The regulations of honour: an attempt at a Weberian and anthropological enquiry through the prism of a Spanish trading group

Abstract: This paper is concerned with a rather neglected issue in sociological analysis: honour as a value and regulating principle of social life. The attempt is made to study honour from a perspective which pays attention to both the carriers of honour and the social order itself, its maintenance and reproduction. It focuses on a group of Spanish traders who were fervent Catholics who claimed and were reputed to be men of honour. The article shows that honour was incarnated in two external domains: the family house and lineage, providing status-honour, and the trading routes, which brought our group fame as courageous and trustworthy men. Engaging with contemporary debates, it is contended that neither trust nor ethics need be brought to the exchanges from the outside, as is the case with modern capitalist forms, for they are a function of personalised social bonding and embedded in honour itself. Abstract: Cet article traite d'un sujet plutôt négligé par l'analyse sociologique: l'honneur comme valeur et principe régulateur de la vie sociale. La perspective retenue considére les groupes porteurs de l'honneur et l'ordre social lui-même, son maintien et sa reproduction. L'article se centre sur un groupe de commerçants espagnols, catholiques fervents, qui se proclamaient et sont reconnus hommes d'honneur. L'article montre que l'honneur s'incarne dans deux domaines: la maison et le lignage familiaux, sources d'honneur comme statut, et les routes commerciales, qui conféraient au groupe une réputation d'hommes courageux et dignes de confiance. En lien avec les débats contemporains, nous soutenons qu'il n'y a ici nul besoin d'introduire dans ces échanges confiance et éthique, comme il le faut dans les formes capitalistes modernes. Ici, ils s'ancrent dans l'honneur même. Abstract: Diese Besprechung untersucht ein von der soziologischen Analyse vernachlässigtes Thema: die Ehre als Wert und Regelungselement des sozialen Lebens. Untersuchungsgegenstand: eine Gruppe spanischer Kaufleute, überzeugte Katholiken, die sich als Ehrenmänner bezeichneten und auch als solche betrachtet wurden. Die Ehre gründet sich auf zwei Bereiche: den Familienstamm, Ausgangspunkt für den Ehrenstatus, und die Handelsstraßen, die der Gruppe den Ruf von mutigen Männern und Vertrauensleuten einbrachten. Im Zusammenhang mit der gegenwärtigen Auseinandersetzung behaupten wir, dass im Austausch weder Vertrauen noch Ethik eingeführt werden müssen, wie es bei modernen Formen des Kapitalismus notwendig ist. Sie sind mit der Ehre verwurzelt

The sociological imagination and its promise fifty years later: Is there a future for the social sciences as a free form of enquiry?

This paper offers a restatement of Wright Mills’ The Sociological Imagination and tries to judge whether its promise can be credibly renewed today by addressing the question about the present and future possibilities of the social sciences as free forms of enquiry. Relying on Weber, Mills and other thinkers, the paper sustains that the possibilities for a truly free social science essentially depend on three major ‘conditions’: the subjective stance or vocation, the sociological imagination proper, and an independent social science politics, conditions whose apt names can also be ‘love’, ‘insight’ and ‘courage’. An analysis of the presence and strength of each of these conditions in contemporary social science and in academia shows the magnitude of the task faced for the existence of a free social science

Time and method: After survival, for a renewed praxis of social theory

This paper is an intervention in the debate on Big Data or the digital. Recognising the importance of engaging with what has become known as Big Data, I seek to re-situate the Big Data issue in a different perspective and to disrupt the debate around it. The paper shows that the call to fully and inventively engage with the digital, or Big Data, is a strategic response which can be construed as a wager for the survival of academic sociology, and that underpinning such a wager there lies a rather coherent, but essentially unstated, vision which involves ontological and epistemological assumptions, and a whole stance. Once such assumptions are brought out through an ontological analysis, the paper is able to spell out the political stance within which the ‘politics of method’ advocated by many participants in the debate has to be situated, as well as to show how such politics overlooks the political economy of social data and displaces theory and critique. Even more importantly, the paper seeks to expound an alternative view. Thus, to the temporality of running after an endlessly changing time, it opposes the temporality of subjectivation. To the emphasis on method, it opposes a praxis, or a conduct of life – a praxis encompassing and appreciative of method and methodological inventiveness, but subordinating it to theory and more in particular to a Machiavellian social theory. Thus, to the risk of falling into resignation in view of the inevitability implied in the aforementioned ontology, the paper is also a call for a more combative social theory – one which is still able to feel disquiet in view of what is happening in our present times, but never abandons hope. Only such capacity for disquiet, for wonder and astonishment, it is argued, can provide the impulse for a renewal of social theory – the impulse which was at the origin of the discipline and has to be at the core of its renewal. The paper is thus an invitation to widen the Big Data debate and to seriously consider so far unexamined perspectives and possibilities

The retable of the chapel of Our Lady of Mercy in the cloister of Oporto’s Cathedral: study, conservation and restoration

The retable located in the Chapel of Our Lady of Mercy, in the cloisters of Oporto’s cathedral, dates back to the 17th century. Artistically, it belongs to a transition period between the Mannerism and the Baroque styles. The artistic value and the lack of documented information about the artwork led to the development of a project contemplating its the study. Both chemical and physical analyses - observation of the support, micro-FTIR and SEM-EDS - suggest that the retable was carved in sweet chestnut wood, accordingly to the techniques used at the time. The retable presents water-gilded areas contrasting with blue and red phytomorphic motifs. The polychromed areas were later covered with lead white paint. There were also evidences of previous conservation-restoration interventions. The frail condition of the retable’s materials testified the need to conserve and restore it. Among other procedures, the materials were consolidated and the lacunae were filled and inpainted - partially regenerating the artwork’s aesthetic unit

An altogether new prince five centuries on: Bringing Machiavelli to bear on our present

Our situation demands a new encounter with Machiavelli, and this confrontation involves a simultaneous engagement with Machiavelli’s thought and our time. However, contrary to prevalent approaches, it is neither a merely textual or scholastic exegesis nor a ‘return’ to Machiavelli, but an attempt to put Machiavelli’s thought to work in our time, so as to try to take the measure of our situation and envisage possible effective interventions in it. Both aspects depend on a prior operation which consists in placing Machiavelli in its proper site: in the battlefront, confronting the grave problems we face. But this has direct consequences for us; it interpellates our own positioning and therefore questions the extent to which we desire to transform our situation or are attached to it

Social theory and the politics of big data and method

This article is an intervention in the debate on big data. It seeks to show, firstly, that behind the wager to make sociology more relevant to the digital there lies a coherent if essentially unstated vision and a whole stance which are more a symptom of the current world than a resolute endeavour to think that world through; hence the conclusion that the perspective prevailing in the debate lacks both the theoretical grip and the practical impulse to initiate a much needed renewal of social theory and sociology. Secondly, and more importantly, the article expounds an alternative view and shows by thus doing that other possibilities of engaging the digital can be pursued. The article is thus an invitation to widen the debate on big data and the digital and a call for a more combative social theory

Fast VPN mobility across Wi-Fi hotspots

Wi-Fi hotspots deployed by domestic networks are an attractive approach to foster ubiquitous Internet access for mobile computers. However, it raises several security issues, since the owners of such hotspots cannot be trusted to be honest; therefore, visitors should consider them as potential Man-in-the-Middle attackers. On the other hand, the owners of such hotspots should not be legally accounted for illegal or unethical activities performed by visitors. We defend that both issues can be tackled by using a VPN-based access architecture for visitors. However, current VPN solutions do not handle gracefully the mobility of clients, an interesting possibility to navigate in a sea of user-provided hotspots. In this paper, we propose a modification of OpenVPN, a very effective and secure, open-source VPN solution, to support the seamless mobility of VPN clients. The proposed modification allows OpenVPN tunnels to be reconfigured as soon as possible after a client handover, in order to minimize outage delays and traffic losses. Performance evaluation with an implemented prototype in different test scenarios showed that we can reduce the handover delay imposed at the VPN level down to 1.7% of the current value, at least

Synthesis and fluorescence properties of side-chain carboxylated 5,9-diaminobenzo[a]phenoxazinium salts

The efficient synthesis of a series of novel side-chain carboxylated 5,9-diaminobenzo[a]phenoxazinium salts is described. The ring system was prepared by the reaction of 5-alkylamino-2-nitrosophenol hydrochlorides with the appropriate N-alkylated-naphthylamine. Evaluation of the visible and fluorescence properties of the cationic dyes was carried out in ethanol and water at physiological pH. In both solvents they showed intense visible absorption maxima in the range 500-638 nm (ethanol) and 625-650 (water), and fluoresced strongly, with fluorescence maxima from 612 to 669 nm (ethanol) and from 654 to 685 nm (water). A wide variation in fluorescence quantum yields is observed, ranging from 0.051 to 0.50 and 0.065 to 0.32 in ethanol and water, respectively.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT)

Therapy adherence in community elderly from inner and coast councils of Northern Portugal

Global aging associated with chronic comorbidities leads to increased simultaneous use of drugs and complex drug therapies. Therapy adherence is essential to ensure the effectiveness of therapeutic and control of chronic diseases in elderly. Objectives: To estimate the prevalence of therapy adherence and associated factors in community elderly from inner and coast councils of northern Portugal. Methods: This cross-sectional and correlational study was based on a questionnaire, with MAT scale (measure of adherence to therapy) validated for the Portuguese population (Delgado & Lima, 2001), applied by interview to 384 elderly (≥65 years) living in the community in northern Portugal councils of Esposende, Guimarães and Lamego. It was used descriptive statistics and Chi-Square test, with a significance level of 5%. Results: The sample consisted mainly of females elderly (60,7%), with age mean of 75.8 years old, while 47.7% was between 65-74 years. On average, 4.99 different drugs are administered per day, being medicines that act on the circulatory system the most prescribed. The prevalence of therapy adherence was 86,6%. Elderly people who have help with medication, are those who most adhere to drug therapy (p=0.035). Conclusions: This study shows a considerable prevalence of therapy adherence. Having help with medication seems to be associated with better therapy adherence.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Design of body adornments obtained from the conformation through a mold and subsequent simple machining of epoxy resin mosaics loaded with fired faience residues

No presente trabalho pretende-se a partir do processo de design avaliar a possibilidade de reutilização e valorização dos resíduos de cacos cerâmicos cozidos da fábrica Bordallo Pinheiro. Para a criação de novos produtos, adornos corporais, tal como anéis, colares, brincos e ganchos. Utilizou-se um processo por moldação via liquída com resina epóxi carregada com resíduos cozidos de faiança que posteriormente foram sujeitos a operações simples de maquinação que permitiram transformar com sucesso os resíduos cerâmicos cozidos em adornos corporais que são compatíveis com mercados de alto valor acrescentado como é no caso do design ou da indústria da moda. Os produtos são da autoria da designer Inês Pereira Coutinho e o trabalho decorreu sob a orientação do professor José Frade.In the present work, it is intended, from the design process, to evaluate the possibilities of reusing and revaluing the wasted shards of fired ceramics from the Bordallo Pinheiro, ceramic factory. Through the creation of new products, ranging within the context of body adornments from rings to hair clips, including necklaces and earrings. Using the process molding with liquid epoxy resin loaded with crushed cooked faience residues then after curing, machine through simple operations, the body adornments came successfully to existence. From mere crushed fired faience to body adornments compatible with high added value markets like the industries of design and fashion. The products are authored by the designer Inês Pereira Coutinho and the work was carried out under the guidance of Professor José Frade