The public life of white affects

The growing political power of racialized groups in white‐supremacist societies has unsettled the hegemonic position of whiteness. In the United States, this political shift has led to the linguistic repositioning of whiteness within public discourse as visible and vulnerable rather than unmarked and dominant; such repositioning operates as part of a larger strategy for maintaining white supremacy. Within white publics, which are simultaneously constituted through white public space, white public discourse, and white affects, those who are white‐identified linguistically engage in affective performances that reassert racial dominance by invoking claims of wounded whiteness. The article compares the affective strategies of white public discourse found, on the one hand, in ethnographic interviews with white youth in liberal educational spaces in California and, on the other hand, in the mediatized discourse of the US racist far right. The analysis identifies five affective discourse strategies deployed in the white public discourse of both groups: colormute racism; disavowals of racism; appropriations of diversity discourses; performances of white fragility; and claims of reverse racism. This shared set of discursive strategies is part of the larger convergence and mutual dependence of militant racism and mainstream racism in protecting all white people’s possessive investment in white supremacy.     

Risking safety and rights: online sex work,crimes and ‘blended safety repertoires’

It has been well established that those working in the sex industry are at various risks of violence and crime depending on where they sell sex and the environments in which they work. What sociological research has failed to address is how crime and safety have been affected by the dynamic changing nature of sex work given the dominance of the internet and digital technologies, including the development of new markets such as webcamming. This paper reports the most comprehensive findings on the internet‐based sex market in the UK demonstrating types of crimes experienced by internet‐based sex workers and the strategies of risk management that sex workers adopt, building on our article in the British Journal of Sociology in 2007. We present the concept of ‘blended safety repertoires’ to explain how sex workers, particularly independent escorts, are using a range of traditional techniques alongside digitally enabled strategies to keep themselves safe. We contribute a deeper understanding of why sex workers who work indoors rarely report crimes to the police, reflecting the dilemmas experienced. Our findings highlight how legal and policy changes which seek to ban online adult services advertising and sex work related content within online spaces would have direct impact on the safety strategies online sex workers employ and would further undermine their safety. These findings occur in a context where aspects of sex work are quasi‐criminalized through the brothel keeping legislation. We conclude that the legal and policy failure to recognize sex work as a form of employment, contributes to the stigmatization of sex work and prevents individuals working together. Current UK policy disallows a framework for employment laws and health and safety standards to regulate sex work, leaving sex workers in the shadow economy, their safety at risk in a quasi‐legal system. In light of the strong evidence that the internet makes sex work safer, we argue that decriminalisation as a rights based model of regulation is most appropriate.     

College Students’ Perceptions of Media Portrayals of Divorce

This study takes an exploratory, qualitative approach to examine college students’ perceptions about divorce in the media. Findings suggest that participants perceived both positive and negative representations of divorced families in the media they consume, highlighting the complex nature of navigating and communicating through a divorce. Specifically, college students reported on aspects of the ex-spousal relationship, how children are affected, and the contrast between life pre- and postdivorce. An inductive theme analysis revealed several positive and negative media representations of divorce. Largely, college students perceive media messages about divorce to be accurate portrayals and impactful representations.     

A revised approach to racism in youth multiculture: the significance of schoolyard conversations about sex,dating and desire

Anxieties about social cohesion in multicultural societies have prompted scrutiny of how young people negotiate culturally diverse spaces. A key perspective of the literature at the intersections of youth studies and urban multiculture is that young people shift between racist and convivial modes of relationality to navigate their complex social worlds. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in a culturally diverse high school in Melbourne, Australia, I suggest that this binary framing fails to capture some of the diverse logics and practices within multicultural youth sociality. Reconciling dichotomous conceptual frames that position young people as moving back-and-forth between forms of exclusion and openness, I propose an alternative frame – a perverse form of everyday cosmopolitanism – through which to consider young people’s intercultural relations. To do this, I draw on young people’s conversations about sex, dating and desire as an entry point for new theorising about racism. Race and ethnicity were cornerstones of students’ frequent discussions about sexual ‘tastes’ and activity, discourses that have racist histories and effects. However, students did not understand their social world in such terms. These students’ social practices offer a situated illustration of how racism can function as part of a more inclusive cosmopolitan ethos in young lives, which I term ‘perverse cosmopolitanism’.     

Family violence in gambling help-seeking populations

Elevated rates of family violence among treatment-seeking problem gamblers compared to general population estimates have been reported in Spain, Canada and Australia. This study examined the occurrence of family violence among 454 problem gambling help-seeking clients (370 gamblers, 84 affected others) recruited through 3 national gambling treatment services in New Zealand. Measures used were the Problem Gambling Severity Index, and a modified version of the HITS Scale which assessed physical, emotional, verbal and sexual abuse. Past-year family violence among gamblers in this sample was 46.8% for victimization, 41.2% for perpetration and 55.0% for any form of family violence. Among affected others the occurrence was 65.5% for victimization, 57.1% for perpetration and 71.4% for any form of violence. The most common type of violence was verbal intimate partner violence. Affected others and women gamblers reported higher rates of violence victimization and perpetration. These findings underscore the importance of screening gambling help-seeking clients for family violence, and the development of prevention and treatment programmes to address violence in this population, with particular attention to affected others and women gamblers. Future research should assess coercive control and the gendered nature of family violence among problem gambling help-seekers.     

Nativity Seen in the Anthropocene: Contemporary Fieldwork and Subjective Challenges

Ongoing political changes, diasporic mobilities and new communication modalities present anthropologists with novel challenges for conducting ethnographic field work. As both configurations of and expectations for varied forms of social identity change, so too has the notion of the native, what Arjun Appadurai once called the technical preserve of anthropologists. Through reflection on contemporary field work experiences in Kazakhstan, the Philippines and South Korea, this set of papers considers how changing political and cultural regimes, diasporic mobilities and social media also tag the native anthropologist, a concept which can be to the advantage of the researcher, but also can create new problems and complexities for research.     

Linking family engagement with a rights perspective: macro factors influencing practice

While child welfare practitioners in many countries are struggling to develop methods of effective family engagement, they operate within different national and cultural contexts that influence, both positively and negatively, the ability to engage with families. Increasingly, international comparisons are necessary to further understanding of the development of social work practice. This is particularly necessary because most countries utilize international frameworks (such as the United National Convention on the Rights of the Child) to provide guidance in the development of policies, programs, and interventions. Each country (and locality) struggles to advance practice to be more effective and humane. Our paper offers a comparative analysis focused on family-oriented and rights-based frameworks of different countries. Based on a review of current national policies and a review of the literature regarding family-based practices, we examine similarities and differences among four countries: the United Kingdom, Sweden, the United States, and South Korea. These countries were selected because they have some similarities (advanced industrialized democracies, professional social work, and formal child protection systems) but have some differences in their social welfare systems (policies, specific practices, and socio-cultural context). These differences can be utilized to advance understanding regarding the promise and potential for family engagement strategies. We then discuss the utility of this comparison for theory-building in the arena of child-care practice and conclude by identifying the challenges and limitations of this work.     

A Framework for Enabling Evidence-based Practice in Allied Health

Evidence-based practice (EBP) is upheld as best practice in health and human services but there is a need for more research on how this approach can be enabled in day-to-day practice. This qualitative study examined EBP with allied health managers and practitioners in a health service network (n = 17). The findings highlight the systemic nature of EBP and the extent to which it involves both individual and environmental attributes. Individual attributes include clear understanding of EBP, relevant knowledge and skills, and motivation and passion. Environmental attributes are the presence of an organisational culture that values and prioritises EBP and an integrated mix of research support services, professional development activities, supervision and mentorship, and university partnerships. Theoretical frameworks can be useful for making sense of complex processes, planning, and evaluating change. Therefore, the findings are presented as a framework incorporating reflective questions relating to the elements identified as enabling EBP.     

The Impact of Formal and Informal Respite Care on Foster,Adoptive, and Kinship Parents Caring for Children Involved in the Child Welfare System

This paper reports the results of a quantitative 42-item survey that explored foster, adoptive, and kinship parents’ (N = 160) utilization of different types of respite services (formal, informal, and a mixture of formal and informal), as well as their impressions of the impact of respite care on aspects of their lives related to family cohesion and stability, caring for their children, and their personal wellbeing. An exploratory cross-sectional, survey design was used to assess both the formal and informal respite care experiences of the foster, adoptive, and kinship caregivers. Two-tailed Fisher’s exact tests were used to examine the relationship between the type of respite received and caregivers’ respite experiences. Findings indicated that parent experiences differed depending on the type of respite services they received. Specifically, parents who used a mixture of formal and informal respite reported positive experiences related to respite more frequently than the other two types of respite groups, while those who received only informal respite reported less benefit than others. Parents who used formal respite (either alone or mixed with informal respite) reported greater stress reduction. The greatest increase in family stability was reported by parents who received a mix of informal and formal respite. While this study revealed clear benefits for families to using both informal and formal respite services, the findings suggest that formal respite care was helpful to parents regardless of whether used alone or in combination with informal care.     

Governmentality within Children's Technological Play: Findings from a Critical Discourse Analysis

In many countries today, digital technology and instant communication are embedded in children's everyday lives to the extent that their play frequently incorporates smartphones, the Internet and other technologies. In this paper, we explore the recent historical conditions within the New Zealand context that have increased the accessibility of these technologies and imbued them with particular meanings. We suggest that from a Foucauldian perspective, these technologies can be seen as a form of subtle disciplinary power using techniques of governmentality through which children's ways of thinking are shaped to benefit societal requirements of the current historical era.