A Girl Is a Girl,Is a Girl,Is a Girl

ABSTRACT

Before I did not know I was the other in my country, before I did not know it was not safe to be the other in this, before I did not know my existence was a series of ellipses, owing to mispronunciations and a smothering absence of words, before I did not know that the past will, unfailingly, be subsumed by its past and fantasies of a future will become present torments, before I did not know all of that, I did not know I was to be a woman. … Thirty-odd years in, having married a man and birthed children, I was made to look at myself and pronounce the most foreign of words. The sound was deafening. The sound left me speechless. These writings are an attempt at puncturing the silence enveloping the most dangerous of (my) words.     

Speaking out loud: Muslim women,Indian Delights and culinary practices in eThekwini/Durban

I asked, ‘Did your mother teach you to cook?’ Almost an hour later, time consumed by mutual reminiscences of Indian Delights, stories of the tastes and textures and colours of food and life in Durban, at last when I thought it would never be answered my question swam back up to the surface of our conversation: ‘You know, then I lived with my oldest sister, not my mother. Her mother-in-law taught me.’ Too heavy a shift of register, the answer dropped into the bubble of conversation we had made around ourselves, imposing another reluctant silence. I could not ask more, not then. Deliverance came through other stories. We talked about the subtly different combinations of spices that women even from the same family choose to use, and the embodied pleasures of walking into a kitchen steamed up with the smells of several dishes all cooking at once. And for the moment we avoided returning to a family narrative of separation, loss and melancholy.     

Spiralling Up or Spinning Out: A Guide for Reflecting on Action Research Practice

This paper offers a theoretical ‘action research spiral’ model to guide reflection on the dual client focus of action research. While theoretically exploring and highlighting the tensions and dilemmas created by this dual client focus, this paper will argue for a greater degree of reflection on action research practice and utilize vignettes from action research cases to illustrate those reflective processes. It is concluded that further discussion and reflection on the process of action research is an important component of social science’s contribution to phronetic knowledge.

I saw the University as helping us to reflect on what we are doing—they are the expert reflectors. This is particularly what I saw as X’s role. Sometimes his interjections go above their heads and his ‘nine words or less’ statements need to have some explanation, and I should feed this back to him. I also see the University as playing a visionary role, helping to show us new things about what is possible. I don’t see the University as helping to pull the team together—that is when it gets confusing. They are observing us, they are looking at us as the rats, and when they see something that they think needs to be addressed, they can feed this back to us—and this is where teaching and formal learning comes in. This is a difficult role for the University. I can see some of the University people just squirming—you can see it in their face that they want to intervene. They know something about what we are doing but are not imparting the knowledge. This can piss people off. They are withholding what they know and not helping. But it can also piss people off if they come in too early and tell us what is going on and what to do and not let us wallow around for a while, and learn. This is what I see as a major problem for the University. As you observe us, at what point do you reflect the learning and feedback, and yet not prostitute the learning or dirty the data. …We are the rats, the factory is your laboratory. But when we are looking at the role of the University, you are the rats. (Plant Manager and Industry Sponsor of an Action Research Project, 2000)     

Locked down? Speaking from the shadows and silence for survival

I write to speak of silencing and the suffering of survivors of domestic abuse in the family courts of England and Wales and the struggle to find a voice to articulate the hardship faced in this lockdown through court. It has taken the whole period of lockdown to find the words, the courage to keep writing, even as tears stream down my face, even as I sit in a virtual court hearing, even as my voice breaks as I fight to be heard. This text is a glimpse into a world that is hidden in plain view, where I will share fragments of my lived experience. I am scared to write but know I speak or am lost in the silent void that I have known for too long. Domestic abuse and the taboo around it screams at me to remain unseen, hidden, and invisible. I keep returning to find the words, as the very real cost of not naming the violence and reaching out to speak through it is too high. The fragmented account that follows is a raw telling of living life through the court system; it is written to share a voice that was unheard in the family law court and has been minimized, side-lined, ordered, and silenced through 3 years of the court journey and the embodied effects this has had. It moves between space and time to show a journey endured. Can you hear me? Will you bear witness?     

Mutuality in Relationships with Health Care Providers

Abstract

I have had a mobility impairment for many years and have experienced repeated trauma at the hands of medical personnel. They have withheld anesthesia and postoperative pain medication, insisting that I had no pain. Physicians have also refused to believe that I have been physically active, and have minimized the degree of impairment that I described. They hold the same biases about people with disabilities as do most people: that we are lazy and weak, and that we do not try hard enough. Despite my ongoing attempts at self advocacy, my orthopedist has made unilateral decisions about my treatment goals and the management of my diseased joints. These have caused me to wear out other joints, until I am significantly impaired and can work only a few hours a week. He then began to treat me differently, since his preconceptions prevented him from seeing me as an individual with unique abilities facing attitudinal and physical barriers. Our relationship was the only tool available to me to attempt to break down his prejudices to stop the harm he was causing me. I will describe a series of oppressive medical provider relationships. I will then demonstrate my attempts to assert myself as an essential mutual partner in decisions about my goals, and show the limitations of this approach in the presence of a great power differential.     

Objectivity and the Bell-shaped Curve

“There's one good piece of advice my Pappy gave me which I've never forgotten:

“‘Son,’ he said, ‘always make sure that your own chicken coop is in good order before you go offering to help others fix theirs.’” —Anonymous.     

Getting away on a sabbatical

When the time came for me to leave on a sabbatical to do research in Mississippi, I had to leave my 32-year-old daughter, who suffers short-term memory loss due to a cancerous brain tumor she had when she was 15. Leaving became a traumatic moment for me as she had just received notice that she could move into an apartment. She had been on a waiting list for a place for over a year. In some ways, I believed that the timing for my sabbatical could not have been worse for our family. Still, my other four children, my husband, and I moved her as we wanted her to have this opportunity for semi-independent living as soon as possible. Two weeks prior to my departure, I began writing a narrative capturing my emotions, detailing how difficult my getting off was for me.     

STRATEGIES FOR ENGAGING ADOLESCENT GIRLS AT AN EMERGENCY SHELTER IN A THERAPEUTIC RELATIONSHIP: RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE GIRLS THEMSELVES

Engaging clients is an extremely important part of the therapeutic process. Although there is a literature on adult engagement, few articles discuss adolescent engagement. Those articles that do discuss adolescent engagement have been conducted from the perspective of adults. The purpose of this study was to explore, from the client's perspective, ways to engage and build a positive therapeutic alliance with adolescent girls. A focus group (N = 5) was conducted with residents of an emergency shelter for adolescent girls in an urban area. Clients were asked three questions: ‘If you could tell a counselor anything, what would you tell her/him?’ .‘What do counselors need to know?’ and ‘How can a counselor get you to talk?’ Seven messages emerged from the clients' responses, which focused on a request to be respected, listened to, and not judged. More specifically, themes included ‘Treat me like I'm on your level’, ‘Tell me a little about yourself’, ‘Ask my permission to take notes’, ‘Pay attention to what I'm saying’, ‘Tell me what you're doing’, ‘Don't tell me what's in my file’, and ‘Don't call me names’. Clients provided concrete ways in which social workers and other counseling professionals could better work with them.     

“What Colour Is Your English?”*

This paper raises questions about ways in which the “imagined community” is discursively patrolled through accents. Drawing on preliminary research with African immigrant women, we argue that “Canadian English” constitutes a border allowing only partial and provisional crossing for those with an “African English” accent. The accent border is material and figurative, affecting access to material benefits such as jobs or housing, as well as shaping perceptions of who belongs in Canada. Thus, accents form a site through which racialized power relations are negotiated and “Others” are reproduced materially and figuratively in Canada.

Citing Literature

Volume 40 , Issue 5 December 2003

Pages 565-573     

Exploring the (Post) Industrial Subculture - Towards a Critical (Post) Anal-ytical Approach to Organizational Analysis

You could maintain incredulity toward metanarratives as much as you liked, but it wouldn't keep your feet on the ground. Not if you were an oilskin. If you were a fleece however, your feet may be on the ground, but your ideas may be in the air. Yet your problem wouldn't be how to resolve your differences - it would be how to recognise them.     

Race and Place in the Adaptation of Mariel Exiles*

The influx of lower class émigrés during the 1980 Mariel Boatlift complicates the “success story” image of previous waves of Cuban exiles to the United States. Examination of Mariel exiles in terms of racial variation in adaptation does not exist; nor is analysis of the geographic distribution and internal migration of Mariel Cubans within the United States represented. Mariel exiles maneuver along distinguishable paths of adaptation as evidenced by patterns of settlement and geographical mobility. I argue that place is a necessary ingredient in illuminating diverse adjustment experiences among immigrants and refugees in the United States.

相似文献   

Developing Effectiveness in the Therapeutic Use of Self

Traditional technique guided the effective psychotherapist more toward restraint of self than active use of self. Contemporary trends in technique are moving more toward encouraging the therapist to be aware of and use his or her real self in the relationship with clients, in other words to loosen the rigors of anonymity and neutrality in service of genuine relating and its attendant growth-enhancing potential. The authors of this paper offer the argument that the application of what you know as a psychotherapist (that is the accumulation of knowledge and techniques from professional education and training) can only be helpful and effective if you are aware of how who you are as a person in the room with the client (that is the accumulation of your own personality traits, personal belief systems, and psychology in the relational matrix with the client) is influencing the therapy. Support for this argument from the clinical literature provides the theoretical bases for three processes outlined in the paper which will guide the effective psychotherapist in integrating the personal self with the professional and technical self: 1) inventory of self; 2) development of self-knowledge; and 3) acceptance of risks to self.     

University of Queensland diploma in social studies

“… Your abilities are too infant-like for doing much alone. You talk of pride: O, that you could turn your eyes towards the napes of your necks, and make but an interior survey of your good selves!” (Coriolanus, Act II, Scene I.)     

Method Madness

I caution you not to expect a cookbook solution to your difficulty. I cannot tell you what to do in ten easy steps. Precious few successful career searches are conducted in so mechanical a fashion. You must decide the best sequence of events for yourself. —Howard Figler, The Complete Job Search Handbook     

A Cultural Challenge: Understanding Evolution

Abstract

To what extent can what we know from science about the origins of the universe and of life in the universe influence our basic human quest for understanding? From modern science we know that the birth and death of stars is very important. If it were not happening, you and I would not be here. In order to get the chemical elements to make the human body, we had to have three generations of stars. Did we happen by chance or by necessity in this evolving universe? There is a third element here that is very important. It is what I call @opportunity.@ What this means is that the universe is so prolific in offering the opportunity for the success of both chance and necessary processes that such a character of the universe must be included in the discussion. Within such a universe all living things came to be through Neo-Darwinian evolution and the so-called Intelligent Design Movement is not a valid alternative.

If we confront what we know of origins scientifically with religious faith in God the Creator, in the senses described above, what results? I would claim that the detailed scientific understanding of origins has no bearing whatsoever on whether God exists or not. It has a great deal to do with my knowledge of God, should I happen to believe he exists.     

After inclusion. Thinking with Julian Go's ‘Thinking against empire: Anticolonial thought as social theory’

This contribution engages Go's generative invitation to think against empire by thinking through the epistemic and disciplinary implications of such endeavour. I zoom in on the need to explicitly address the purpose and ethos of scholarly inquiry and how that translates into decolonial academic praxis. Thinking with Go's invitation to think against empire, I feel compelled to constructively engage the limitations and impossibilities of decolonising disciplines such as Sociology. I glean from the various attempts at inclusion and diversity in society and argue that adding or including Anticolonial Social Thought/marginalised voices and peoples in the existing corridors of power—such as canons or advisory boards—is at best a minimal rather than a sufficient condition of decolonisation or going against empire. This raises the question of what comes after inclusion. Rather than offer a ‘correct’ or single alternative anticolonial way, the paper explores the pluriversally inspired method(ological) avenues that appear when we commit to thinking about what happens after inclusion when the goal is decolonisation. I expand on my ‘discovery’ and engagement with the figure and political thought of Thomas Sankara and how this led me to abolitionist thought. The paper then offers a patchwork of methodological considerations when engaging the what, how, why?—questions of research. I engage with questions of purpose, mastery, and colonial science and turn to the generative potential of approaches such as grounding, Connected Sociologies, epistemic Blackness, and curating as methods. Thinking with abolition and Shilliam's (2015) distinction between colonial and decolonial science, between knowledge production and knowledge cultivation, the paper invites us to not only think of what we need to do more of or better when taking Anticolonial Social Thought seriously, but also what we might need to let go of.     

With the Best of Intentions

Abstract

Charities and humanitarian organisations in Singapore that were involved in post-Tsunami relief and reconstruction work are repeatedly queried by volunteers, donors, and journalists. The world has pledged and donated billions to Tsunami relief and reconstruction, and I have personally given money to Singapore charities. Why do I still read about needy people in temporary shelters? Where has the money gone? Another question reflects similar sentiments of puzzlement, even frustration: I am moved by the devastation and would like to help by volunteering my time and expertise. I have signed up to volunteer with several humanitarian organisations. I am highly qualified and could help people. Why am I still not sent overseas?

These are good questions that deserve solid answers. This article discusses the latest thinking in relief circles as to which volunteers are best sent overseas and how donations can most responsibly be used for effective and sustainable reconstruction. The authors draw on Singapore's experience with providing relief in the aftermath of the Tsunami along with Dr. Tay Keong Tan's observations of relief and rehabilitation efforts in the Tsunami-affected areas of Sri Lanka and Indonesia. The article finds that volunteering requires much more than just a giving heart. Also, donations may be used most effectively by thinking long-term rather than just short-term. Further, donations are best administered in a way coordinated with local relief plans and in consultation with local people. The article closes by considering lessons for volunteers, donors, and humanitarian relief agencies from the Tsunami's aftermath.     

The Organisation and the Mouth of Hell

FLESH

‘We are now beginning a two week consultation period—but let me say this [finger raised for emphasis)—if you are not for this project [dramatic pause) you ought to be looking for a move elsewhere’. (Announcement preceding a post‐1992 university restructuring, April 2002)

‘Hang on. I am just parking the car. I am walking into the building. I am now entering the mouth of hell…’ (Conversation with a friend who was calling from his mobile phone as he entered his workplace)

‘My heart sinks every time I have to go there. It takes away your spirit’. (Former colleague writing about her experiences of going to work)

‘I am nailed to the desk at the moment…’. (My email to friend in another institution) ‘Your email was full of Catholic imagery’. (Reply)

‘We live on that border, crossroads beings, crucified beings’. (Kristeva, 1987 Kristeva, J. 1987. Tales of love, Edited by: Roudiez, L. New York: Columbia University Press.  [Google Scholar]: 254)