Fengshui your graffiti: embodied spatial practices in the ‘city of gambling’

ABSTRACT

To date, the academic discussion of graffiti culture in Greater China borrows a set of theoretical assumptions or preoccupations based on Euro-American graffiti subculture practices, focusing on the artistic dimensions of graffiti. This article, based on an ethnography in Macau, tries to re-examine two forms of local graffiti culture – the one influenced by hip hop culture, the other by the Chinese writing tradition – and endeavours to analyse the logic of their different spatial strategies and embodied practices.     

„Drop your tools!“

This essay unfolds its subject matter ‘resistance’ in a pointed way on various levels referring to learning as a personal, social and organisational process. On the one hand the significance of resistance for learning is analysed: resistance here has an irritating effect within the system and allows the learning process to be understood as oscillating between adaptation and rejection. On the other hand this essay probes into the development of dynamic forms of resistance against learning occasionally triggerd off by the process of learning itself.     

How to turn your friends into enemies: Causes and outcomes of customers’ sense of betrayal in crisis communication

Crises are violations of customers’ expectations for a company. Loyal customers who feel betrayed due to the violations of expectations often become the company’s worst enemies. To extend the line of research of situational crisis communication theory (SCCT), this study explored how attributed responsibility, customer-company relationship (CCR), and their interaction affect betrayal. A company’s defining attributes and customer-company identification (CCI) shape customers’ expectations for a company. This study also examined how a direct threat to a company’s defining attribute in a crisis and CCI affect betrayal. A total of 395 Whole Foods customers participated in an online quasi-experiment.The antecedent concepts from SCCT all affect betrayal, with the attributed responsibility being the strongest predictor. Customers also feel more betrayed when the crisis directly threatens the company’s defining attribute and when they strongly identify with the company. Consequently, sense of betrayal has strong effects on customers’ attitudinal, emotional, and intentional responses.     

Wait until your father gets home? Mother's and fathers’ spanking and development of child aggression

This study examined whether fathers’ and mothers’ spanking contributed to development of child aggression in the first 5 years of life. We selected parents (N = 1,298) who were married or cohabiting across all waves of data collection. Cross-lagged path models examined fathers’, mothers’, and both parents’ within-time and longitudinal associations between spanking and child aggression when the child was 1, 3, and 5 years of age. Results indicated that mothers spanked more than fathers. When examining fathers only, fathers’ spanking was not associated with subsequent child aggression. When examining both parents concurrently, only mothers’ spanking was predictive of subsequent child aggression. We found no evidence of multiplicative effects when testing interactions examining whether frequent spanking by either fathers or mothers was predictive of increases in children’s aggression. This study suggests that the processes linking spanking to child aggression differ for mothers and fathers.     

“This will help your children”: Service providers’ experiences with military families during cycles of deployment

ABSTRACT

Military families face not only the same challenges as other families, but also unique issues due to their military involvement. Parenting programs for civilian families can be helpful, but they do not generally cover the specific issues faced by military families. The purpose of this qualitative study was to gather information from a focus group of eight service providers about the types of issues that affect military families, such that content and delivery of workshops at a social service agency could be formed to specifically cater to military families. This study utilized a phenomenological approach, and analyses revealed areas for social service involvement around the cycle of deployment. Specifically, social services could be helpful by using psychoeducational and normalization techniques around the five major themes that resulted from this study: (1) the issues of servicemembers psychologically withdrawing before deployment, (2) family cohesion and connectedness during and after deployment, (3) family stability during reintegration of the service member, (4) military families experience many of the same challenges that nonmilitary families do (such as domestic violence and financial issues), and (5) utilizing a military culture framework for all military family programs.     

Acting your age? Sports science and the ageing body

The medicalisation of aging and old age constructs ageing as first and foremost a biomedical event and as a process of inevitable decline. In sports science and sports medicine the functional decrements normally associated with ageing are being addressed. There is evidence reported in the scientific literature suggesting that certain exercise interventions can ‘reduc[e] or prevent[…] functional declines linked to secondary aging’ [Goggin, N.L., and Morrow, J.R. Jr. (2001). "Physical Activity Behaviors of Older Adults." Journal of Aging and Physical Activity 9, 58–66.].However a sociological critique is necessary. Whilst sports science seeks to position itself as a key player in the fight against ageing, it also opens the potential for the reconstruction of the ageing body as fit. However the evidence that exercise can fundamentally reshape older bodies is equivocal. A new frame is proposed which divorces exercise from anti-ageing purposes and uses the science of exercise to enable older people to recover a sense of physical competence as a creative pursuit in its own right.     

Does your older adult client have a gambling problem?

Pathological gambling is becoming an increasing problem in today's culture, particularly because opportunities and inducements to gamble abound. This article describes symptoms, consequences, and comorbidities experienced by pathological gamblers. Gambling pathology is often invisible because pathological gamblers seldom disclose gambling problems to their primary care provider. Thus, nurses will benefit from knowledge of the physical and emotional signs of the disorder. A two-question assessment tool, the Lie/Bet Questionnaire, is useful in helping nurses identify pathological gamblers. Interventions and treatment options, including group therapy and environmental modification, are also discussed. As always, education concerning problems and consequences of pathological gambling is a first step. Because research has indicated that visits to casinos by older adults have doubled since 1975, the authors use an example of an older adult to clarify the issues. Although the article's content is applicable to clients across the life span, it has particular significance for older adults.     

How you “act your age” when you watch TV

Americans watch a great deal of television. But the factors traditionally considered to determine or explain television usage—availability of free time, low income or class status, low education, emotional difficulties, and lack of structured social interactions—are not generalizable across the adult life span. The television viewing of people over the age of 30 has been understudied—a research bias that mirrors society's youth orientation and essentially excludes older adults from this model. The author analyzed data collected in the National Opinion Research Center's 1988 General Social Survey to assess the determinants of television viewing for adults of all ages. Results indicate that as persons perceive themselves to be in different stages of life and take on age-appropriate roles, tasks, and perspectives, they have distinctively different reasons for viewing. Second, the factors considered to determine TV viewing in the traditional model fit the pattern of younger adults' viewing best while predicting the behavior of the elderly least. The author proposes an interpretation of the findings, and discusses future research avenues including the development of age-sensitive models and theories.An earlier version of this article was presented at the annual meeting of the Eastern Sociological Society in April 1992.     

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WWW.Womenofchina.cn is the English website of the All-China Women's Federation(ACWF).It offers comprehensive information on Chinese women and wishes to share Chinese women's lives, experiences and perspectives with the world.The website has columns including Newswire, Focus,People,Data,Women's     

‘How can a chord be weird if it expresses your soul?’ Some critical reflections on the diagnosis of Aspergers syndrome

This paper questions the way in which the diagnosis of Aspergers syndrome has come to be widely accepted and used as an essentially medical category. It does so by drawing upon sociological and historical analyses of society, psychiatry and psychology, as well as the writings of service users, other practitioners in the autistic spectrum disorder field and the author's own clinical experience. It is argued that the seeming popularity of this label within Western society may have as much to do with widespread social and cultural change during recent decades as with the supposed deficits of those who attract the diagnosis. The aims are to ask what this might mean for health and social care practice in this field and to encourage the growth of theories and approaches that are grounded more firmly in an awareness of the social environment, while also reflecting the varied experiences and standpoints of people who carry this label.     

Is your church “liked” on Facebook? Social media use of Christian congregations in the United States

Despite the increasing interests in social media platforms among religious congregations, little is known about the patterns of these organizations' social media use. This study examines religious congregations' adoption of Facebook, using the data from the 2012 National Congregations Study. The results show that Christian congregations' involvement in nonreligious activities, both social service and political activities, predicts their Facebook adoption. Congregations' membership size and staff resources are also positively associated with their Facebook use. Other organizational characteristics, including religious tradition, clergyperson's age, and urban location, also explain congregations' Facebook use. Overall, the findings suggest that Christian congregations' adoption of social media platforms is closely related with their community outreach and social marketing activities as well as their resources. This study concludes with suggestions for narrowing the gap in social media use between resource‐rich and resource‐restricted congregations, as well as between urban and rural congregations.     

‘It's a magnifying glass for your relationship’: a thematic analysis of motivations,benefits, and challenges in consensually non-monogamous relationships

The last decade has seen an increase in public and academic interest in consensual non-monogamy (CNM). CNM involves sexual and/or romantic relationships between multiple partners, with the consent of all individuals involved. Engagement in CNM is estimated at 5% of the general population, although due to stigma with the strong idealisation of monogamy in many cultures, it is a hidden population. This qualitative study explores the motivations, benefits, and challenges experienced in CNM relationships, an area that has been understudied despite the resurgence of interest in it. While previous research has mainly focused on comparisons between CNM and monogamy or individual types of CNM such as polyamory, this study seeks to provide a broader understanding of CNM relationships. We employ a critical realist framework and thematically analyse semi-structured interviews with eight participants. The results identify three overarching themes: mononormativity and cultural norms; growth and responsibility; and diversity and complexity; each has several subthemes. These findings suggest that CNM provides opportunities for greater diversification of needs and increased community and individual growth. The study also highlights the challenges experienced in CNM relationships and the strategies used to manage them, such as personal responsibility for managing difficult emotions and temporarily closing a relationship at times for relationship security. A novel finding in this study is that some individuals involved in CNM have internalised cultural norms and the idealisation of monogamy and need to unlearn these norms. This study adds to the existing knowledge on CNM and is expected to be of interest to clinicians and researchers seeking to understand its motivations, benefits, and challenges. Relationship therapists will benefit from increased knowledge of how to work with clients interested or engaged in CNM relationships. Overall, this study supports previous findings that CNM is a viable, enjoyable, yet sometimes challenging type of relationship.     

‘Shoot with your pen’: Isaac William(s) Wauchope’s Ingcamango Ebunzimeni and the power of speaking obscurely in public

This article explores Ingcamango Ebunzimeni, a collection of poems published in the latter months of 1912 by the African intellectual and missionary Isaac William(s) Wauchope (1852–1917). Wauchope is most prominently known for having written a poem that, among other things, incites his peers to ‘take paper and ink’ and ‘[s]hoot with your pen’. Ingcamango Ebunzimeni is a peculiar moment in the life and writing of Wauchope. In a remarkable series of events, Wauchope served a two‐year prison sentence in Tokai between 1910 and 1912. In the argument that follows, I raise a number of issues regarding the circumstances leading to the writing and publication of Ingcamango Ebunzimeni. Taking as a point of departure Wauchope’s seeming reluctance to explicitly engage his feelings about his imprisonment, I suggest that speaking ‘obscurely’ within a public context allows Wauchope to make utterances that begin to contest, in very complex ways, the fall from grace occasioned by his imprisonment. Wauchope’s poems address themselves to a context where the recent events of his life give rise to dire tensions between the dominant colonial version of his life story that holds him to be a ‘masquerading minister’ and its resistive corollary which seeks to redeem him as the unwilling victim of an unremorseful social order that, having generated a class of Christianised Africans as an example of civilisation, casts them down as a symptomatic failure of the very same process. Indeed, it is in addressing himself to both spheres of meaning simultaneously that Wauchope defines the complexity of Ingcamango Ebunzimeni.