Making it ‘APP’en: service user feedback: developing and implementing a service user APP: reflections from Northern Ireland,England and Scotland

Despite the advent of social media and increasing use of smart phone technology amongst global and UK populations, APP’s for social work remain in their infancy. Several have been developed which focus on the education of social workers and practitioners providing information on specific social work issues, and one we are aware of that explores ethics and values using a games-based approach. In this paper, we discuss the importance of service user perspective in social work practice and how this informed the development of the feedback App. We reflect on developing this instrument using digital technologies which social workers can use to gather anonymous feedback from service users about their experiences of social work interventions. This project, developed in response to demands placed on social work agencies to evidence the effectiveness of service interventions, provide robust data from service users for inspection regimes and sustain service user involvement in improving services. The evaluation model is designed to document the implementation process, exploring what works and what barriers, challenges and lessons were learned by the project team together with how some of the tensions in the process were addressed and resolved.     

‘Familial looking’: Chinese Canadian vernacular photography of the exclusion period (1923–1967)

This essay examines the roles of photographic and oral testimony in the construction of Chinese Canadian family identity during a period of discriminatory immigration laws and family separation. Extending Marianne Hirsch’s idea of the ‘familial look’, I argue that Chinese Canadians deployed photography to serve as visual proxies that could transcend physical border restrictions. By examining the interplay between visual and verbal cues and the entanglement of selective framing and storytelling, I posit that the strategic use of photography was a means of building a material trace of family presence in the face of absence and loss. However, as a medium where distance and absence are inherent properties, photography – when paired with oral history – also reveals gaps and discontinuities in the construction of memory. Containing and activating trans-temporal and transnational narratives, family photographs and oral histories act upon each other, changing the way we interpret each mode of articulating the past. Deployed as forms of énoncés, photographs in this period declared Chinese Canadians as members of a visible citizenry, in spite of barriers preventing their achievement of full rights as Canadians. This research draws from the development of the project Chinese Canadian Women, 1923–1967, an online multimedia resource and digital repository that brings together oral histories and photographic collections of families across Canada.     

The Marketing of Italian Wine Brands in China: The ‘Mainstreaming’ Approach

Italian wine is well known all around the world for its long history, nice taste and outstanding quality. However, when trying to enter the Chinese market, Italian wine producers do not obtain the proper market share or high reputation that they deserve. Based on empirical research, this article will provide explanation on the reasons behind this phenomenon. The authors argue that a ‘mainstreaming process’ marketing strategy should be adopted by Italian wine brands when facing competition from both domestic and other foreign wine producers in China.     

‘Such a Mass of Disgusting and Revolting Cases’: Moral Panic and the ‘Discovery’ of Sexual Deviance in Post-Emancipation Jamaica (1835–1855)

Why were so many sex offences prosecuted in the Jamaican courts in the 1840s and early 1850s when so few had been heard before 1834? Local elites and colonial officials were almost unanimous in their belief that this episode represented an outbreak of sexual deviance and a disturbing manifestation of regression towards ‘African barbarism’. Using the concept of the moral panic as an explanatory tool, I argue here that this ‘epidemic’ was largely manufactured, the product of displaced elite anxieties about the dangers of freedom, and that it played a pivotal role in the abandonment of reform and the return to repression a decade after full emancipation.     

‘Us’ and ‘them’: the limits and possibilities of a ‘politics of neurodiversity’ in neoliberal times

The neurodiversity movement claims that there are neurological differences in the human population, and that autism is a natural variation among humans – not a disease or a disorder, just ‘a difference’. A ‘politics of neurodiversity’ is based on the claim that the ‘neurodiverse’ population constitutes a political grouping comparable with those of class, gender, sexuality or race. This paper considers the limits and possibilities of neurodiverse political activism, and concludes by calling for a politics of identity that does not depend on a politics of ‘us’ and ‘them’.     

The shifting ‘stages’ of performance: a study of ‘Chavang Kut’ festival in Manipur

Chavang Kut, a post-harvesting festival in Manipur, represents an important cultural expression of the Chin-Kuki-Mizo group of people. The article looks at the participation of the Thadou community in the celebration by tracing their performative historiography. In the past, the celebration was primarily important in the religio-cultural sense. The rhythmic movements of the dances in the festival were inspired by animals, agricultural techniques and showed their relationship with ecology. Today, the celebration witnesses the shifting of stages and is revamped to suit new contexts and interpretations. The traditional dances which forms the core of the festival is now performed in the out-of-village settings and are staged in a secular public sphere. While used by the state as a political project to bring unity amongst the different communities of Manipur, recent socio-political occasions showed how it is used as a site of contestations against the state.     

‘Heritage’ and ‘cultural practice’ in a globalized disaster: a preliminary thematic analysis of documents produced during the Ebola epidemic of 2013–2015

The Ebola crisis of 2013–2015 highlighted the relationship between cultural heritage, neoliberal globalization and public health. It also raised the problem of cultural compatibility between organizations within the global ‘epidemic space’, which intruded on the pre-existing ‘heritage space’. In this paper, we discuss the differences and disjunctures between ‘heritage’ as it was explicitly and implicitly defined by two organizations positioned very differently in the global epidemic space – UNESCO, and the University of Makeni, Sierra Leone’s first private university. A thematic analysis of documents produced by these institutions reveals that they both placed the themes of human dignity and cultural heritage at the forefront of their responses. It also reveals that they dealt with those themes in sharply disjunctive ways, indicating the limits of cultural compatibility within the global ‘epidemic space’.     

Contributions to the History of Public Relations in the Midst of a Dictatorship: First Steps in the Professionalization of Public Relations in Spain (1960–1975)

ABSTRACT

The practice of public relations in Spain began during the Franco dictatorship, which was established in 1939, following a 3-year civil war. The first consultancy was opened in Barcelona in 1960, at the beginning of a period of economic growth due to a change of direction in the regime. After the end of the autarchy and international ostracism, Spain began an unprecedented economic and social transformation. Public relations thus helped businesses to make contact with an ever-better-informed media and public opinion and, in this way, contributed to economic development while simultaneously promoting associationism and improvement in the teaching of the subject.     

Arguing with a Monument: Frederick Douglass’ Resolution of the ‘White Man Problem’ in his ‘Oration in Memory of Lincoln’

This revisionist view applies an ‘interracial turn’ lens to Frederick Douglass’ 1876 Freedmen’s Monument Speech, in which he critiqued the myth of Lincoln as ‘the liberator.’ After sketching interracial dynamics in Douglass ante bellum career, I do a close reading of visual rhetoric in this oration. Read through a history of Douglass’ complex but ultimately fecund relationships with white men, the speech constitutes a performative resolution of Douglass’ ‘white man problem,’ I argue. A historically situated reading of Douglass’ rhetoric reveals the maturity of his political thought, which calls on future audiences to reassess Douglass’ identity, and legacy. A ‘revised Douglass’ charted a path by which the United States could revise its own ‘white male problem.’ Douglass’ model is timely, given recurring episodes of interracial vio-lence, and the social and rhetorical unrest they spark. As a figure who battled racialism and lived a ‘more attractive alternative,’ Douglass provides deep legitimation for an ‘interracial turn’ in fields including American Studies, communication, ethnography, rhetorical studies, and literary criticism.     

Young people in a city of culture: ‘Ultimate beneficiaries’ or ‘Economic migrants’?

There is burgeoning literature on cities that host major cultural events. However, there is surprisingly very little empirical research focusing specifically on young people and cities of culture, so we have limited knowledge in terms of how young people actually experience and interpret cultural events. Given this, we offer an important and timely contribution to such debates. Our spatial focus is Derry/Londonderry (D/L) in Northern Ireland. During 2013 D/L was the UK’s inaugural City of Culture (CoC). The bid document and legacy plans for CoC stated that young people would be ‘cultural assets’ during 2013 and the ‘ultimate beneficiaries’ of the CoC legacy [Derry City Council 2010. Cracking the Code. City of Culture 2013. Derry: Derry City Council, 2013a. Our Legacy Promise. Building on the Success of 2013. Derry: Derry City Council, 2013b. Legacy Plan 2013–2023. Derry: Derry City Council]. This paper unpacks and analyses the extent to which young people in D/L related to and engaged with CoC and, arguably more importantly, how CoC affected their plans and aspirations for the future. Our research problematises the claim that young people were the ‘ultimate beneficiaries’ of CoC; most strikingly, it shows that young people, despite offering very positive views, both expect and desire to live in cities other than D/L. As such, the debilitating long-standing trend of economic migration of young people will continue raising important issues for local stakeholders.     

Constructing merit in the civil service: The French Ministry of Culture (1880–1980)

Merit-based procedures for evaluation and grading in the French Civil Service have often been studied with the idea that concepts and practices circulate between public and private sectors, domestic and foreign organizations. Less attention has been afforded the in-house origins of procedures for assessing the work of civil servants. This article focuses on the procedures gradually built up to evaluate government employees in the French Ministry of Culture. Light is shed on the difficulties of making good the Republic's promise to base merit on differences in talent alone. How is a civil servant's work to be measured? Are qualifications evaluated while seeing to it that as many employees as possible can be promoted? Focusing on procedures – imagined or actually implemented – for grading, evaluating and promoting museum personnel shows that the process follows a timing and modality that vary depending on one's position in the hierarchy. The evaluation process nevertheless creates ties between socio-occupational groups that all else separates. Ways to measure civil servants’ activity existed before the neomanagerial objection to bureaucratic rules and regulations of the 1960s; the French system for evaluating merit is, thus, not simply an importation of anglo-saxon managerial methods.     

The role of mediatory myths in sustaining ideology: the case of Cuba after the ‘special period’

After the collapse of the Soviet bloc, management researchers devoted considerable energy to investigating ways to operate the transition to market economies. However, one country of the former Soviet bloc, Cuba, resisted transition and reaffirmed loyalty to the values of La Revolucion. Little is known about management in Cuba. This study seeks to approach one particular aspect of management in this country: the relationship between national ideology and management practice. To analyse the topic, qualitative data from Cuban managers and management professors were gathered over a 10‐year period. Results suggest that the dynamics of managerial ideology can be understood as the interplay of several processes operating at distinct levels: institutional, professional, organizational and individual. The interplay between conformance to the ideology and its use as a practical resource is a potential source of change and of conflict demands that are tackled with recourse to mediatory myths.     

‘Queen of the world’: experiences of ‘at-risk’ young people participating in equine-assisted learning/therapy

There is a significant body of research into the benefits of animal-assisted therapy (AAT) but less into the fields known as equine-assisted learning and therapy (EAL/EAT) where horses are incorporated in therapeutic and learning interventions. This paper explores the experiences of seven ‘at-risk’ young people who participated in a therapeutic horsemanship (TH) programme. The study followed a practice-near approach seeking to capture the young people's experiences within a participative ethnography. Themes related to the risk and resilience literature such as self-confidence, self-esteem, self-efficacy and a sense of mastery, empathy and the opening of positive opportunities are explored in this paper.     

Outdoor brothel culture: the un/making of a transsexual stroll in Vancouver's West End, 1975–1984

In the mid-1970s, following a series of police raids on prostitution inside downtown nightclubs, a community of approximately 200 sex workers moved into Vancouver's West End neighborhood, where a small stroll had operated since the early 1970s. This paper examines the contributions made by three male-to-female (MTF) transsexuals of color to the culture of on-street prostitution in the West End. The trans women's stories address themes of fashion, working conditions, money, community formation, violence, and resistance to well-organized anti-prostitution forces. These recollections enable me to bridge and enrich trans history and prostitution history – two fields of inquiry that have under-represented the participation of trans women in the sex industry across the urban West. Acutely familiar with the hazards inherent in a criminalized, stigmatized trade, trans sex workers in the West End manufactured efficacious strategies of harm reduction, income generation, safety planning, and community building. Eschewing the label of “victim”, they leveraged their physical size and style, charisma, contempt towards pimps, earning capacity, and seniority as the first workers on the stroll to assume leadership within the broader constituency of “hookers on Davie Street”. I discover that their short-lived outdoor brothel culture offered only a temporary bulwark against the inevitability of eviction via legal injunction in July 1984, and the subsequent rise in lethal violence against all prostitutes in Vancouver, including MTF transsexuals.     

Another chapter in the story of /r/: ‘Labiodental’ variants in British English

In this article we trace the history of [bnu;]-like variants of British English /r/. Although [bnu;] has generally been dismissed as an infantilism, or indicative of affected or disordered speech, it seems to have become established as an accent feature of non-standard south-eastern accents. We present tentative evidence to suggest this may be related to the presence of similar variants in the London East End Jewish community. After summarising previous discussions of [bnu;], we concentrate on a sociophonetic study of /r/ variants used by speakers from Derby and Newcastle. [bnu;] is found in both cities, with a higher incidence in Derby. Acoustic evidence suggests that the spreading variants are qualitatively different from [?]. We conclude that the spread of [bnu;] is part of a general and widespread process of accent levelling.     

Searching for Appropriateness in Social Work Education in Botswana: The Process of Developing a Master in Social Work (MSW) Programme in a ‘Developing’ Country

Developing a tertiary academic programme in Botswana is not only an intellectual activity but also an institutional process that must be balanced to satisfy different stakeholders and contending claims. This paper focuses on the intellectual and institutional processes of developing a Master in Social Work (MSW) programme at the University of Botswana. It discusses the intricacies of identifying the need for a MSW and the consultative process of designing the programme and course objectives, titles, and course content. The paper takes the view that institutional and intellectual issues are significant factors of the exercise of searching for appropriateness in social work education in an African context.     

From a ‘builder of socialism’ to ‘free floating intellectual’: My politically incorrect career in sociology

Conclusion In the final analysis, despite the reservations expressed earlier, I do not regret having become a sociologist because it has allowed me to write a few books and express ideas on some subjects of importance, modest as their impact might have been.15 I also found academic life generally congenial espe-cially given the abundance of leisure that goes with it.