Historical Thinking and Sports History: A Case Study Using the Brooklyn Dodgers

Abstract

This article discusses how the history of sports can serve as way to understand abstract concepts associated with local history and social studies education. An introductory discussion outlines how sports can engage and interest students, focusing especially on ideas related to history thinking (such as change and continuity). A case study using the Brooklyn Dodgers’ move to Los Angeles is used to illustrate these ideas, focusing on themes associated with suburbanization and urban renewal. A lesson plan is also provided.     

Couple-Level Patterns of Disclosure Process Beliefs and Their Association with Marital Satisfaction

Abstract

Grounded in symbolic interaction theory, we used latent class analysis (LCA) to investigate the preexisting patterns of belief surrounding the disclosure process in married relationships. With a sample of 131 heterosexual married dyads from the U.S., we found four classes: two classes represented similarity of spouses’ beliefs (Both High Beliefs and Neither High Beliefs), and two classes represented dissimilarity of spouses’ beliefs (where only the wife endorsed high beliefs, Wife High Beliefs, and where only the husband did, Husband High Beliefs). Husbands’ satisfaction was positively associated with membership in the Both High Beliefs class. An interaction between spouses’ satisfaction was found: the impact of wives’ satisfaction on class membership is dependent on husbands’ satisfaction. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Social work stories: situated views and larger visions in disciplinary scholarship and education

ABSTRACT

This paper is about the changing imaginations of social work in an increasingly entangled world. It is also about the ways in which literatures shared across time and space encourage us to identify with larger collectivities. My central argument is that if social work is to find a larger vision in the wake of the failure of a range of modern progress narratives, we must engage differently with the challenge posed by multiplying and sometimes conflicting knowledge communities. Thinking with contemporary debates in transdisciplinary critical social theory, I nominate and explore a number of alternative heuristics—‘generational problematic,’ ‘translational space,’ and ‘imagined communities’—in support of future work on the uneven temporal and spatial communities of affiliation that reproduce and change what social work is, or could be, about. I conclude with theoretical suggestions, and some thoughts toward how social work education might better support incoming generations to locate themselves within the broader life-course of the discipline and profession.     

Unintended consequences in traffic-light food labeling: A call for mixed methods in public health research

Abstract

Nudge theory describes how indirect suggestions and positive reinforcement can influence decision-making. We used nudge theory to implement a traffic-light labeling and choice architecture (modifying product placement) intervention at Harvard University cafeterias, but found no significant change in sales. Survey and focus group data showed that some students thought the labeling may exacerbate eating disorders, however, there is extremely limited research on potential negative consequences of labeling. One way to describe these findings is through 20th century philosopher Michel Foucault’s concept of biopower. Biopower manipulates cultural norms and nudges individuals to engage in self-surveillance and self-discipline, de facto subjugating themselves to certain ways of being. Biopower may lead to the creation of an in-group and an out-group based on who can adopt the new behaviors, such as healthy eating. Those in the out-group may face additional unintended consequences, highlighting the need for mixed-methods research to better evaluate public health interventions.     

Gender,technology and the ablenational Paralympic body politic

ABSTRACT

The Paralympic games is a pedagogic, pervasive, political, powerful, and ‘popular’ cultural site where the heightened visibility of disability bring into being specific forms of disability as they articulate within cultures, institutions and practices. Regarded as a ‘positive charge’ by Stuart Hall, the Paralympics intends to challenge the devalued disabled body politic of typical disability representation. This has been stimulated by the entry of Channel 4 as the UK Paralympic rights holders in 2012 which has seen greater media coverage of certain technologically enhanced cyborgian parasport bodies and an emerging celebrity / sexualized disability culture. This contemporary moment in disability representation provides a compelling space in which to (re-)address the gendered nature of hyper-visible Parasport hybrids, their potential to disrupt ‘normative’ relations of power, and, the wider impact on disability politics in a neoliberalised culture of widening and affective circuits of bodily inclusion and control. Drawing on an integrated content and textual analysis of 90?h of Paralympic programming from the Rio 2016 Games we highlight two emblematic segments so as to enhance our appreciation of contemporary disabled politics as it intersects with gender, technology and nation. We analyse these emblematic segments at the intersection of critical disability studies, cultural studies and sport, using concept of ablenationalism to highlight the extent certain technological capacitated parasport bodies perform gendered representational work as part of the seductive apparatus of neoliberal micro-governance suggestive of an emerging ecology of disability-gender relations. In doing so, we highlight the Paralympic contradictions and interrogate the assumed ‘positive charge’ of the contemporary (re-)presentation of disability.     

Enhancing the Practical Relevance of Research

This article seeks to encourage scholars to conduct research that is more relevant to the decisions faced by managers and policymakers, and addresses why research relevance matters, what relevance means in terms of a journal article, and how scholars can increase the relevance of their research. I define relevant research papers as those whose research questions address problems found (or potentially found) in practice and whose hypotheses connect independent variables within the control of practitioners to outcomes they care about using logic they view as feasible. I provide several suggestions for how scholars can enhance research relevance, including engaging practitioners in on‐campus encounters, at managerial conferences, and at crossover workshops; conducting site visits and practitioner interviews; working as a practitioner; and developing a practitioner advisory team. I describe several ways that scholars can convey relevant research insights into practitioners, including presenting at practitioner conferences, writing for practitioners in traditional crossover journals and in shorter pieces like op‐eds and blogs, and attracting the interest of those who write columns, blogs, and articles about research for practitioners. I conclude by describing a few ways that academic institutions can encourage more relevant research, focusing on journals, professional societies, and doctoral programs.     

近十年来土族研究综述

本文从历史、语言文字、文学艺术、宗教文化、婚姻家庭、经济发展等方面 ,对土族近十年来的研究状况作了总结 ,可资参考     

Conceptual frameworks and the philosophical foundations of general living systems theory

The continued expansion and fragmentation of biological disciplines impede education, communication, and efficient advance of biological research. Reversing these trends may require a unification of theories and concepts from all levels of biological organization. One form of this unification is the statement of generalizations that apply to all living systems. We explore the philosophical foundations of general theories of living systems by analyzing conceptual frameworks as they apply to biology. This analysis examines the relation of empirical observation, theories, and conceptual frameworks within the context of an individual scientist's conceptual continuum. Also presented are a small set of translevel generalizations that articulate our conceptual framework of living systems in terms of organismic system organization, the environmental system-organismic system dyad, system capacity, and system incorporation. A set of procedural rules are stated which suggest minimum criteria for the evaluation of the explanatory adequacy of biological theories. The relation of this work to other similar analyses and syntheses of biological knowledge is discussed.