It is sometimes argued that ideal theories in political philosophy are a form of ideology. This article examines arguments building on the work of Charles Mills and Raymond Geuss for the claim that ideal theories are cognitively distorting belief systems that have the effect of stabilizing unjust social arrangements. I argue that Mills and Geuss neither succeed in establishing that the content of ideal theories is necessarily cognitively defective in the way characteristic for ideologies, nor can they make plausible which (...) mechanisms ensure the alleged negative effects of the widespread acceptance of ideal theorizing. This does not mean that all hope is lost for the ideology objection, however. By turning to a second Marxian model of ideology, I argue that the ideological character of ideal theories is not so much a matter of their content, but rather of their form. Ideal theories falsely present the normative concepts that they use as semantically practice-independent and thereby block potential challenges from subordinate groups to dominant ideologies. It is therefore not the normative content of ideal theories which proves to be objectionable, but the particular role their concepts play in wider political discourse. (shrink)

Vinten looks at the relationship between Wittgenstein’s philosophy and the social sciences as well as at the ideological implications of Wittgenstein’s philosophy and applications of Wittgenstein’s philosophy to problems in social science. He examines and assesses the work of thinkers like Richard Rorty, Perry Anderson, and Chantal Mouffe. -/- “Robert Vinten has produced an impressively meticulous and wide-ranging discussion of how Wittgenstein’s mature philosophy can revitalize the social sciences. There is insight and scholarship on every page. This important book will (...) open up new possibilities for both philosophers and social scientists.” —Leonidas Tsilipakos, Lecturer, University of Bristol, UK. (shrink)

Ideology is commonly defined along functional, epistemic, and genetic dimensions. This article advances a reasonably unified account that specifies how they connect and locates the mechanisms at work. I frame the account along a recent distinction between anchoring and grounding, endorse an etiological reading of functional explanations, and draw on current work about the epistemology of delusion, looping effects, and structuring causes to explain how ideologies originate, reproduce, and possibly collapse. This eventually allows articulating how the legitimating function of ideologies (...) relates to the constitutive and causal role they play when embedded into the facts they are originally designed to anchor. (shrink)

This study explored the transcending experience as described by visual artists that sometimes occurs during the art-making process. The exploration was conducted within a philosophical framework informed by the researcher's practice of Transcendental Meditation (TM). From this perspective, transcending is related to personal, inner (subjective), and ephemeral aesthetic experiences which never-the-less make a powerful contribution to the visual artist's experience of the creative process and to a lesser extent, the final product. The focus of the study was on the identification (...) and documentation of the personal and subjective aspects of art-making. The study consisted of two parts; (a) this written thesis that elucidates and supports the argument, and (b) an exhibition of paintings, drawings, and journals which represent a personal narrative. The research questions for the written document are directed towards extracting artists' statements that describe the nature and benefits of transcending during art-making. Document analysis techniques were employed to study the writings of a variety of artists and to create a mosaic of insightful commentary. As a visual arts educator, the significance of the study related to the benefits of the art-making process for students of all ages. Both the exhibition and written document are presented to demonstrate that art-making and the viewing of art can provide access to silent (inner) experiences of the human mind. Strengthening the students' spiritual/aesthetic experience through art-making may bring the benefits of personal enrichment for some students by promoting the development of stronger self-concepts and self-esteem. This study presents research about an aspect of visual arts education that has to date been largely ignored. Arguments for the development of self-realization and a fuller understanding of the aesthetic experience may contribute to a case for strengthening the place of the visual arts within the curriculum. (shrink)

A profile of teacher competences is described and interrogated in the light of inherent, language-based problematics. It is argued that such texts tend to constrain the modes and parameters within which to think about one's practice, in addition to masking possible deficiences in education systems through a pathologisation of the individual practitioner. The importance of keeping alive alternative discourses is stressed. Such discourses, it is argued, should recognise the complex idiosyncratic, contingent aspects of teaching and learning, and should include students' (...) reflections on their own in- and out-school experiences through dialogic, autobiographical writing. (shrink)

This article theorizes the inseparable relationship of power and knowledge. It argues that there is a transhistorical constant in the production and dissemination of knowledge: a dialectical contradiction within its institutional heart. The production, dissemination and, importantly, the consolidation of knowledge, is bound up with the obfuscation of this and restriction or prevention of knowledge dissemination. These latter processes are part of the concept I call structural mystification. The article explains and theoretically justifies this concept and details the manner of (...) its working, using the example of educational systems. (shrink)

This article seeks to examine how religious ideas that are not the focus of a particular halakhic question become the crux of the ruling, thereby molding it and dictating its bias. We will attempt to demonstrate this through a study of Jewish medical ethics, based on some of the rulings of one of the greatest halakhic decisors of the previous generation: Rabbi Eliezer Yehuda Waldenberg (1915–2006). Rabbi Waldenberg molds his rulings on the basis of a religious principle asserting that the (...) legitimacy of any medical procedure is qualified and limited. Rabbi Waldenberg rejects certain accepted medical practices, including plastic surgery, in vitro fertilization, and organ transplants. Even if these procedures are regarded by other halakhic decisors as being legitimate, for Rabbi Waldenberg they are ethically and religiously improper, and therefore they are halakhically forbidden. (shrink)

: Three major strategies exist for the protection of endangered habitat and species: (1) land acquisition programs, (2) government legislation and regulatory agencies, and (3) "stewardship" programs that are voluntary and community-based. While all of these strategies have merit, we suggest that stewardship holds particular advantages and should be considered more often as a strategy of first choice. In this article, we examine the Municipal Wetland Stewardship program of Newfoundland, a popular and successful Canadian policy for the local protection of (...) wetlands. Important issues are at stake: competing philosophical foundations for managerial ecology, the value of "local ecological knowledge," principles of community-based conservation, the question of whether stewardship empowers local communities or controls them from afar, and ethical conflicts around American colonialism, hunting, and ecotourism. The results suggest that despite some potentially problematic ironies, the Newfoundland program provides a model for a public policy aimed both at the pragmatics of biophysical sustainability and at the ideals of environmental ethics, social justice, and democratic politics. (shrink)

This paper considers the trajectory of Althusser's Spinozism pre- and post-May ‘68. Where Althusser's application of Spinoza would often lead him into unknown or non-Marxist territory, one alternative way to think this relation is through the figure of Mao, whose concept of non-antagonistic contradiction I propose to read in terms of Spinoza's “determinate negation.” Although not going so far as to suggest that a certain combination of Mao and Spinoza would have enabled Althusser to “complete” Marx, this paper speculates on (...) this omission from his work and what positive insights we can draw from it retrospectively for developing Althusser's political philosophy. (shrink)

Mimicry is common among animals, plants, and other kingdoms of life. Humans in late capitalism, however, have devised an unique method of mimicking the signs that trigger evolutionarily-programmed instincts of their own species in order to manipulate them. Marketing and advertising are the most pervasive and sophisticated forms of known human mimicry, deliberately hijacking our instincts in order to select on the basis of one dimension only: profit. But marketing and advertising also strangely undermine their form of mimicry, deceiving both (...) the intended targets and the signaler simultaneously. Human forms of mimicry have the regular consequence of deceiving the imitator, reducing meta-cognitive awareness of the act and intentions surrounding such deception. Therefore, the deceiver in the end deceives himself as well as intended targets. Drawing on scholarship applying Niko Tinbergen’s ethological discovery of supernormal stimuli in animals to humans, this article analyzes sophisticated mass mimicry in contemporary culture, in both intended and unintended forms. (shrink)

ABSTRACTBased on an overview of the ways in which politics and the political have been thought in critical discourse analysis, the author calls for a focus on the metapolitical dimension of discourse. The author develops his notion of metapolitics on the basis of post-foundational insights into politics, the political and processes of politicization. Metapolitics refers to projects and struggles where conflicting modes and models of politics clash. Metapolitical debates potentially reshape the structure of the public realm as well as the (...) entities, borders and processes that constitute it. The author differentiates his descriptive and analytic use of the term from the way this signifier has been used programmatically by the anti-democratic New Right and its heirs. He demonstrates that metapolitical projects can be democratic as well as anti-democratic. In order to facilitate discourse analyses of metapolitical projects, debates and struggles, the author suggests that the metapolitical dimension of contemporary debates can be explored further by integrating insights from governmentality studies, studies of political rationality and the discourse theoretical logics approach with CDA. Moreover, a further exploration of the linguistic and textual underpinnings of metapolitics constitutes a promising pathway for future investigation. The study of metapolitics should be part and parcel of the transdisciplinary domain of critical discourse studies so that our understanding of the linguistic and non-linguistic features of metapolitical projects can be developed in equal measure at multiple levels of abstraction. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe concepts of ‘utopia’ and ‘ideology’ were key elements in political debate in the twentieth century, but seem to have disappeared from the scene in the twenty-first. After the collapse of communism, the media and intellectuals announced the demise of utopia, coinciding with the end of history and ideology. In common parlance, the use of the terms largely remains pejorative or, in academic circles, conceptually ambiguous. Despite their inherent ambiguity, this paper reflects on the role played by the concepts of (...) utopia, hope and political imagination in the mobilisation of people. Three recent examples of advertisements are analysed in order to understand how utopian rhetoric is used and how their reception depends on their inclusion within broader cultural and political narratives. (shrink)

The prominent literary theorist, Terry Eagleton, is one of a limited number of Marxist theorists to have taken Wittgenstein’s ideas seriously. He wrote the script for Derek Jarman’s film about Wittgenstein and his work in cultural theory is clearly indebted, to some extent, to Wittgenstein. His Ideology: an Introduction employs the Wittgensteinian notions of ‘family resemblance’ and ‘forms of life’ and he also leans on Wittgenstein’s remarks about epistemological matters in it. Among the novels inspired by Wittgenstein there is one (...) by Eagleton—Saints and Scholars—that has a semi-fictionalised version of Wittgenstein meeting in Dublin with James Connolly, Nikolai Bakhtin and Leopold Bloom. Eagleton has clearly both endeavoured to understand Wittgenstein as a person and engaged with Wittgenstein’s philosophical work. In this paper I will argue that Eagleton’s interpretation of Wittgenstein, in his paper ‘Wittgenstein’s Friends’, is defective in various respects, but I will conclude that the project of uniting the insights of Wittgenstein and Marx is nonetheless a sound one. (shrink)

This essay examines the political implications of Edo (present-day Tokyo) popular culture in early modern Japan by focusing on the interface between distinct forms of literary and visual representation and the configuration of social order (the status hierarchy and the division of labor), as well as moral and ideological discourses that were conducive to the reproduction of the order. Central to the forms of representation in Edo popular culture was the overarching literary and artistic principle, which I call a phrase (...) adapted from M.M. Bakhtin's work on Fyodor Dostoevsky. By creating a dialogical interaction of divergent voices and perspectives, Edo popular culture created pluralized, contentious images of Tokugawa society, images that underlined contradictory realities that had become widely discernible around the turn of the eighteenth century. The most salient of all the contradictions was the growing disjuncture between the ideological premise of social and economic hierarchies and their actual reversals. The dialogic imagination captured and accentuated the fluid and dynamic social interactions that threw the formal arrangements of social order into disarray, as well as the widely perceived tensions originating from these interactions, by supplying images that sharply contrasted with those that the Tokugawa authorities worked hard to foster and defend: of a harmonious, self-contained, and perfectly functioning society. (shrink)

It is said we live in a second Gilded Age, which makes our understanding of the first all the more relevant. Rosanne Currarino’sThe Labor Question in Americamakes the bold claim that, far from being a period of defeat for the Left, the original Gilded Age saw an expansion of democratic citizenship. A group of economists, social reformers and labour organisers transformed our understanding of political participation from the earlier, producerist to a more modern, consumerist ideal of social inclusion and collective (...) agency. However, on her own telling, Currarino’s ‘expansion’ comes across more as a ‘substitution’. Some workers gained in wages what they lost in control of the means of production. Though Currarino fairly identifies the utopian aspirations underlying the demand for higher levels of consumption, her narrative relies on an overly rigid distinction between production and consumption, missing out on the way in which consumption came to be defined in ways that assumed the workplace would be a site of submission. Finally,The Labor Questionfails to include, as parts of its narrative, the extraordinary violence that marked struggles over the labour question. In this context, the shift from ‘producerist’ emphases on worker control to ‘consumerist’ views of economic citizenship look more like an ideological displacement than they do a progressive expansion of democracy. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with rethinking the nature of social life in terms of how it appears — not to us academics at the centre of it, as consisting in a system, or a plurality of systems -but how it might appear from a position more in on the margins, at those moments when ordinary people must relate themselves to each other, unsystematically and practically. To do this, we must also rethink the nature of language and thought as possessing within (...) these moments, a formative or creative character — for it must have the ability to create practical connections between aspects of people's lives, as required, on the spot. This is to privilege the role of rhetoric in these regions over that of logic. This also leads to a rethinking of ideology and power: as being to do with, not ideas, but the practical shaping (or not) — in moments when in practical communication with others — of collective, sharable forms of life. Where it is in such moments, in which different people meet each other in socially constructing their lives together, that political struggles are their most intense, and where ideology can be detected at work. (shrink)

Julia Kristeva is known as rejecting feminism, nonetheless her work is useful for feminist theory. I reconsider Kristeva's rejection of feminism and her theories of difference, identity, and maternity, elaborating on Kristeva's contributions to debates over the necessity of identity politics, indicating how Kristeva's theory suggests the cause of and possible solutions to women's oppression in Western culture, and, using Kristeva's theory, setting up a framework for a feminist rethinking of politics and ethics.

The Irish Republic's economic success story has been simultaneously regarded as antithetical to and indicative of neoliberal hegemony. The question of the neoliberal pedigree of the Irish case is explored here from the perspective of mediatized representations of political economy. The paper's argument is advanced in three distinct stages. First, it outlines a theoretical and methodological rationale for the analysis itself. Second, it formulates a summary account of neoliberalism as discourse and ideology, introducing a key analytical distinction between ‘transparent’ and (...) ‘euphemized’ neoliberal discourses. Third, it presents an empirical overview of how neoliberal assumptions are articulated through mediatized representations of political economy. The article shows how the ‘Celtic Tiger’ can be understood as a case of neoliberal hegemony, as long as it is recognised that neoliberalism is hegemonically constituted through a plurality of discursive forms and rhetorical strategies. In addition, the paper highlights the constitutive role of media representation, especially the media rhetoric of Irish political leaders, in the production and reproduction of an Irish neoliberalism. (shrink)

What possesses aesthetic value? According to a broad view, it can be found almost anywhere. According to a narrower view, it is found primarily in art and is applied to other items by courtesy of sharing some of the properties that make artworks aesthetically valuable. In this paper I will defend the broad view in answering the question: how should we characterize aesthetic value and other aesthetic concepts? I will also criticize some alternative answers.

This paper takes as its starting point the observation of quasi-religious, ‘cultural’ characteristics in the dominant discourse of Western liberal democracy, and of ‘ideological’ characteristics in the discourse of Islamism – noting that both discourses rely, to some extent, upon the notion of rationality. Having provided working definitions of rationality, ideology, and culture, it goes on to argue that culture and ideology may be viewed as discursive macro-strategies which are related to the degree of power enjoyed by a given social (...) system at particular historical moments in time: the former being associated with the consolidation of established power and the latter with a bid to acquire power. It suggests that the general function of cultural and ideological strategies is to mask the underlying irrationalities of free-market democracy and Islamism, respectively, and concludes by considering some of the implications of this view in the context of globalization and the ‘war on terror’. (shrink)

A critical review of Bourdieu’s theory of the state is developed here against the backdrop of both his wider theoretical project and empirical studies. Elaborating the concepts of symbolic capital, symbolic violence, and symbolic domination, the centrality that Bourdieu accords to symbolic forms is compared to benchmark Weberian accounts that start with the state monopoly of violence. Reviewing also some of the burgeoning secondary literature discussing his theory of the state, Bourdieu’s writings, which encompass various antinomies, are shown to vacillate (...) between two distinct perspectives—a strong and a weak theory of the state. His rejection of the “physicalist” approaches of Marx, Elias, and Tilly is elaborated and subject to a counter-critique, particularly in relation to the notion of symbolic “violence.” Bourdieu’s account of the state is shown to be as much a political as theoretical intervention. His antagonism towards Marxist accounts in particular is shown to be rooted in a pragmatic interest in the role of the “left hand of the state” in progressive reform; and this perspective is traced back to the twin influences of Durkheim and Hegel, French republicanism, and in particular the potential of the state to express a universal interest. At the same time, compared with sophisticated Marxist and Weberian accounts and the work of Norbert Elias and Gramsci, Bourdieu’s theory is shown to be severely lacking in the way that he deals with violence and coercion. His “expanded materialism,” particularly with the “strong theory,” bends the stick too far and overplays the symbolic basis of consent. Nevertheless, Bourdieu’s insights with regard to the pervasive influences of state practices of classification, taxonomy, delegation, and naming are shown to have real utility with regard to focused empirical investigations of the state in modern societies. (shrink)

How do we achieve social justice? How do we change society for the better? Some would argue that we must do it by changing the laws or state institutions. Others that we must do it by changing individual attitudes. I argue that although both of these factors are important and relevant, we must also change culture. What does this mean? Culture, I argue, is a set of social meanings that shapes and filters how we think and act. Problematic networks of (...) social meanings constitute an ideology. Entrenched ideologies are resilient and are barriers to social change, even in the face of legal interventions. I argue that an effective way to change culture is through social movements and contentious politics, and that philosophy has a role to play in promoting such change. (shrink)

Concerns over conflicts of interest in academic research and medical practice continue to provoke a great deal of discussion. What is most obvious in this discourse is that when COIs are declared, or perceived to exist in others, there is a focus on both the descriptive question of whether there is a COI and, subsequently, the normative question of whether it is good, bad or neutral. We contend, however, that in addition to the descriptive and normative, COI declarations and accusations (...) can be understood as performatives. In this article, we apply J.L. Austin’s performative speech-act theory to COI discourses and illustrate how this works using a contemporary case study of COI in biomedical publishing. We argue that using Austin’s theory of performative speech-acts serves to highlight the social arrangements and role of authorities in COI discourse and so provides a rich framework to examine declarations, accusations and judgements of COI that often arise in the context of biomedical research and practice. (shrink)

This article focuses on a number of cases in international law in which US domestic courts have produced judgments that conflict with those given by the International Court of Justice. The nature of these courts’ judgments has been extremely closely tied to the interpretation given by the US national Executive to a certain international norm. This situation raises a number of questions, which can be broadly categorized into two spheres: the legal (regarding the overall legality of the courts’ decisions) and (...) the semiotic (regarding the manner in which a ‘meaning’ for the norm has been claimed by the courts). In this article we aim to provide answers to a number of these questions, both from the standpoint of international law and from that of a reader-response model of semiosis. We also analyse the level of interdependency that exists between the two spheres. (shrink)

The relationship betweendiscourse and ideology can be described as thatof process and effect [Purvis and Hunt (1993)British Journal of Sociology 44: 473–499].Discourse, used within relations of domination,can result in the formation of ideology. Tostudy this relationship systematically requiresa methodology that contextualizes discoursewithin social relations and examines when suchdiscourse becomes an ideology. I use Thompson'stheory/methodology of ``depth hermeneutics'' tostudy documents produced by agriculturalinterest groups concerning the 1996 FederalAgriculture Improvement and Reform (FAIR) Actand I assess the ideological status of thediscourses contained in (...) these documents. Thefindings suggest that the organizationsrepresenting the small-to-medium-sized farmerstended to use more agrarian themes, fewermarket themes, and fewer linguistic strategiesindicative of ideology. The organizationsrepresenting more concentrated,vertically-integrated interests andagribusinesses use fewer agrarian themes, moremarket themes, and more linguistic strategies.Therefore, market themes, not agrarian themes,form an ideology in this context. (shrink)

The concept of multiplicity describes the fluid nature of identity and experience in the wake of postmodernity. Yet the question of how we negotiate and maintain our identities, despite our multiplicities, requires phenomenological clarification. I suggest that recognition of multiplicity needs to be combined with an acknowledgement of continuity, however minimal. I maintain that this continuity is evidenced in our pre-reflective self-awareness, embodiment and habitual activities. Our authorship of life narratives and our ability to deliberate and shape our identities takes (...) place against the background of our lived, prereflective experience. I develop the notion of prereflective self-awareness using the work of Sartre, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty. I suggest that prereflective self-awareness, embodiment and habitual activity are themselves shaped by our participation in sociocultural frameworks that give meaning to our lives. (shrink)

This paper explores how gender can operate as a disguise for class in an examination of the self-sacrifice of the Maiden in Euripides' Children of Herakles. In Part I, I discuss the role of human sacrifice in terms of its radical potential to transform society and the role of class struggle in Athens. In Part II, I argue that the representation of women was intimately connected with the social and political life of the polis. In a discussion of iconography, the (...) theater industry and audience I argue that female characters became one of the means by which different groups promoted partisan interests based on class and social status. In Part III, I show how the Maiden solicits the competing interests of the theater audience. After discussing the centrality and marginality of the Maiden's character, I draw upon the funeral oration as a comparative model with which to understand the quite different role of self-sacrifice in tragedy. In addition to representing and mystifying the interests of elite, lower class and marginal groups, the play glorifies a subordinate character whose contradictory social status embodies the social position of other “marginal” members of Athenian society. The play stages a model for taking political action to transform the social system and for commemorating the tragic costs of such undertakings. (shrink)

With the question “What is ' discourse?' “ as the starting point, this paper addresses ways of identifying particular discourses, and attends to how these discourses should be distinguished from texts. The emergence of discourse analysis within psychology, and the continuing influence of linguistic and post-structuralist ideas on practitioners, provide the basis on which discourse -analytic research can be developed fruitfully. This paper discusses the descriptive, analytic and educative functions of discourse analysis, and addresses the cultural and political questions which (...) arise when discourse analysts reflect on their activity. Suggestions for an adequate definition of discourse are proposed and supported by seven criteria which should be adopted to identify discourses, and which attend to contradictions between and within them. Three additional criteria are then suggested to relate discourse analysis to wider political issues. (shrink)

It is popularly believed within sport's practice communities that a contest fails if the competitor who performs most skilfully in it does not win. The belief is rarely acknowledged explicitly, and therefore deserves to be considered ideological in a sense. In this paper I challenge that belief. For conceptual reasons, I confine the discussion to the purposive sports, e.g. football and tennis. The concept of skill is approached by articulation of a set of platitudes about skill in the purposive sports. (...) The first is the conceptual wedge between skill and success. The second is the distinction between skill and other performance-relevant qualities such as courage, strength and luck. The third is the fact that skill deficits can be compensated by sufficient amounts of the other performance relevant qualities. The fourth is the dispositional and dynamic character of skill. The relation between skill and final objectives in the purposive sports means that (i) qualities such as nerve and courage can trump the more skilful performance; and (ii) poor execution of a narrow range of skills can result in the competitive failure of the more skilful performance. There is no viable ideal of sport that would ground regret about the realisation of the immediately preceding possibilities. The inclination towards such regret might be partly motivated by the wish to take a gratifying view of ourselves. An end to this response, and a more inclusive, less hierarchical conception of sport skills, is worth recommending. (shrink)

Educating students to become participatory citizens in their country is one of the explicit tasks of public education in a democratic-liberal state. In this article, I use civics education in Israel as a case study for the examination of the justification and the practicability of implementing political education in schools, as opposed to implementing its rivals –ideological education or a-political education. I argue that a liberal-democratic stance and its educational implication—political education—are two concepts submerged in ideology, and, as a result, (...) political education in schools is not ideology-free. I also argue that the common kind of political-civic education in Israel is irrelevant for the significant minorities of Palestinian and Ultra-Orthodox Jewish citizens. Revealing the emptiness and futility of present-day political-civil education leads me to propose to separate this education into different ideological-educational streams, allowing each of them to emphasize its ideology in civil-political education. (shrink)

This article examines a simile preserved in the fragmentary book 5 of Cicero's De Re Publica, which figures the ideal statesman in terms of a farm bailiff and a household steward. Through a philological, philosophical, and socio-cultural explication of these similes and their context within De Re Publica, this article argues that Cicero draws upon Greek philosophical treatments of household and political relations and reworks traditional Roman political ideology so as to refigure the conceptual relationship between the statesman and the (...) state: from the farmer of res publica to its subservient, yet still overseeing, bailiff. By casting the ideal statesman in the decidedly servile role of a public bailiff, Cicero subordinates his statesman to res publica, yet also empowers him to act as its jurisprudential overseer, and this change marks a significant and perhaps strikingly original contribution to Roman political thought. (shrink)

In this essay I seek to re?examine the ?what is ideology?? question in the light of recent developments in ideology theory. We see that contemporary ideology theory tends to employ either a ?restrictive? or an ?inclusive? conception of ideology. Most theorists operating in the field of ideology study see these two approaches as both rival and exclusive. Furthermore the relationship between the analyst of ideology and the ideological field is at issue in both cases. I argue that the concept/conception distinction (...) allows us to discern that these two approaches do not merely employ rival conceptions of the same concept. There are two concepts of ideology at work here, which perform such radically different roles that their coexistence can be seen as unproblematic, reflecting the presence of both normative and interpretative work in social science. (shrink)

Postmodern theory is used to consider literacy instruction with and without an electronic whiteboard to investigate what it means to move beyond using technology to replicate older models of classroom structure that may be historically situated but that also limit or at least, do not support engagement in ways that may be possible through use of new technologies. Using postmodern theory in this regard is a way in which to consider again the thoughts and practices that tend to construct identities (...) and ideologies in ways that work against true engagement in literacy tasks, lead to subjection and demonstration of acquiescence in place of engagement that leads to participation and critical engagement. Critical engagement as opposed to gaining and maintaining student attention to task are considered in this paper. Thinking about use of the electronic whiteboard from a postmodern perspective cautions us about careful use of this technology to avoid sending messages to students about them and their role in literacy development, the classroom, and in society. (shrink)

The politics of the Anthropocene has been widely debated within recent sociological theory. This article seeks to argue that Marxism, critical theory and especially the work of Herbert Marcuse have a great deal to contribute to these debates. Here, I seek to link together the recent revival of interest in the idea of the commons by the alter-globalisation movement and Marxist social theory in an attempt to challenge some of the dominant assumptions in respect of the nature/culture division and the (...) neoliberal dominance of mainstream politics. The more critical politics of the commons would suggest both a radical politics fit for the twenty-first century and a way of understanding the environmental crisis located within critical understandings of the histories of capitalism and social movements. This is suggestive of a civilisation-based politics focused on questions of emancipation informed by political economy, a critique of the dominant consumer society and culture rather than questions of deconstruction. In the final section, I seek to explore how Marcuse’s concerns remain linked to contemporary global ethical movements for change. (shrink)

In modern times a gap has appeared between the arts of history and literature, and the sciences of historicism and criticism. Many modern critics, historians, and teachers of literature and history (and even many so‐called authors of literature) have welcomed, or at least complied with, the “scientification” of their arts, resulting in widespread illiteracy with regard to literature and history. The solution to this problem lies in a (re‐)investigation of how the art of literature teaches us the truth. I maintain (...) that the lifeblood of literature is the set of common joys and griefs, the common blessings and sufferings, of mankind. Without a communication of these passions as passions with the result of a transformation or shaping of the soul – without a mimesis, as the Greeks would say –across the boundaries of tribe, race, gender and era, there is no literature; and no literacy. Using a scene from Solzhenitsyn's First Circle, I argue that these passions are part of the truth (or falsity) of any story involving human beings. So literature and history would both be restored if the writers, readers, and teachers of each developed a deeper concern for the whole truth. (shrink)

In recent decades, academic science has increasingly been directed toward commercializable ends by neoliberal governments. In this article, I outline a concern that academic scientists have not been consulted about the transformation of science, but nevertheless, in some ways accept commercialization as the way things are done. I focus on the ways in which academic scientists attempt to exercise agency, albeit within the parameters of the neoliberal knowledge economy. In this economy, scientific inquiry has transformed to be focused more on (...) producing marketable products. In order to explore the parameters of scientists’ agency in the context of that transformation, I first elaborate on the idea of agency’s “parameters” and argue that the literature on commercialization lacks attention to how researchers’ agency is encouraged and discouraged in the context of academic research in the United States and Canada; second, I make a case for using the concept of hegemony to understand the ideas and practices of contemporary science; third, I propose a methodological direction that can attend to researchers’ agency in the contemporary context of the neoliberal knowledge economy. (shrink)

Since 2013, several social actors of the Federal University of Santa Catarina community have formed a public sphere in order to deliberate and decide on the University Hospital’s affiliation to the Brazilian Hospital Services Company, a public company set up in accordance with a private law which has been created by the Brazilian federal government in order to set up a management body for public university hospitals. Underpinned by critical discourse analysis, our purpose is to analyze the embedded ideologies in (...) discursive practices within the UFSC/ebserh public sphere, especially those perpetrated by the federal government’s bureaucratic means as to mystify reality, and also promote and legitimize dominant interests and actions with regard to the UH/ufsc’s affiliation to the EBSERH. We organized this analysis in five main categories: staff shortage and the ideological use of the double standard policy, the ideology of neo-liberalism and managerialism, blame avoidance behavior and the ideological dispute between ideology and pragmatism, the policy of terror and the fallacy of choice and ideology of participationism. (shrink)

This paper specifies competences and skills of methodologically rational decision making and their impact on security of organisations. The study indicates some reasons for developing the competencies and skills in education, professional development and taking them into account in the recruitment. It is the practical aim of this paper. Its scientific aim is to formulate and to partly justify general hypotheses concerning the impact of methodologically rational and irrational attitudes of members of organisations on their security. We apply the method (...) of ideal types of Max Weber and phenomenological analyses, which concern intentionality of methodologically rational and irrational mental attitudes. (shrink)

This essay is a response to Askegaard and Linnet’s : 381–404) call for a greater epistemological plurality within consumer culture theory. The article begins with a brief review of what these authors refer to as the dominant existential–phenomenological perspective and their Morinian alternative and then presents contemporary political philosophy as another alternative. Political philosophy has experienced quite a renaissance in recent years, and the school of thought has inspired major epistemological and ontological interventions throughout the academy. Here, I provide a (...) general introduction to this field of social inquiry and then focus specifically on the contributions of French philosopher Alain Badiou. Badiou’s work is particularly valuable for fields such as CCT, as it presents a unified epistemological framework for developing knowledge of social structures, cultural forms and subjectivities. The utility of political philosophy in general as well as the Badiouian framework is then demonstrated with recourse to the extant CCT literature. Ultimately, a Badiouian perspective has the potential to fulfil Askegaard and Linnet’s call for epistemologies that can attend to everyday experience while also considering the operation of cultural, political and sociological forces. (shrink)