fenntarthatóságával kapcsolatban. Az előremutató statisztikák vonatkozásában még évtizedekig emelkedő tendenciát mutat a 65 éves és idősebb (vagy a WHO számításait követve a 60 éves és idősebb) személyek társadalmon belüli aránya. Míg 2020-ban a 60 éves vagy idősebb személyek száma 1 milliárd fő volt a világon, addig 2050-re e tekintetben 34%-os emelkedést prognosztizálnak (WHO, 2020). Az európai illetve magyar adatok sem térnek el ettől, az Eurostat számításai szerint a 65 éves és idősebb népesség társadalmon belüli aránya 2020 és 2050 között 20,6%-ról 29,5%-ra emelkedik (Eurostat, 2021), míg a magyarországi számok alapján 2019 és 2050 között 19,6%-ról 27,8%-ra növekszik ugyanezen érték (European Comission, 2021). Az olyan váratlan események, mint a COVID-19 világjárvány szintén komoly hatást gyakorolnak a szociális ellátásokra, különös tekintettel a járvány által egyik legérzékenyebben érintett csoport, az idős személyek számára biztosított ellátásokra. Az aktuális intézményrendszer a jelenlegi működési feltételekkel (tárgyi, anyagi, humánerőforrás) sem képes maradéktalanul kiszolgálni az igényeket, így amennyiben nem történik érdemi változás, rövid időn belül egyre nagyobb nyomás nehezedik rá, melynek feloldásaként elkerülhetetlenné válik a rendszer újrastrukturálása, olyan koncepciók, mint az aktív idősödés, ellátásba integrálása. Az aktív idősödés és az idősek nappali ellátásaAz aktív idősödés elképzelésének megjelenését vizsgálva egészen az 1960-as évekig szükséges visszamenni, ekkor az ún. disengagement theory, mint az első időseket érintő egységes elképzelés jelent meg (Cumming & Henry, 1961). Ezt követően több egymást tartalmilag megközelítő fogalom formálódott a szakirodalomban, alkalmanként egymással párhuzamosan pl: produktív idősödés (Butler & Gleeson, 1985), sikeres idősödés (Rowe & Kahn, 1987, 1997), aktív idősödés (WHO, 2002), vagy éppen az egészséges idősödés (WHO, 2015, 2020). Közülük mégis az aktív idősödés fogalma tekinthető a leginkább komplex elképzelésnek. Kialakításakor törekedtek arra, hogy az érintettek csoportjának vonatkozásában az élet minden területét bevonva alkossanak új elképzelést, akkor amikor az aktív idősödésről beszélnek. Így jött létre az aktív idősödés leginkább átfogó megfogalmazása, melyet manapság is alkalmaznak: „az aktív idősödés egy olyan folyamat, mely optimalizálja a lehetőségeket az egészségügy, társadalmi részvétel és biztonság területein, hogy az idősödés folyamata során erősítse az életminőség pozitív irányú változását.” (WHO, 2002). Az aktív idősödés nappali ellátásban való megjelenése, ennek vizsgálata abból a szempontból is érdekes, hogy feltételezhetően a nappali ellátásban megjelenő ellátottak a leginkább függetlenek és önállóak, azaz aktívak, akik kisebb segítségekkel képesek saját otthonukban élni. Így magának az aktív idősödésnek a vizsgálata feltételezhetően az ő esetükben pontos képet mutat, hogy az elképzelés jelen van-e és amennyiben igen az életük mely területén vizsgálható leginkább. MódszertanKevert módszertan mentén korábbi kvantitatív és kvalitatív adatfelvételek eredményei kerülnek prezentálásra, melyek a 7 régiós központban működő idősek számára nappali ellátást biztosító intézményekben kerültek felvételre. A kutatás kvantitatív szakasza a kényelmi mintavétel alkalmazásával készült, ennek elsődlegesen időbeli és anyagi okai voltak. Az első adatfelvételi szakasz során az aktív idősödés index (Zaidi et al., 2013) által is használt mérőeszköz került használatra apróbb változtatásokkal a magyar minta sajátosságai és az index mérőeszközét ért korábbi kritikák okán. 397 fő ellátott töltötte ki az anonim, önkitöltős kérdőívet. A kutatás kvalitatív szakaszában a régiós központokban működő idősek nappali ellátását vezetőkkel interjúk (8 db interjú), majd fókuszcsoportos formában az idősek nappali ellátásában dolgozókkal készültek adatfelvételek (7 db fókuszcsoportos interjú). KonklúziókAz egyre növekvő ellátotti igények okán az idősek számára biztosított szociális ellátások, köztük az idősek nappali ellátása is, egyértelműen átgondolásra és megalapozott keretek mentén történő átalakításra szorulnak. Az aktív idősödéshez köthető fontos területeknek jelentős része alacsony gyakorisággal jelenik meg a mintában. Az önkéntesség csupán a válaszadók 10,5%-nak életében van jelen minimum havi rendszerességgel, míg az info-kommunikációs ismeretek, illetve eszközök használata szintén a minta 35-36%-a esetében releváns. Fontos megjegyezni, hogy a válaszadók 20%-nak háztartásában a számítógép/internet kapcsolat hiánya anyagi okokra vezethető vissza. Az info-kommunikációs eszközök és tudás iránti növekvő igényt az interjúk és a fókuszcsoportos interjúk is alátámasztották, azonban ennek elsődleges okaként az adatfelvétel idején kezdődő és erősödő COVID-19 járvány miatti lezárásokat és az online kapcsolattartás felértékelődését jelölték meg. Az ellátottak körében tapasztalt alacsony IKT tudás mellett, több helyszínen felmerült a szakemberek ilyen típusú tudással való támogatásának szükségessége is. Az aktív idősödés index által mellőzött, azonban az önállóságot erősen támogató háztartáson belüli akadálymentesítés aránya szintén alacsony a válaszadók körében (25%). Az interjúk és fókuszcsoportok kapcsán jellemzően a makro szintű, szervezeti problémákat jelezték magas gyakorisággal a válaszadók pl.: ütköző szolgáltatások problémája, ellátottak szolgáltatásba és saját otthonukba jutása, speciális igényű (elsősorban demens) idős ellátottak ellátásának biztosítása magasabb férőhely számmal. Irodalmak:Butler, R., & Gleason, H. P. (1985). Enhancing vitality in later life. USA: SpringerCumming, E. & Henry, W. E. (1961). Growing Old. New York: Basic.European Comission (2021). The 2021 Ageing Report: Economic and Budgetary Projections for the EU Member States (2019-2070), Institutional Paper 148., Brussels.Eurostat (2021). Population structure indicators at national level. Letöltve: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/DEMO_PJANIND__custom_1210940/defa ult/table?lang=en (letöltve: 2021.09.18)Rowe, J. W., & Kahn, R. L. (1987). Human aging: usual and successful. Science, 237(4811), 143–149. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.3299702Rowe, J. W., & Kahn, R. L. (1997). Successful aging. The Gerontologist, 37(4), 433–440. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/37.4.433World Health Organisation (WHO) (2002). Acive Ageing – A policy Framework, 12. old. Letöltve: https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/67215 (letöltve: 2021.09.18)World Health Organization (WHO) (2015). World Report on Ageing and Health. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization. Letöltve: https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/186463 (letöltve: 2021.07.15World Health Organization(WHO) (2020). Decade of Healthy Ageing 2020-2030. Letölve: https://cdn.who.int/media/docs/default-source/decade-of-healthy-ageing/final-decade-proposal/decade-proposal-final-apr2020-en.pdf?sfvrsn=b4b75ebc_25&download=true (letöltve: 2021.09.18)
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Patterson, Jennifer, and Francia Kinchington. "Learning sustainability at the Barefoot College: local and global community values in action." Sustainable Earth Reviews 7, no. 1 (May 14, 2024). http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s42055-024-00086-7.

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Abstract This article investigates learning sustainability at the Barefoot College, identifying potential replicability and relevance for other contexts. Background Government statistics in India, suggest that some 32 million children have no access to education, especially in rural areas. Despite initiatives, 80% mainly from lower castes and deprived backgrounds, have never attended school. Operating across many villages, the ‘Barefoot College’ (BFC) is a mature non-government organisation (NGO) centred on Tilonia, in Northern Rajasthan. Here, poverty is so extreme that children can be sold into textile factories because parents cannot afford to feed them. However, skills learned at BFC such as conserving fossil fuels and water, how to vote, literacy and health practices, improve local lives immeasurably and benefit the planet. The research question (RQ) examines the key characteristics and impact of learning sustainability in this environment. The lead author was astonished by the depth and beauty of how teachings of semi-literate women, teachers and children have generated a living, breathing sustainable community. Method This research used an education case study methodology comprising multiple nested cases. Narratives of three key BFC project cases, the solar panel mamas, the Barefoot health and social workers and the children’s Night Schools, contextualise participant interviews that enable individual voices and experiences to emerge. Strategies aligned with a feminist standpoint approach enhance rigour and trustworthiness, systematically comparing qualitative data initiated in 2012 across semi-structured interviews, observations, and photographs. We found two key themes: dealing with on-the-ground inequality and practices of teaching and learning, together with five subthemes. These are in turn examined within a global sustainability-based framework to evaluate and characterise of BFC learning sustainability and sustainable leadership. Results The research finds that learning sustainability at BFC contains novel key elements that are scalable and transferable. Meticulous joined-up-thinking underpins the BFC projects. Participants’ words confirm local and global relevance. Mapping learning sustainability in practice confirms individual self-actualisation and community agency through transformative education with impact. Individual and organisational adaptability are evidenced through individuals’ transformation into community leaders. Conclusion The Global North has a lot to learn from the BFC, where learning sustainability is deeply embedded in belonging to the community. Bottom-up leadership through active participation and democracy empowers all community members, instilling pride in the Barefoot ethos. In this difficult environment, locally rooted projects nurture the ecological commons including rainwater harvesting and reducing fossil fuels. Projects enable traditions and clean technologies to flourish, whilst strengthening individual and community belonging and identity.
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Maras, Steven. "Reflections on Adobe Corporation, Bill Viola, and Peter Ramus while Printing Lecture Notes." M/C Journal 8, no. 2 (June 1, 2005). http://dx.doi.org/10.5204/mcj.2338.

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In March 2002, I was visiting the University of Southern California. One night, as sometimes happens on a vibrant campus, two interesting but very different public lectures were scheduled against one another. The first was by the co-chairman and co-founder of Adobe Systems Inc., Dr. John E. Warnock, talking about books. The second was a lecture by acclaimed video artist Bill Viola. The first event was clearly designed as a networking forum for faculty and entrepreneurs. The general student population was conspicuously absent. Warnock spoke of the future of Adobe, shared stories of his love of books, and in an embodiment of the democratising potential of Adobe software (and no doubt to the horror of archivists in the room) he invited the audience to handle extremely rare copies of early printed works from his personal library. In the lecture theatre where Viola was to speak the atmosphere was different. Students were everywhere; even at the price of ten dollars a head. Viola spoke of time and memory in the information age, of consciousness and existence, to an enraptured audience—and showed his latest work. The juxtaposition of these two events says something about our cultural moment, caught between a paradigm modelled on reverence toward the page, and a still emergent sense of medium, intensity and experimentation. But, the juxtaposition yields more. At one point in Warnock’s speech, in a demonstration of the ultra-high resolution possible in the next generation of Adobe products, he presented a scan of a manuscript, two pages, two columns per page, overflowing with detail. Fig. 1. Dr John E. Warnock at the Annenberg Symposium. Photo courtesy of http://www.annenberg.edu/symposia/annenberg/2002/photos.php Later, in Viola’s presentation, a fragment of a video work, Silent Mountain (2001) splits the screen in two columns, matching Warnock’s text: inside each a human figure struggles with intense emotion, and the challenges of bridging the relational gap. Fig. 2. Images from Bill Viola, Silent Mountain (2001). From Bill Viola, THE PASSIONS. The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles in Association with The National Gallery, London. Ed. John Walsh. p. 44. Both events are, of course, lectures. And although they are different in style and content, a ‘columnular’ scheme informs and underpins both, as a way of presenting and illustrating the lecture. Here, it is worth thinking about Pierre de la Ramée or Petrus (Peter) Ramus (1515-1572), the 16th century educational reformer who in the words of Frances Yates ‘abolished memory as a part of rhetoric’ (229). Ramus was famous for transforming rhetoric through the introduction of his method or dialectic. For Walter J. Ong, whose discussion of Ramism we are indebted to here, Ramus produced the paradigm of the textbook genre. But it is his method that is more noteworthy for us here, organised through definitions and divisions, the distribution of parts, ‘presented in dichotomized outlines or charts that showed exactly how the material was organised spatially in itself and in the mind’ (Ong, Orality 134-135). Fig. 3. Ramus inspired study of Medicine. Ong, Ramus 301. Ong discusses Ramus in more detail in his book Ramus: Method, and the Decay of Dialogue. Elsewhere, Sutton, Benjamin, and I have tried to capture the sense of Ong’s argument, which goes something like the following. In Ramus, Ong traces the origins of our modern, diagrammatic understanding of argument and structure to the 16th century, and especially the work of Ramus. Ong’s interest in Ramus is not as a great philosopher, nor a great scholar—indeed Ong sees Ramus’s work as a triumph of mediocrity of sorts. Rather, his was a ‘reformation’ in method and pedagogy. The Ramist dialectic ‘represented a drive toward thinking not only of the universe but of thought itself in terms of spatial models apprehended by sight’ (Ong, Ramus 9). The world becomes thought of ‘as an assemblage of the sort of things which vision apprehends—objects or surfaces’. Ramus’s teachings and doctrines regarding ‘discoursing’ are distinctive for the way they draw on geometrical figures, diagrams or lecture outlines, and the organization of categories through dichotomies. This sets learning up on a visual paradigm of ‘study’ (Ong, Orality 8-9). Ramus introduces a new organization for discourse. Prior to Ramus, the rhetorical tradition maintained and privileged an auditory understanding of the production of content in speech. Central to this practice was deployment of the ‘seats’, ‘images’ and ‘common places’ (loci communes), stock arguments and structures that had accumulated through centuries of use (Ong, Orality 111). These common places were supported by a complex art of memory: techniques that nourished the practice of rhetoric. By contrast, Ramism sought to map the flow and structure of arguments in tables and diagrams. Localised memory, based on dividing and composing, became crucial (Yates 230). For Ramus, content was structured in a set of visible or sight-oriented relations on the page. Ramism transformed the conditions of visualisation. In our present age, where ‘content’ is supposedly ‘king’, an archaeology of content bears thinking about. In it, Ramism would have a prominent place. With Ramus, content could be mapped within a diagrammatic page-based understanding of meaning. A container understanding of content arises. ‘In the post-Gutenberg age where Ramism flourished, the term “content”, as applied to what is “in” literary productions, acquires a status which it had never known before’ (Ong, Ramus 313). ‘In lieu of merely telling the truth, books would now in common estimation “contain” the truth, like boxes’ (313). For Ramus, ‘analysis opened ideas like boxes’ (315). The Ramist move was, as Ong points out, about privileging the visual over the audible. Alongside the rise of the printing press and page-based approaches to the word, the Ramist revolution sought to re-work rhetoric according to a new scheme. Although spatial metaphors had always had a ‘place’ in the arts of memory—other systems were, however, phonetically based—the notion of place changed. Specific figures such as ‘scheme’, ‘plan’, and ‘table’, rose to prominence in the now-textualised imagination. ‘Structure’ became an abstract diagram on the page disconnected from the total performance of the rhetor. This brings us to another key aspect of the Ramist reformation: that alongside a spatialised organisation of thought Ramus re-works style as presentation and embellishment (Brummett 449). A kind of separation of conception and execution is introduced in relation to performance. In Ramus’ separation of reason and rhetoric, arrangement and memory are distinct from style and delivery (Brummett 464). While both dialectic and rhetoric are re-worked by Ramus in light of divisions and definitions (see Ong, Ramus Chs. XI-XII), and dialectic remains a ‘rhetorical instrument’ (Ramus 290), rhetoric becomes a unique site for simplification in the name of classroom practicality. Dialectic circumscribes the space of learning of rhetoric; invention and arrangement (positioning) occur in advance (289). Ong’s work on the technologisation of the word is strongly focused on identifying the impact of literacy on consciousness. What Ong’s work on Ramus shows is that alongside the so-called printing revolution the Ramist reformation enacts an equally if not more powerful transformation of pedagogic space. Any serious consideration of print must not only look at the technologisation of the word, and the shifting patterns of literacy produced alongside it, but also a particular tying together of pedagogy and method that Ong traces back to Ramus. If, as is canvassed in the call for papers of this issue of M/C Journal, ‘the transitions in print culture are uneven and incomplete at this point’, then could it be in part due to the way Ramism endures and is extended in electronic and hypermedia contexts? Powerpoint presentations, outlining tools (Heim 139-141), and the scourge of bullet points, are the most obvious evidence of greater institutionalization of Ramist knowledge architecture. Communication, and the teaching of communication, is now embedded in a Ramist logic of opening up content like a box. Theories of communication draw on so-called ‘models’ that draw on the representation of the communication process through boxes that divide and define. Perhaps in a less obvious way, ‘spatialized processes of thought and communication’ (Ong, Ramus 314) are essential to the logic of flowcharting and tracking new information structures, and even teaching hypertext (see the diagram in Nielsen 7): a link puts the popular notion that hypertext is close to the way we truly think into an interesting perspective. The notion that we are embedded in print culture is not in itself new, even if the forms of our continual reintegration into print culture can be surprising. In the experience of printing, of the act of pressing the ‘Print’ button, we find ourselves re-integrated into page space. A mini-preview of the page re-assures me of an actuality behind the actualizations on the screen, of ink on paper. As I write in my word processing software, the removal of writing from the ‘element of inscription’ (Heim 136) —the frictionless ‘immediacy’ of the flow of text (152) — is conditioned by a representation called the ‘Page Layout’, the dark borders around the page signalling a kind of structures abyss, a no-go zone, a place, beyond ‘Normal’, from which where there is no ‘Return’. At the same time, however, never before has the technological manipulation of the document been so complex, a part of a docuverse that exists in three dimensions. It is a world that is increasingly virtualised by photocopiers that ‘scan to file’ or ‘scan to email’ rather than good old ‘xeroxing’ style copying. Printing gives way to scanning. In a perverse extension of printing (but also residually film and photography), some video software has a function called ‘Print to Video’. That these super-functions of scanning to file or email are disabled on my department photocopier says something about budgets, but also the comfort with which academics inhabit Ramist space. As I stand here printing my lecture plan, the printer stands defiantly separate from the photocopier, resisting its colonizing convergence even though it is dwarfed in size. Meanwhile, the printer demurely dispenses pages, one at a time, face down, in a gesture of discretion or perhaps embarrassment. For in the focus on the pristine page there is a Puritanism surrounding printing: a morality of blemishes, smudges, and stains; of structure, format and order; and a failure to match that immaculate, perfect argument or totality. (Ong suggests that ‘the term “method” was appropriated from the Ramist coffers and used to form the term “methodists” to designate first enthusiastic preachers who made an issue of their adherence to “logic”’ (Ramus 304).) But perhaps this avoidance of multi-functionality is less of a Ludditism than an understanding that the technological assemblage of printing today exists peripherally to the ideality of the Ramist scheme. A change in technological means does not necessarily challenge the visile language that informs our very understanding of our respective ‘fields’, or the ideals of competency embodied in academic performance and expression, or the notions of content we adopt. This is why I would argue some consideration of Ramism and print culture is crucial. Any ‘true’ breaking out of print involves, as I suggest, a challenge to some fundamental principles of pedagogy and method, and the link between the two. And of course, the very prospect of breaking out of print raises the issue of its desirability at a time when these forms of academic performance are culturally valued. On the surface, academic culture has been a strange inheritor of the Ramist legacy, radically furthering its ambitions, but also it would seem strongly tempering it with an investment in orality, and other ideas of performance, that resist submission to the Ramist ideal. Ong is pessimistic here, however. Ramism was after all born as a pedagogic movement, central to the purveying ‘knowledge as a commodity’ (Ong, Ramus 306). Academic discourse remains an odd mixture of ‘dialogue in the give-and-take Socratic form’ and the scheduled lecture (151). The scholastic dispute is at best a ‘manifestation of concern with real dialogue’ (154). As Ong notes, the ideals of dialogue have been difficult to sustain, and the dominant practice leans towards ‘the visile pole with its typical ideals of “clarity”, “precision”, “distinctness”, and “explanation” itself—all best conceivable in terms of some analogy with vision and a spatial field’ (151). Assessing the importance and after-effects of the Ramist reformation today is difficult. Ong describes it an ‘elusive study’ (Ramus 296). Perhaps Viola’s video, with its figures struggling in a column-like organization of space, structured in a kind of dichotomy, can be read as a glimpse of our existence in or under a Ramist scheme (interestingly, from memory, these figures emote in silence, deprived of auditory expression). My own view is that while it is possible to explore learning environments in a range of ways, and thus move beyond the enclosed mode of study of Ramism, Ramism nevertheless comprises an important default architecture of pedagogy that also informs some higher level assumptions about assessment and knowledge of the field. Software training, based on a process of working through or mimicking a linked series of screenshots and commands is a direct inheritor of what Ong calls Ramism’s ‘corpuscular epistemology’, a ‘one to one correspondence between concept, word and referent’ (Ong, Orality 168). My lecture plan, providing an at a glance view of my presentation, is another. The default architecture of the Ramist scheme impacts on our organisation of knowledge, and the place of performance with in it. Perhaps this is another area where Ong’s fascinating account of secondary orality—that orality that comes into being with television and radio—becomes important (Orality 136). Not only does secondary orality enable group-mindedness and communal exchange, it also provides a way to resist the closure of print and the Ramist scheme, adapting knowledge to new environments and story frameworks. Ong’s work in Orality and Literacy could thus usefully be taken up to discuss Ramism. But this raises another issue, which has to do with the relationship between Ong’s two books. In Orality and Literacy, Ong is careful to trace distinctions between oral, chirographic, manuscript, and print culture. In Ramus this progression is not as prominent— partly because Ong is tracking Ramus’ numerous influences in detail —and we find a more clear-cut distinction between the visile and audile worlds. Yates seems to support this observation, suggesting contra Ong that it is not the connection between Ramus and print that is important, but between Ramus and manuscript culture (230). The interconnections but also lack of fit between the two books suggests a range of fascinating questions about the impact of Ramism across different media/technological contexts, beyond print, but also the status of visualisation in both rhetorical and print cultures. References Brummett, Barry. Reading Rhetorical Theory. Fort Worth: Harcourt, 2000. Heim, Michael. Electric Language: A Philosophical Study of Word Processing. New Haven: Yale UP, 1987. Maras, Steven, David Sutton, and with Marion Benjamin. “Multimedia Communication: An Interdisciplinary Approach.” Information Technology, Education and Society 2.1 (2001): 25-49. Nielsen, Jakob. Multimedia and Hypertext: The Internet and Beyond. Boston: AP Professional, 1995. Ong, Walter J. Orality and Literacy: The Technologizing of the Word. London: Methuen, 1982. —. Ramus: Method, and the Decay of Dialogue. New York: Octagon, 1974. The Second Annual Walter H. Annenberg Symposium. 20 March 2002. http://www.annenberg.edu/symposia/annenberg/2002/photos.php> USC Annenberg Center of Communication and USC Annenberg School for Communication. 22 March 2005. Viola, Bill. Bill Viola: The Passions. Ed. John Walsh. London: The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles in Association with The National Gallery, 2003. Yates, Frances A. The Art of Memory. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1969. Citation reference for this article MLA Style Maras, Steven. "Reflections on Adobe Corporation, Bill Viola, and Peter Ramus while Printing Lecture Notes." M/C Journal 8.2 (2005). echo date('d M. Y'); ?> <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0506/05-maras.php>. APA Style Maras, S. (Jun. 2005) "Reflections on Adobe Corporation, Bill Viola, and Peter Ramus while Printing Lecture Notes," M/C Journal, 8(2). Retrieved echo date('d M. Y'); ?> from <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0506/05-maras.php>.
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Khara, Tani, and Matthew B. Ruby. "Meat Eating and the Transition from Plant-Based Diets among Urban Indians." M/C Journal 22, no. 2 (April 24, 2019). http://dx.doi.org/10.5204/mcj.1509.

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India has one of the world’s highest proportions of plant-based consumers relative to its total population (Sawe). However, the view that India is a predominantly vegetarian nation is likely inaccurate, as recent findings from the 2014 Indian Census indicate that only three in ten Indians self-identity as vegetarian (Census of India). Other studies similarly estimate the prevalence of vegetarianism to range from about 25% (Mintel Global) to about 40% (Euromonitor International; Statista, “Share”), and many Indians are shifting from strict plant-based diets to more flexible versions of plant-based eating (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations). When it comes to meat eating, poultry is the most widely consumed (USDA Foreign Agricultural Service; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development). Some claim that the changing consumer landscape is also eroding traditional taboos associated with beef and buffalo meat consumption (Kala; Bansal), with many tending to underreport their meat consumption due to religious and cultural stigmas (Bansal).This change in food choices is driven by several factors, such as increasing urbanisation (Devi et al.), rising disposable incomes (Devi et al.; Rukhmini), globalisation, and cross-cultural influences (Majumdar; Sinha). Today, the urban middle-class is one of India’s fastest growing consumer segments (Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania), and the rise in the consumption of animal products is primarily occurring in urban India (National Sample Survey Office), making this an important market to investigate.From a global perspective, while many Western nations are increasingly adopting plant-based diets (Eswaran), the growth in meat consumption is predicted to mainly come from emerging markets (OECD/FAO) like India. With these points in mind, the purpose of this study was to explore contemporary eating practices in urban India and to understand how social structures, cultures, and traditions influence these practices. The findings indicate that the key reasons why many are transitioning away from plant-based diets are the rise of new and diverse meat-based foods in urban India, emerging tastes for meat-based cuisines, and meat becoming to be viewed as a status symbol. These factors are further elaborated upon in this article.MethodA key question of this research was “What are eating practices like in urban India today?” The question itself is a challenge, given India’s varied cultures and traditions, along with its myriad eating practices. Given this diversity, the study used an exploratory qualitative approach, where the main mode of data gathering was twenty-five unstructured individual face-to-face interviews, each approximately sixty minutes in duration. The discussions were left largely open to allow participants to share their unique eating practices and reflect on how their practices are shaped by other socio-cultural practices. The research used an iterative study design, which entailed cycles of simultaneous data collection, analysis, and subsequent adaptations made to some questions to refine the emerging theory. Within the defined parameters of the research objectives, saturation was adequately reached upon completion of twenty-five interviews.The sample comprised Mumbai residents aged 23 to 45 years, which is fairly representative given about a third of India’s population is aged under 40 (Central Intelligence Agency). Mumbai was selected as it is one of India’s largest cities (Central Intelligence Agency) and is considered the country’s commercial capital (Raghavan) and multicultural hub (Gulliver). The interviews were conducted at a popular restaurant in downtown Mumbai. The interviews were conducted predominantly in English, as it is India’s subsidiary official language (Central Intelligence Agency) and the participants were comfortable conversing in English. The sample included participants from two of India’s largest religions—Hindus (80%) and Muslims (13%) (Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India), and comprised an even split of males and females.The Market Research Society of India has developed a socio-economic classification (SEC) grid that segments urban households into twelve groups (Market Research Society of India). This segmentation is based on two questions: level of education—from illiteracy to a postgraduate degree—and the ownership of eleven items that range from fairly basic (e.g., electricity connection, gas stove) to relatively sophisticated (e.g., refrigerator, personal computer). As previous qualitative work has found that education levels and disposable incomes can significantly impact one’s ability to make informed and deliberate food choices (Khara), and given meat is a relatively expensive commodity in India (Puskar-Pasewicz), the study focused on the most affluent segments—i.e., SEC A1 and some of SEC A2.It is said that researcher values and predispositions are to some extent inseparable from the research process, and therefore that potential researcher bias must be managed by being self-aware, looking for contradictory data, and being open to different interpretations of the data (Ogden). As the interviewer is a vegan of Indian ethnicity, she attempted to manage researcher bias in several ways. Triangulation of data sources (e.g., interviews, observations, product analysis) helped provide a multi-faceted understanding of the topic (Patton). The discussion guide and findings were also discussed with researchers from different cultural and dietary backgrounds. It is also argued that when a researcher shares the same background as the participants—as was the case in this study—participants may remain silent on certain issues, as they may assume the researcher knows the context and nuances in relation to these issues (McGinn). This arose in some instances as some participants said, “it’s standard stuff you know?” The interviewer hence took an “outsider” role, stating “I’ll need to know what standard stuff is”, so as to reduce any expectation that she ought to understand the social norms, conventions, and cultural practices related to the issue (Leckie). This helped yield more elaborate discussions and greater insight into the topic from the participant’s own unique perspective.The Rise of New and Diverse Meat-based Foods in Urban India Since the early 1990s, which marked the beginning of globalisation in India, urban Indian food culture has undergone a significant change as food imports have been liberalised and international food brands have made their way into the domestic market (Vepa). As a result, India’s major urban centres appear to be witnessing a food revolution:Bombay has become so metropolitan, I mean it always was but it’s so much more in terms of food now … and it’s so tempting. (Female, age 32)The changing food culture has also seen an increase in new dishes, such as a lamb burger stuffed with blue cheese, and the desire to try out exotic meats such as octopus, camel, rabbit, and emu. Many participants described themselves as “food obsessed” and living in a “present and continuous state of food”, where “we finish a meal and we’ve already started discussing our next meal”.In comparison, traditional plant-based foods were seen to have not undergone the same transformation and were described as “boring” and “standard” in comparison to the more interesting and diverse meat-based dishes:a standard restaurant menu, you don’t have all the different leafy vegetables…It’s mostly a few paneer and this or that—and upon that they don’t do much justice to the vegetable itself. It’s the same masala which they mix in it so everything tastes the same to me. So that’s a big difference when you consider meats. If I eat chicken in different preparations it has a different taste, if I have fish each has a different taste. (Male, age 29)If I’m going out and I’m spending, then I’m not going to eat the same thing which I eat at home every day which is veg food ... I will always pick the non-vegetarian option. (Male, age 32)Liberalisation and the transformation of the local media landscape also appears to have encouraged a new form of consumerism (Sinha). One participant described how an array of new TV channels and programmes have opened up new horizons for food:The whole visual attraction of food, getting it into your living room or into your bedroom and showing you all this great stuff … [There are now] kiddie birthdays which are MasterChef birthdays. There are MasterChef team building activities … So food is very big and I think media has had a very, very large role to play in that. (Female, age 40+)In a similar vein, digital media has also helped shape the food revolution. India has the world’s second largest number of Internet users (Statista, Internet) and new technology seems to have changed the way urban Indians interact with food:We are using social sites. We see all the cooking tips and all the recipes. I have a wife and she’s like, “Oh, let’s cook it!” (Male, age 25)I see everything on YouTube and food channels and all that. I really like the presentation, how they just a little they cook the chicken breast. (Female, age 42)Smartphones and apps have also made access to new cuisines easier, and some participants have become accustomed to instant gratification, givendelivery boys who can satisfy your craving by delivering it to you … You order food from “Zomato” at twelve o’clock, one o’clock also. And order from “Sigree” in the morning also nowadays … more delivery options are there in India. (Male, age 30)This may also partially explain the growing popularity of fusion foods, which include meat-based variations of traditional plant-based dishes, such as meat-filled dosas and parathas.Emerging Tastes for Meat-based Cuisines Many highlighted the sensory pleasure derived from meat eating itself, focusing on a broad range of sensory qualities:There’s the texture, there’s the smell, there’s aroma, there’s the taste itself … Now imagine if chicken or beef was as soft as paneer, we probably wouldn’t enjoy it as much. There’s a bit of that pull. (Female, age 32)Some discussed adopting a plant-based diet for health-related reasons but also highlighted that the experience, overall, was short of satisfactory:I was doing one week of GM Diet … one day it was full of fruits, then one day it was full of vegetables. And then in the third day, when it was actually the chicken part, frankly speaking even I enjoyed … you just cannot have veggies everyday. (Female, age 35)Only eating veg, I think my whole mouth was, I think gone bad. Because I really wanted to have something … keema [minced meat]. (Female, age 38)Plant-based foods, in comparison to meat-based dishes, were described as “bland”, “boring”, and lacking in the “umami zing”. Even if cooked in the same spices, plant-based foods were still seen to be wanting:you have chicken curry and soya bean curry made from the same masala … but if you replace meat with some other substitutes, you’re gonna be able to tell the difference ... the taste of meat, I feel, is better than the taste of a vegetable. (Male, age 32)The thing is, vegetarian dishes are bland … They don’t get the feeling of the spices in the vegetarian dish ... So when you are eating something juicy, having a bite, it’s a mouthful thing. Vegetarian dishes are not mouthful. (Male, age 25)At the end of a vegetarian meal … I think that maybe [it is] a lack of fullness … I’m eating less because you get bored after a while. (Female, age 32)Tasting the Forbidden FruitIn India, chicken is considered to be widely acceptable, as pork is forbidden to Muslims and beef is prohibited for Hindus (Devi et al.; Jishnu). However, the desire for new flavours seems to be pushing the boundaries of what is deemed acceptable, as highlighted in the discussion below with a 25-year-old male Muslim participant:Participant: When I go out with my friends then I try new things like bacon.Moderator: Bacon?Participant: Yeah... when I went with my colleagues to this restaurant in Bandra—it’s called Saltwater Cafe. And they had this chicken burger with bacon wrapped on it.Moderator: Okay.Participant: And I didn’t know at the time that it’s bacon … They didn’t tell me what we are having … When I had it, I told them that it’s tasting like different, totally different, like I haven’t had this in my life.Moderator: Yeah.Participant: And when they told me that it’s bacon then, I thought, okay fine. Something new I can have. Now I’m old enough to make my own choices.Similarly, several Hindu participants expressed similar sentiments about beef consumption:One of our friends, he used to have beef. He said this tastes better than chicken so I tried it. (Male, age 30)I ended up ordering beef which I actually would never eat ... But then everyone was like, it’s a must try ... So I start off with eating the gravy and then it entices me. That’s when I go and try the meat. (Female, aged 23)Although studies on meat eating in India are limited, it seems that many prefer to consume meats outside the home (Suresh; Devi et al.), away from the watchful eyes of parents, partners and, in some instances, the neighbours:My dad would say if you want to eat beef or anything have it outside but don’t bring it home. (Male, age 29)One of my friends … he keeps secret from his girlfriend … he come with us and eat [meat] and tell us not to tell her. (Male, age 26)People around have a little bit of a different view towards people eating non-veg in that area—so we wouldn’t openly talk about eating non-veg when somebody from the locality is around. (Female, age 32)Further to this point, some discussed a certain thrill that arose from pushing social boundaries by eating these forbidden meats:feel excited ... it gave me confidence also. I didn’t know ... my own decision. Something that is riskier in my life, which I hadn’t done before. (Male, age 25)Meat as a Status SymbolIn urban India, meat is increasingly considered a status symbol (Roy; Esselborn; Goswami). Similarly, several participants highlighted that meat-based dishes tend to be cooked for special occasions:non-vegetarian meals [at home] were perceived as being more elaborate and more lavish probably as compared to vegetarian meals. (Male, age 34)Dal [a lentil dish] is one of the basic things which we don’t make in the house when you have guests, or when you have an occasion … We usually make biryani…gravies of chicken or mutton. (Female, age 38)Success in urban India tends to be measured through one’s engagement with commodities that hold status-enhancing appeal (Mathur), and this also appears to apply to eating practices. Among meat-eating communities, it was found that serving only plant-based foods on special occasions was potentially seen as “low grade” and not quite socially acceptable:It’s just considered not something special. In fact, you would be judged…they would be like, “Oh my God, they only served us vegetables.” (Female, age 32)If you are basically from a Gujarati family, you are helpless. You have to serve that thing [vegetarian food] ... But if you are a non-vegetarian … if you serve them veg, it looks too low grade. (Female, age 38)In fact, among some families, serving “simple vegetarian food” tended to be associated with sombre occasions such as funerals, where one tends to avoid eating certain foods that give rise to desires, such as meat. This is elaborated upon in the below discussion with a Hindu participant (female, aged 40+):Participant: So an aunt of mine passed away a little over a year ago … traditionally we have this 13 day thing where you eat—We call it “Oshoge”… the khaana [food] is supposed to be neutral.Moderator: The khaana is supposed to be vegetarian?Participant: Yeah, it’s not just vegetarian … You’re supposed to have very simple vegetarian food like boiled food or you know dahi [plain yoghurt] and puffed rice … after a day of that, we were all looking at each other and then my cousin said, “Let me teach you how to fillet fish.” Similarly, a Muslim participant mentioned how serving certain dishes—such as dal, a common vegetarian dish—tends to be reserved for funeral occasions and is therefore considered socially unacceptable for other occasions:I’m calling a guest and I make dal chawal [lentils and rice] okay? They will think, arrey yeh kya yeh mayat ka khaana hai kya? [oh what is this, is the food for a corpse or what]? ... I can make it on that particular day when somebody has died in the family ... but then whenever guest is at home, or there is an occasion, we cannot make dal. (Female, age 38)ConclusionUrban India is experiencing a shift in norms around food choices, as meat-based dishes appear to have become symbolic of the broader changing landscape. Meat is not only eaten for its sensory properties but also because of its sociocultural associations. In comparison, many plant-based foods are perceived as relatively bland and uninteresting. This raises the question of how to make plant-based eating more appealing, both in terms of social significance and sensory enjoyment. In view of the attachment to familiar customs against the backdrop of a rapidly changing urban culture (Sinha; Venkatesh), perhaps plant-based foods could be re-introduced to the urban Indian as a blend of Western novelty and traditional familiarity (Majumdar), thereby representing the “the new along with the old” (Sinha 18), and hence enhancing their status. 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15

Munro, Andrew. "Discursive Resilience." M/C Journal 16, no. 5 (August 28, 2013). http://dx.doi.org/10.5204/mcj.710.

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Abstract:
By most accounts, “resilience” is a pretty resilient concept. Or policy instrument. Or heuristic tool. It’s this last that really concerns us here: resilience not as a politics, but rather as a descriptive device for attempts in the humanities—particularly in rhetoric and cultural studies—to adequately describe a discursive event. Or rather, to adequately describe a class of discursive events: those that involve rhetorical resistance by victimised subjects. I’ve argued elsewhere (Munro, Descriptive; Reading) that Peircean semiosis, inflected by a rhetorical postulate of genre, equips us well to closely describe a discursive event. Here, I want briefly to suggest that resilience—“discursive” resilience, to coin a term—might usefully supplement these hypotheses, at least from time to time. To support this suggestion, I’ll signal some uses of resilience before turning briefly to a case study: a sensational Argentine homicide case, which occurred in October 2002, and came to be known as the caso Belsunce. At the time, Argentina was wracked by economic crises and political instability. The imposition of severe restrictions on cash withdrawals from bank deposits had provoked major civil unrest. Between 21 December 2001 and 2 January 2002, Argentines witnessed a succession of five presidents. “Resilient” is a term that readily comes to mind to describe many of those who endured this catastrophic period. To describe the caso Belsunce, however—to describe its constitution and import as a discursive event—we might appeal to some more disciplinary-specific understandings of resilience. Glossing Peircean semiosis as a teleological process, Short notes that “one and the same thing […] may be many different signs at once” (106). Any given sign, in other words, admits of multiple interpretants or uptakes. And so it is with resilience, which is both a keyword in academic disciplines ranging from psychology to ecology and political science, and a buzzword in several corporate domains and spheres of governmental activity. It’s particularly prevalent in the discourses of highly networked post-9/11 Anglophone societies. So what, pray tell, is resilience? To the American Psychological Association, resilience comprises “the process of adapting well in the face of adversity.” To the Resilience Solutions Group at Arizona State University, resilience is “the capacity to recover fully from acute stressors, to carry on in the face of chronic difficulties: to regain one’s balance after losing it.” To the Stockholm Resilience Centre, resilience amounts to the “capacity of a system to continually change and adapt yet remain within critical thresholds,” while to the Resilience Alliance, resilience is similarly “the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and still retain its basic function and structure” (Walker and Salt xiii). The adjective “resilient” is thus predicated of those entities, individuals or collectivities, which exhibit “resilience”. A “resilient Australia,” for example, is one “where all Australians are better able to adapt to change, where we have reduced exposure to risks, and where we are all better able to bounce back from disaster” (Australian Government). It’s tempting here to synthesise these statements with a sense of “ordinary language” usage to derive a definitional distillate: “resilience” is a capacity attributed to an entity which recovers intact from major injury. This capacity is evidenced in a reaction or uptake: a “resilient” entity is one which suffers some insult or disturbance, but whose integrity is held to have been maintained, or even enhanced, by its resistive or adaptive response. A conjecturally “resilient” entity is thus one which would presumably evince resilience if faced with an unrealised aversive event. However, such abstractions ignore how definitional claims do rhetorical work. On any given occasion, how “resilience” and its cognates are construed and what they connote are a function, at least in part, of the purposes of rhetorical agents and the protocols and objects of the disciplines or genres in which these agents put these terms to work. In disciplines operating within the same form of life or sphere of activity—disciplines sharing general conventions and broad objects of inquiry, such as the capacious ecological sciences or the contiguous fields of study within the ambit of applied psychology—resilience acts, at least at times, as a something of a “boundary object” (Star and Griesemer). Correlatively, across more diverse and distant fields of inquiry, resilience can work in more seemingly exclusive or contradictory ways (see Handmer and Dovers). Rhetorical aims and disciplinary objects similarly determine the originary tales we are inclined to tell. In the social sciences, the advent of resilience is often attributed to applied psychology, indebted, in turn, to epidemiology (see Seery, Holman and Cohen Silver). In environmental science, by contrast, resilience is typically taken to be a theory born in ecology (indebted to engineering and to the physical sciences, in particular to complex systems theory [see Janssen, Schoon, Ke and Börner]). Having no foundational claim to stake and, moreover, having different purposes and taking different objects, some more recent uptakes of resilience, in, for instance, securitisation studies, allow for its multidisciplinary roots (see Bourbeau; Kaufmann). But if resilience is many things to many people, a couple of commonalities in its range of translations should be drawn out. First, irrespective of its discipline or sphere of activity, talk of resilience typically entails construing an object of inquiry qua system, be that system an individual, a community of circumstance, a state, a socio-ecological unit or some differently delimited entity. This bounded system suffers some insult with no resulting loss of structural, relational, functional or other integrity. Second, resilience is usually marshalled to promote a politics. Resilience talk often consorts with discourses of meliorative action and of readily quantifiable practical effects. When the environmental sciences take the “Earth system” and the dynamics of global change as their objects of inquiry, a postulate of resilience is key to the elaboration and implementation of natural resource management policy. Proponents of socio-ecological resilience see the resilience hypothesis as enabling a demonstrably more enlightened stewardship of the biosphere (see Folke et al.; Holling; Walker and Salt). When applied psychology takes the anomalous situation of disadvantaged, at-risk individuals triumphing over trauma as its declared object of inquiry, a postulate of resilience is key to the positing and identification of personal and environmental resources or protective factors which would enable the overcoming of adversity. Proponents of psychosocial resilience see this concept as enabling the elaboration and implementation of interventions to foster individual and collective wellbeing (see Goldstein and Brooks; Ungar). Similarly, when policy think-tanks and government departments and agencies take the apprehension of particular threats to the social fabric as their object of inquiry, a postulate of resilience—or of a lack thereof—is critical to the elaboration and implementation of urban infrastructure, emergency planning and disaster management policies (see Drury et al.; Handmer and Dovers). However, despite its often positive connotations, resilience is well understood as a “normatively open” (Bourbeau 11) concept. This openness is apparent in some theories and practices of resilience. In limnological modelling, for example, eutrophication can result in a lake’s being in an undesirable, albeit resilient, turbid-water state (see Carpenter et al.; Walker and Meyers). But perhaps the negative connotations or indeed perverse effects of resilience are most apparent in some of its political uptakes. Certainly, governmental operationalisations of resilience are coming under increased scrutiny. Chief among the criticisms levelled at the “muddled politics” (Grove 147) of and around resilience is that its mobilisation works to constitute a particular neoliberal subjectivity (see Joseph; Neocleous). By enabling a conservative focus on individual responsibility, preparedness and adaptability, the topos of resilience contributes critically to the development of neoliberal governmentality (Joseph). In a practical sense, this deployment of resilience silences resistance: “building resilient subjects,” observe Evans and Reid (85), “involves the deliberate disabling of political habits. […] Resilient subjects are subjects that have accepted the imperative not to resist or secure themselves from the difficulties they are faced with but instead adapt to their enabling conditions.” It’s this prospect of practical acquiescence that sees resistance at times opposed to resilience (Neocleous). “Good intentions not withstanding,” notes Grove (146), “the effect of resilience initiatives is often to defend and strengthen the political economic status quo.” There’s much to commend in these analyses of how neoliberal uses of resilience constitute citizens as highly accommodating of capital and the state. But such critiques pertain to the governmental mobilisation of resilience in the contemporary “advanced liberal” settings of “various Anglo-Saxon countries” (Joseph 47). There are, of course, other instances—other events in other times and places—in which resilience indisputably sorts with resistance. Such an event is the caso Belsunce, in which a rhetorically resilient journalistic community pushed back, resisting some of the excesses of a corrupt neoliberal Argentine regime. I’ll turn briefly to this infamous case to suggest that a notion of “discursive resilience” might afford us some purchase when it comes to describing discursive events. To be clear: we’re considering resilience here not as an anticipatory politics, but rather as an analytic device to supplement the descriptive tools of Peircean semiosis and a rhetorical postulate of genre. As such, it’s more an instrument than an answer: a program, perhaps, for ongoing work. Although drawing on different disciplinary construals of the term, this use of resilience would be particularly indebted to the resilience thinking developed in ecology (see Carpenter el al.; Folke et al.; Holling; Walker et al.; Walker and Salt). Things would, of course, be lost in translation (see Adger; Gallopín): in taking a discursive event, rather than the dynamics of a socio-ecological system, as our object of inquiry, we’d retain some topological analogies while dispensing with, for example, Holling’s four-phase adaptive cycle (see Carpenter et al.; Folke; Gunderson; Gunderson and Holling; Walker et al.). For our purposes, it’s unlikely that descriptions of ecosystem succession need to be carried across. However, the general postulates of ecological resilience thinking—that a system is a complex series of dynamic relations and functions located at any given time within a basin of attraction (or stability domain or system regime) delimited by thresholds; that it is subject to multiple attractors and follows trajectories describable over varying scales of time and space; that these trajectories are inflected by exogenous and endogenous perturbations to which the system is subject; that the system either proves itself resilient to these perturbations in its adaptive or resistive response, or transforms, flipping from one domain (or basin) to another may well prove useful to some descriptive projects in the humanities. Resilience is fundamentally a question of uptake or response. Hence, when examining resilience in socio-ecological systems, Gallopín notes that it’s useful to consider “not only the resilience of the system (maintenance within a basin) but also coping with impacts produced and taking advantage of opportunities” (300). Argentine society in the early-to-mid 2000s was one such socio-political system, and the caso Belsunce was both one such impact and one such opportunity. Well-connected in the world of finance, 57-year-old former stockbroker Carlos Alberto Carrascosa lived with his 50-year-old sociologist turned charity worker wife, María Marta García Belsunce, close to their relatives in the exclusive gated community of Carmel Country Club, Pilar, Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina. At 7:07 pm on Sunday 27 October 2002, Carrascosa called ambulance emergencies, claiming that his wife had slipped and knocked her head while drawing a bath alone that rainy Sunday afternoon. At the time of his call, it transpired, Carrascosa was at home in the presence of intimates. Blood was pooled on the bathroom floor and smeared and spattered on its walls and adjoining areas. María Marta lay lifeless, brain matter oozing from several holes in her left parietal and temporal lobes. This was the moment when Carrascosa, calm and coherent, called emergency services, but didn’t advert the police. Someone, he told the operator, had slipped in the bath and bumped her head. Carrascosa described María Marta as breathing, with a faint pulse, but somehow failed to mention the holes in her head. “A knock with a tap,” a police source told journalist Horacio Cecchi, “really doesn’t compare with the five shots to the head, the spillage of brain matter and the loss of about half a litre of blood suffered by the victim” (Cecchi and Kollmann). Rather than a bathroom tap, María Marta’s head had met with five bullets discharged from a .32-calibre revolver. In effect, reported Cecchi, María Marta had died twice. “While perhaps a common conceit in fiction,” notes Cecchi, “in reality, dying twice is, by definition, impossible. María Marta’s two obscure endings seem to unsettle this certainty.” Her cadaver was eventually subjected to an autopsy, and what had been a tale of clumsiness and happenstance was rewritten, reinscribed under the Argentine Penal Code. The autopsy was conducted 36 days after the burial of María Marta; nine days later, she was mentioned for the second time in the mainstream Argentine press. Her reappearance, however, was marked by a shift in rubrics: from a short death notice in La Nación, María Marta was translated to the crime section of Argentina’s dailies. Until his wife’s mediatic reapparition, Carroscosa and other relatives had persisted with their “accident” hypothesis. Indeed, they’d taken a range of measures to preclude the sorts of uptakes that might ordinarily be expected to flow, under functioning liberal democratic regimes, from the discovery of a corpse with five projectiles lodged in its head. Subsequently recited as part of Carrascosa’s indictment, these measures were extensively reiterated in media coverage of the case. One of the more notorious actions involved the disposal of the sixth bullet, which was found lying under María Marta. In the course of moving the body of his half-sister, John Hurtig retrieved a small metallic object. This discovery was discussed by a number of family members, including Carrascosa, who had received ballistics training during his four years of naval instruction at the Escuela Nacional de Náutica de la Armada. They determined that the object was a lug or connector rod (“pituto”) used in library shelving: nothing, in any case, to indicate a homicide. With this determination made, the “pituto” was duly wrapped in lavatory paper and flushed down the toilet. This episode occasioned a range of outraged articles in Argentine dailies examining the topoi of privilege, power, corruption and impunity. “Distinguished persons,” notes Viau pointedly, “are so disposed […] that in the midst of all that chaos, they can locate a small, hard, steely object, wrap it in lavatory paper and flush it down the toilet, for that must be how they usually dispose of […] all that rubbish that no longer fits under the carpet.” Most often, though, critical comment was conducted by translating the reporting of the case to the genres of crime fiction. In an article entitled Someone Call Agatha Christie, Quick!, H.A.T. writes that “[s]omething smells rotten in the Carmel Country; a whole pile of rubbish seems to have been swept under its plush carpets.” An exemplary intervention in this vein was the work of journalist and novelist Vicente Battista, for whom the case (María Marta) “synthesizes the best of both traditions of crime fiction: the murder mystery and the hard-boiled novels.” “The crime,” Battista (¿Hubo Otra Mujer?) has Rodolfo observe in the first of his speculative dialogues on the case, “seems to be lifted from an Agatha Christie novel, but the criminal turns out to be a copy of the savage killers that Jim Thompson usually depicts.” Later, in an interview in which he correctly predicted the verdict, Battista expanded on these remarks: This familiar plot brings together the English murder mystery and the American hard-boiled novels. The murder mystery because it has all the elements: the crime takes place in a sealed room. In this instance, sealed not only because it occurred in a house, but also in a country, a sealed place of privilege. The victim was a society lady. Burglary is not the motive. In classic murder mystery novels, it was a bit unseemly that one should kill in order to rob. One killed either for a juicy sum of money, or for revenge, or out of passion. In those novels there were neither corrupt judges nor fugitive lawyers. Once Sherlock Holmes […] or Hercule Poirot […] said ‘this is the murderer’, that was that. That’s to say, once fingered in the climactic living room scene, with everyone gathered around the hearth, the perpetrator wouldn’t resist at all. And everyone would be happy because the judges were thought to be upright persons, at least in fiction. […] The violence of the crime of María Marta is part of the hard-boiled novel, and the sealed location in which it takes place, part of the murder mystery (Alarcón). I’ve argued elsewhere (Munro, Belsunce) that the translation of the case to the genres of crime fiction and their metaanalysis was a means by which a victimised Argentine public, represented by a disempowered and marginalised fourth estate, sought some rhetorical recompense. The postulate of resilience, however, might help further to describe and contextualise this notorious discursive event. A disaffected Argentine press finds itself in a stability domain with multiple attractors: on the one hand, an acquiescence to ever-increasing politico-juridical corruption, malfeasance and elitist impunity; on the other, an attractor of increasing contestation, democratisation, accountability and transparency. A discursive event like the caso Belsunce further perturbs Argentine society, threatening to displace it from its democratising trajectory. Unable to enforce due process, Argentina’s fourth estate adapts, doing what, in the circumstances, amounts to the next best thing: it denounces the proceedings by translating the case to the genres of crime fiction. In so doing, it engages a venerable reception history in which the co-constitution of true crime fiction and investigative journalism is exemplified by the figure of Rodolfo Walsh, whose denunciatory works mark a “politicisation of crime” (see Amar Sánchez Juegos; El sueño). Put otherwise, a section of Argentina’s fourth estate bounced back: by making poetics do rhetorical work, it resisted the pull towards what ecology calls an undesirable basin of attraction. Through a show of discursive resilience, these journalists worked to keep Argentine society on a democratising track. 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Grove, Kevin. “On Resilience Politics: From Transformation to Subversion.” Resilience: Interational Policies, Practices and Discourses 1.2 (2013): 146-53. Gunderson, Lance H. “Ecological Resilience - in Theory and Application.” Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 31 (2000): 425-39. Gunderson, Lance H., and C. S. Holling, eds. Panarchy Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems. Washington: Island, 2002. Handmer, John W., and Stephen R. Dovers. “A Typology of Resilience: Rethinking Institutions for Sustainable Development.” Organization & Environment 9.4 (1996): 482-511. H.A.T. “Urgente: Llamen a Agatha Christie.” El País (2003). 14 Jan. 2003 ‹http://historico.elpais.com.uy/03/01/14/pinter_26140.asp>. Holling, Crawford S. “Resilience and Stability of Ecological Systems.” Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 4 (1973): 1-23. 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Resilience Solutions Group, Arizona State U. “What Is Resilience?” 2013. 9 Aug. 2013 ‹http://resilience.asu.edu/what-is-resilience>. Seery, Mark D., E. Alison Holman, and Roxane Cohen Silver. “Whatever Does Not Kill Us: Cumulative Lifetime Adversity, Vulnerability, and Resilience.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 99.6 (2010): 1025-41. Short, Thomas L. “What They Said in Amsterdam: Peirce's Semiotic Today.” Semiotica 60.1-2 (1986): 103-28. Star, Susan Leigh, and James R. Griesemer. “Institutional Ecology, ‘Translations’ and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-39.” Social Studies of Science 19.3 (1989): 387-420. Stockholm Resilience Centre. “What Is Resilience?” 2007. 9 Aug. 2013 ‹http://www.stockholmresilience.org/21/research/what-is-resilience.html>. Ungar, Michael ed. Handbook for Working with Children and Youth Pathways to Resilience across Cultures and Contexts. Thousand Oaks: Sage, 2005. Viau, Susana. “Carmel.” Página 12 (2002). 27 Dec. 2002 ‹http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/contratapa/13-14651-2002-12-27.html>. Walker, Brian, et al. “Resilience, Adaptability and Transformability in Social-Ecological Systems.” Ecology and Society 9.2 (2004). Walker, Brian, and Jacqueline A. Meyers. “Thresholds in Ecological and Social-Ecological Systems: A Developing Database.” Ecology and Society 9.2 (2004). Walker, Brian, and David Salt. Resilience Thinking Sustaining Ecosystems and People in a Changing World. Washington: Island, 2006.
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16

Pausé, Cat, and Sandra Grey. "Throwing Our Weight Around: Fat Girls, Protest, and Civil Unrest." M/C Journal 21, no. 3 (August 15, 2018). http://dx.doi.org/10.5204/mcj.1424.

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Abstract:
This article explores how fat women protesting challenges norms of womanhood, the place of women in society, and who has the power to have their say in public spaces. We use the term fat as a political reclamation; Fat Studies scholars and fat activists prefer the term fat, over the normative term “overweight” and the pathologising term “obese/obesity” (Lee and Pausé para 3). Who is and who isn’t fat, we suggest, is best left to self-determination, although it is generally accepted by fat activists that the term is most appropriately adopted by individuals who are unable to buy clothes in any store they choose. Using a tweet from conservative commentator Ann Coulter as a leaping-off point, we examine the narratives around women in the public sphere and explore how fat bodies might transgress further the norms set by society. The public representations of women in politics and protest are then are set in the context of ‘activist wisdom’ (Maddison and Scalmer) from two sides of the globe. Activist wisdom gives preference to the lived knowledge and experience of activists as tools to understand social movements. It seeks to draw theoretical implications from the practical actions of those on the ground. In centring the experiences of ourselves and other activists, we hope to expand existing understandings of body politics, gender, and political power in this piece. It is important in researching social movements to look both at the representations of protest and protestors in all forms of media as this is the ‘public face’ of movements, but also to examine the reflections of the individuals who collectively put their weight behind bringing social change.A few days after the 45th President of the United States was elected, people around the world spilled into the streets and participated in protests; precursors to the Women’s March which would take place the following January. Pictures of such marches were shared via social media, demonstrating the worldwide protest against the racism, misogyny, and overall oppressiveness, of the newly elected leader. Not everyone was supportive of these protests though; one such conservative commentator, Ann Coulter, shared this tweet: Image1: A tweet from Ann Coulter; the tweet contains a picture of a group of protestors, holding signs protesting Trump, white supremacy, and for the rights of immigrants. In front of the group, holding a megaphone is a woman. Below the picture, the text reads, “Without fat girls, there would be no protests”.Coulter continued on with two more tweets, sharing pictures of other girls protesting and suggesting that the protestors needed a diet programme. Kivan Bay (“Without Fat Girls”) suggested that perhaps Coulter was implying that skinny girls do not have time to protest because they are too busy doing skinny girl things, like buying jackets or trying on sweaters. Or perhaps Coulter was arguing that fat girls are too visible, too loud, and too big, to be taken seriously in their protests. These tweets provide a point of illustration for how fat women protesting challenge norms of womanhood, the place of women in society, and who has the power to have their say in public spaces While Coulter’s tweet was most likely intended as a hostile personal attack on political grounds, we find it useful in its foregrounding of gender, bodies and protest which we consider in this article, beginning with a review of fat girls’ role in social justice movements.Across the world, we can point to fat women who engage in activism related to body politics and more. Australian fat filmmaker and activist Kelli Jean Drinkwater makes documentaries, such as Aquaporko! and Nothing to Lose, that queer fat embodiment and confronts body norms. Newly elected Ontario MPP Jill Andrew has been fighting for equal rights for queer people and fat people in Canada for decades. Nigerian Latasha Ngwube founded About That Curvy Life, Africa’s leading body positive and empowerment site, and has organised plus-size fashion show events at Heineken Lagos Fashion and Design Week in Nigeria in 2016 and the Glitz Africa Fashion Week in Ghana in 2017. Fat women have been putting their bodies on the line for the rights of others to live, work, and love. American Heather Heyer was protesting the hate that white nationalists represent and the danger they posed to her friends, family, and neighbours when she died at a rally in Charlottesville, North Carolina in late 2017 (Caron). When Heyer was killed by one of those white nationalists, they declared that she was fat, and therefore her body size was lauded loudly as justification for her death (Bay, “How Nazis Use”; Spangler).Fat women protesting is not new. For example, the Fat Underground was a group of “radical fat feminist women”, who split off from the more conservative NAAFA (National Association to Aid Fat Americans) in the 1970s (Simic 18). The group educated the public about weight science, harassed weight-loss companies, and disrupted academic seminars on obesity. The Fat Underground made their first public appearance at a Women’s Equality Day in Los Angeles, taking over the stage at the public event to accuse the medical profession of murdering Cass Elliot, the lead singer of the folk music group, The Mamas and the Papas (Dean and Buss). In 1973, the Fat Underground produced the Fat Liberation Manifesto. This Manifesto began by declaring that they believed “that fat people are full entitled to human respect and recognition” (Freespirit and Aldebaran 341).Women have long been disavowed, or discouraged, from participating in the public sphere (Ginzberg; van Acker) or seen as “intruders or outsiders to the tough world of politics” (van Acker 118). The feminist slogan the personal is political was intended to shed light on the role that women needed to play in the public spheres of education, employment, and government (Caha 22). Across the world, the acceptance of women within the public sphere has been varied due to cultural, political, and religious, preferences and restrictions (Agenda Feminist Media Collective). Limited acceptance of women in the public sphere has historically been granted by those ‘anointed’ by a male family member or patron (Fountaine 47).Anti-feminists are quick to disavow women being in public spaces, preferring to assign them the role as helpmeet to male political elite. As Schlafly (in Rowland 30) notes: “A Positive Woman cannot defeat a man in a wrestling or boxing match, but she can motivate him, inspire him, encourage him, teach him, restrain him, reward him, and have power over him that he can never achieve over her with all his muscle.” This idea of women working behind the scenes has been very strong in New Zealand where the ‘sternly worded’ letter is favoured over street protest. An acceptable route for women’s activism was working within existing political institutions (Grey), with activity being ‘hidden’ inside government offices such as the Ministry of Women’s Affairs (Schuster, 23). But women’s movement organisations that engage in even the mildest form of disruptive protest are decried (Grey; van Acker).One way women have been accepted into public space is as the moral guardians or change agents of the entire political realm (Bliss; Ginzberg; van Acker; Ledwith). From the early suffrage movements both political actors and media representations highlighted women were more principled and conciliatory than men, and in many cases had a moral compass based on restraint. Cartoons showed women in the suffrage movement ‘sweeping up’ and ‘cleaning house’ (Sheppard 123). Groups like the Women’s Christian Temperance Union were celebrated for protesting against the demon drink and anti-pornography campaigners like Patricia Bartlett were seen as acceptable voices of moral reason (Moynihan). And as Cunnison and Stageman (in Ledwith 193) note, women bring a “culture of femininity to trade unions … an alternative culture, derived from the particularity of their lives as women and experiences of caring and subordination”. This role of moral guardian often derived from women as ‘mothers’, responsible for the physical and moral well-being of the nation.The body itself has been a sight of protest for women including fights for bodily autonomy in their medical decisions, reproductive justice, and to live lives free from physical and sexual abuse, have long been met with criticisms of being unladylike or inappropriate. Early examples decried in NZ include the women’s clothing movement which formed part of the suffrage movement. In the second half of the 20th century it was the freedom trash can protests that started the myth of ‘women burning their bras’ which defied acceptable feminine norms (Sawer and Grey). Recent examples of women protesting for body rights include #MeToo and Time’s Up. Both movements protest the lack of bodily autonomy women can assert when men believe they are entitled to women’s bodies for their entertainment, enjoyment, and pleasure. And both movements have received considerable backlash by those who suggest it is a witch hunt that might ensnare otherwise innocent men, or those who are worried that the real victims are white men who are being left behind (see Garber; Haussegger). Women who advocate for bodily autonomy, including access to contraception and abortion, are often held up as morally irresponsible. As Archdeacon Bullock (cited in Smyth 55) asserted, “A woman should pay for her fun.”Many individuals believe that the stigma and discrimination fat people face are the consequences they sow from their own behaviours (Crandall 892); that fat people are fat because they have made poor decisions, being too indulgent with food and too lazy to exercise (Crandall 883). Therefore, fat people, like women, should have to pay for their fun. Fat women find themselves at this intersection, and are often judged more harshly for their weight than fat men (Tiggemann and Rothblum). Examining Coulter’s tweet with this perspective in mind, it can easily be read as an attempt to put fat girl protestors back into their place. It can also be read as a warning. Don’t go making too much noise or you may be labelled as fat. Presenting troublesome women as fat has a long history within political art and depictions. Marianne (the symbol of the French Republic) was depicted as fat and ugly; she also reinforced an anti-suffragist position (Chenut 441). These images are effective because of our societal views on fatness (Kyrölä). Fatness is undesirable, unworthy of love and attention, and a representation of poor character, lack of willpower, and an absence of discipline (Murray 14; Pausé, “Rebel Heart” para 1).Fat women who protest transgress rules around body size, gender norms, and the appropriate place for women in society. Take as an example the experiences of one of the authors of this piece, Sandra Grey, who was thrust in to political limelight nationally with the Campaign for MMP (Grey and Fitzsimmons) and when elected as the President of the New Zealand Tertiary Education Union in 2011. Sandra is a trade union activist who breaches too many norms set for the “good woman protestor,” as well as the norms for being a “good fat woman”. She looms large on a stage – literally – and holds enough power in public protest to make a crowd of 7,000 people “jump to left”, chant, sing, and march. In response, some perceive Sandra less as a tactical and strategic leader of the union movement, and more as the “jolly fat woman” who entertains, MCs, and leads public events. Though even in this role, she has been criticised for being too loud, too much, too big.These criticisms are loudest when Sandra is alongside other fat female bodies. When posting on social media photos with fellow trade union members the comments often note the need of the group to “go on a diet”. The collective fatness also brings comments about “not wanting to fuck any of that group of fat cows”. There is something politically and socially dangerous about fat women en masse. This was behind the responses to Sandra’s first public appearance as the President of TEU when one of the male union members remarked “Clearly you have to be a fat dyke to run this union.” The four top elected and appointed positions in the TEU have been women for eight years now and both their fatness and perceived sexuality present as a threat in a once male-dominated space. Even when not numerically dominant, unions are public spaces dominated by a “masculine culture … underpinned by the undervaluation of ‘women’s worth’ and notions of womanhood ‘defined in domesticity’” (Cockburn in Kirton 273-4). Sandra’s experiences in public space show that the derision and methods of putting fat girls back in their place varies dependent on whether the challenge to power is posed by a single fat body with positional power and a group of fat bodies with collective power.Fat Girls Are the FutureOn the other side of the world, Tara Vilhjálmsdóttir is protesting to change the law in Iceland. Tara believes that fat people should be protected against discrimination in public and private settings. Using social media such as Facebook and Instagram, Tara takes her message, and her activism, to her thousands of followers (Keller, 434; Pausé, “Rebel Heart”). And through mainstream media, she pushes back on fatphobia rhetoric and applies pressure on the government to classify weight as a protected status under the law.After a lifetime of living “under the oppression of diet culture,” Tara began her activism in 2010 (Vilhjálmsdóttir). She had suffered real harm from diet culture, developing an eating disorder as a teen and being told through her treatment for it that her fears as a fat woman – that she had no future, that fat people experienced discrimination and stigma – were unfounded. But Tara’s lived experiences demonstrated fat stigma and discrimination were real.In 2012, she co-founded the Icelandic Association for Body Respect, which promotes body positivity and fights weight stigma in Iceland. The group uses a mixture of real life and online tools; organising petitions, running campaigns against the Icelandic version of The Biggest Loser, and campaigning for weight to be a protected class in the Icelandic constitution. The Association has increased the visibility of the dangers of diet culture and the harm of fat stigma. They laid the groundwork that led to changing the human rights policy for the city of Reykjavík; fat people cannot be discriminated against in employment settings within government jobs. As the city is one of the largest employers in the country, this was a large step forward for fat rights.Tara does receive her fair share of hate messages; she’s shared that she’s amazed at the lengths people will go to misunderstand what she is saying (Vilhjálmsdóttir). “This isn’t about hurt feelings; I’m not insulted [by fat stigma]. It’s about [fat stigma] affecting the livelihood of fat people and the structural discrimination they face” (Vilhjálmsdóttir). She collects the hateful comments she receives online through screenshots and shares them in an album on her page. She believes it is important to keep a repository to demonstrate to others that the hatred towards fat people is real. But the hate she receives only fuels her work more. As does the encouragement she receives from people, both in Iceland and abroad. And she is not alone; fat activists across the world are using Web 2.0 tools to change the conversation around fatness and demand civil rights for fat people (Pausé, “Rebel Heart”; Pausé, “Live to Tell").Using Web 2.0 tools as a way to protest and engage in activism is an example of oppositional technologics; a “political praxis of resistance being woven into low-tech, amateur, hybrid, alternative subcultural feminist networks” (Garrison 151). Fat activists use social media to engage in anti-assimilationist activism and build communities of practice online in ways that would not be possible in real life (Pausé, “Express Yourself” 1). This is especially useful for those whose protests sit at the intersections of oppressions (Keller 435; Pausé, “Rebel Heart” para 19). Online protests have the ability to travel the globe quickly, providing opportunities for connections between protests and spreading protests across the globe, such as SlutWalks in 2011-2012 (Schuster 19). And online spaces open up unlimited venues for women to participate more freely in protest than other forms (Harris 479; Schuster 16; Garrison 162).Whether online or offline, women are represented as dangerous in the political sphere when they act without male champions breaching norms of femininity, when their involvement challenges the role of woman as moral guardians, and when they make the body the site of protest. Women must ‘do politics’ politely, with utmost control, and of course caringly; that is they must play their ‘designated roles’. Whether or not you fit the gendered norms of political life affects how your protest is perceived through the media (van Acker). Coulter’s tweet loudly proclaimed that the fat ‘girls’ protesting the election of the 45th President of the United States were unworthy, out of control, and not worthy of attention (ironic, then, as her tweet caused considerable conversation about protest, fatness, and the reasons not to like the President-Elect). What the Coulter tweet demonstrates is that fat women are perceived as doubly-problematic in public space, both as fat and as women. They do not do politics in a way that is befitting womanhood – they are too visible and loud; they are not moral guardians of conservative values; and, their bodies challenge masculine power.ReferencesAgenda Feminist Media Collective. “Women in Society: Public Debate.” Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity 10 (1991): 31-44.Bay, Kivan. “How Nazis Use Fat to Excuse Violence.” Medium, 7 Feb. 2018. 1 May 2018 <https://medium.com/@kivabay/how-nazis-use-fat-to-excuse-violence-b7da7d18fea8>.———. “Without Fat Girls, There Would Be No Protests.” Bullshit.ist, 13 Nov. 2016. 16 May 2018 <https://bullshit.ist/without-fat-girls-there-would-be-no-protests-e66690de539a>.Bliss, Katherine Elaine. Compromised Positions: Prostitution, Public Health, and Gender Politics in Revolutionary Mexico City. Penn State Press, 2010.Caha, Omer. 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