Entrepreneurs and producers: Identities of Finnish farmers in 2001 and 2006

The farmers' role within the EU has recently been under reconstruction: in addition to primary agricultural production farmers should fulfil multiple functions such as maintaining the rural landscape, conserving nature and providing services. One essential feature of this new role is the demand for entrepreneurship. Farmers should be capable of competing in the worldwide, global agricultural market. They are also encouraged to diversify into business activities beyond agriculture. How do farmers see themselves in this situation? Is their self-perception compatible with this new reconstruction of the farming economy and the farmers' role? Research, thus far, seems to indicate that traditional or production oriented identities are still dominant among farmers. But there is also some evidence that new identities, such as the entrepreneurial identity, are emerging. In our study we are especially interested in how Finnish farmers have met the demand for adapting to the role of an entrepreneur. We approach the issue of the farmers' changing role from a social psychological perspective by utilizing the concept of identity. Our empirical evidence comes from two nation-wide postal questionnaire data sets, both containing samples from three subgroups: conventional farmers focusing solely on primary agricultural production, diversified farmers who also had other business besides agricultural production, and rural non-agricultural small-scale businesses. The results show that Finnish farmers do not experience “entrepreneur” as something distant from themselves and as not fitting in with their world of ideas, as the work of some researchers would depict. Instead, the majority of Finnish farmers, especially diversified farmers, conceive of themselves both as entrepreneurs and as producers.     

Negotiation of Sexual Identity in Gay On-Air Talent on West Texas Radio and Television Media

ABSTRACT

This analytic autoethnography explores identity negotiation in on-air media personalities in West Texas by augmenting the author’s personal experience with the lived experiences of five other gay radio/television on-air personalities. Employing the communication of identity theory, results indicate conflicts between the personal and communal frames, the relational and communal frames, and the enactment frame with all other frames. Strategies used to help navigate these conflicts include employment of hegemonic masculinity norms, self-monitoring, and assimilation.     

论祁韵士《西陲竹枝词》中的国家认同感

以诗言志、以文记事是中国诗歌的优良传统,而竹枝词则聚合两者功能,广为传承。祁韵士的《西陲竹枝词》完美地结合了诗的"志"和文的"事"功能,作为一名西域文明的热爱者和研究者,他以竹枝词的形式描绘了西域的史地风貌和民俗风情,从历史认同感、空间一体感,以及对西域民情风俗的认同感三方面来表达他对西域的认同。     

社会资本与城市居民社会经济地位认同

社会资本通过影响人们的社会经济地位,进而影响人们社会经济地位的主观评价;通过拜年网的垂直差异性与水平差异性的测量城市居民拥有的社会资本;城市居民拜年网的水平差异性越大,拥有的横向社会资本就越丰富,越有助于提高社会经济地位,并对自己的社会经济地位评价较高;城市居民拜年网的垂直差异性越大,拥有的纵向社会资本就越丰富,越可能获得较高的社会经济地位,并认为自己有较高的社会经济地位;在实证研究的基础上验证了理论假设。     

“社会空间”视角下的城市贫困——基于保定市北市区的实地调查

"社会空间"视角是当代西方一种重要的城市问题研究思路,重点关注城市空间的"差异和不平模式",对国内城市贫困问题的研究具有重要参考价值。这一视角下的实地调查表明,在居住空间、日常活动空间和购物空间三个层面,较其他群体,城市贫困居民体现出了一定的空间差异性;进一步考察主体角度的空间认同和抗争,则发现当前社会转型期城市贫困在社会空间层面已经呈现出一些聚集和隔离的趋势。基于此,建议在政府主导下,在城市整体规划和改造过程中兼顾"空间正义",将"民生"和"减贫"纳入到主流日程规划中以应对未来城市社会空间问题。     

DOUBLE NEGATIONS: HONG KONG CULTURAL IDENTITY IN HOLLYWOOD'S TRANSNATIONAL REPRESENTATIONS

This article attempts to develop a critical understanding of the reconstitution of Hong Kong identity in Hollywood productions involving Hong Kong film talents. It argues that the ‘local’ in the city's historical context of the nineties no longer refers to any entity pertaining to a particular locality and culture but is always already determined by the framework of the transnational, which structures the perception of its local social reality. In particular, the paper suggests that the remaking of Hong Kong cultural identity in Hollywood films could be grasped in terms of the notion of a double negation. While the formation of such an identity is based on a negation of Chineseness, Hong Kong's transnational crossing to Hollywood initiates another negation that negates the very symbolic realm common to Chineseness. Jackie Chan's Hollywood blockbuster, Rush Hour, is used to illuminate the ways in which Hong Kong film stars and directors working for the global entertainment syndicate re-appropriate their agency in the production of a transnational narrative of their identity.     

WHAT MAKES THE LOCAL? A BRIEF CONSIDERATION OF THE REJUVENATION OF HONG KONG IDENTITY

This paper ascertains what makes the local and why the local is important, in the context of change in Hong Kong due to the political transition to PRC sovereignty.In doing so, I hope to pose a modest polemical challenge to cultural studies' tendency to overlook seemingly simplistic empirical information. The return of Hong Kong to China in 1997 has led to a contraction of the political sphere, as the convergence of political structures curbed the development of local identities. The label or category ‘Hong Kong people’ was then appropriated with a specific meaning for the local to resist encroachment of the national. It was true that the high intensity of dominant national discourses during the political transition created a favourable atmosphere for re-nationalization. However, as soon as the political transition was over, Hong Kongers re-adhered to their own label in their struggle for cultural autonomy.Their strong cultural affect toward various national icons during the transition quickly diminished. This multiyear discourse study (1996–1998), which utilizes social scientific methods in conjunction with cultural theories, illustrates important political and methodological impulses necessary for the formulation of a socio-political approach to cultural studies within the Hong Kong context.     

大学生革命精神认同力研究

大学生是祖国的未来,他们对革命精神的认同力直接反映着一个国家的精神建构。随着全球化和网络时代的到来,大学生对革命精神的认同发生了很大变化。调查发现,当代大学生在对革命精神的知晓、认同、反感、思考与选择五个维度上各有特点,基本状况是:革命精神知晓度比较高,认同度持中,反感存在,思考与选择则较世俗化。由此,提升当代大学生革命精神认同力应该从丰富大学生了解革命精神的途径、倡导革命精神中符合时代要求的内容、制定切合各群体的价值和道德标准、高度重视"官德"建设对于革命精神认同力的正效应等方面入手。     

Commentary

Abstract

The diagnosis of Gender Identity Disorder (GID) in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM; American Psychiatric Association, 2000) continues to be controversial. Three papers by Hill et al. (2005), Lev (2005), and Winters (2005) each offer a critique of this diagnosis. Drawing from our clinical experience and research with transgender youth and adults as well as the scientific literature on gender dysphoria, we will comment on the main issues raised by these authors: the criteria reflect bias, who needs this diagnosis, and how can we lessen the associated stigma. Our discussion will clarify the rationale behind GID, and illustrate the dilemmas inherent in reform or removal of the diagnosis from the DSM.     

Oriental Othering and National Identity: A review of Early Israeli Anthropological Studies of Palestinians

Israeli culturalism, like Israeli identity at large, is premised on a two-pronged negation-that of the Jewish diaspora and that of the Arab East. Its emergence was assisted, directly or indirectly, by academic anthropology. The formative cohort of Israeli anthropology, mainly male researchers who came of academic age in the 1960s and 1970s, displayed stronger preoccupation with the Palestinian citizens of Israel than is normally recognized. This preoccupation, and the marginal status of Palestinians as a minority trapped within the ethno-territorial Jewish project, render the relationship between anthropological knowledge, Israeli statehood and constructions of Israeli identity particularly suggestive. The combination of these elements, so deeply integrated into Israeli public discourse, resurfaces in a grotesque, exaggerated form, as Israelis grapple to make sense of the Palestinian Intifada of 2000-2001 and of Wahabist inspired terrorism and America's 'War Against Terror' further a field.