Studying Abroad at Home: The Meaning of Education Abroad During the Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic virtually ended studying abroad. New (online) formats are offered, but this has not stopped universities from having to revise curricula, renegotiate partnerships and consult with students about studying abroad in 2020 and beyond. This short essay stems from the author’s experience of cancelling his own Japanese study abroad program in late February 2020 to avoid the program participants taking unnecessary risks in the face of the unknown speed at which COVID-19 was spreading in Europe. The cancellation of that study trip brought to the fore, however, entrenched issues with short term study abroad programs and pushed the author to consider what the value of the ‘abroad’ in ‘study abroad’ had been until then. A short comparison with the practice of ethnography ensues, inspired by early pandemic debates on the future of anthropological fieldwork, which is another endeavour that has traditionally depended on relatively extended stays abroad. The essay closes with two problems that study abroad organisers will have to think about in a post-corona world

When experiences of presence go awry: A survey on psychotherapy practice with the ambivalent‐to‐distressing ‘hallucination’ of the deceased

Objectives: Experiences of presence, involving the sensory perception or felt presence of the deceased, are common amongst the bereaved (30–60%). Despite them being predominantly comforting and reassuring, a minority (approximately 25%) report ambivalent or distressing experiences. The study’s aim was to explore how psychotherapy is practised with this subset. Method: A mixed‐method approach, involving both quantitative analysis and thematic analysis, was used to analyse data from an online survey, conducted in English and Spanish, amongst mental health therapists (i.e., psychologists, psychotherapists, and counsellors). Seventy responded to the survey and four of them were further interviewed. Results: The participants primarily framed interventions for ambivalent‐to‐distressing experiences of presence as grief therapy, with the severity of the presentation as the main factor influencing their clinical decision‐making, but several perspectives co‐existed regarding how to intervene. These discourses were categorized into two themes: ‘A normalising and exploratory psychotherapy’ and ‘A grief stages psychotherapy’. The main sources of patient’s distress, as understood by the sample, were located in the bereaved–departed relationship, in pre‐existing mental health issues, and in a societal taboo or stigma. Conclusion: After comparing and contrasting the participants’ working hypotheses with existing knowledge on experiences of presence, and contemporary theories in the research area, guidelines are presented on how to intervene with people disturbed by their experiences of presence. Practitioner points: Perceiving the deceased person, or feeling their presence, is common and normal amongst bereaved people. When these experiences are distressing or ambivalent, therapists’ share that psychological suffering may originate from the departed–bereaved relationship, pre‐existing mental health issues, or the effect of societal taboo or stigma. Psychotherapy is frequently aimed at normalizing, accepting, supporting, and exploring patient’s experienc

Ἡ περί Υἱοῦ καί Λόγου Διδασκαλία τοῦ Ἁγίου Κυρίλλου Ἀλεξανδρείας στό ἔργο του «Περί τῆς Ἁγίας καί Ὁμοουσίου Τριάδος» (Λόγοι Α΄- Ζ΄)

Ἡ παρούσα διπλωματική ἐργασία ἀσχολεῖται μέ τήν περί Υἱοῦ καί Λόγου Διδασκαλία τοῦ Ἁγίου Κυρίλλου Ἀλεξανδρείας στούς ἑπτά λόγους του Περί τῆς Ἁγίας καί Ὁμοουσίου Τριάδος. Ἡ ἐργασία διαιρεῖται σέ Πρόλογο, Εἰσαγωγή, σέ πέντε Κεφάλαια, σέ Ἐπίλογο – Συμπεράσματα καί Βιβλιογραφία. Συγκεκριμένα, στήν Εἰσαγωγή γίνεται περιληπτική ἀναφορά στήν δομή τῆς ἐργασίας. Στό πρῶτο Κεφάλαιο, ἐκτίθεται ἡ διδασκαλία τοῦ ἱεροῦ πατρός ὅτι ὁ Υἱός εἶναι ὁμοούσιος μέ τόν Πατέρα, ἀφοῦ προέρχεται «κατά φύσιν ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ Πατρός». Κατά τόν Πατριάρχη Ἀλεξανδρείας, ὁ Υἱός ὡς ὁμοφυής μέ τόν γεννήσαντα αὐτόν Πατέρα εἶναι ἀνόμοιος, ἐτεροφυής καί ὑπερκείμενος ὀντολογικά τῶν κτισμάτων. Τό δεύτερο Κεφάλαιο, χωρίζεται σέ δύο ὑποενότητες. Στήν πρώτη ὑποενότητα ἐκτίθεται ἡ διδασκαλία τοῦ Ἀρχιεπισκόπου Ἀλεξανδρείας ὅτι ὁ Υἱός δέν εἶναι κτίσμα οὔτε ποίημα τοῦ Πατρός. Στήν δεύτερη ὑποενότητα παρατίθεται ἡ διδασκαλία τοῦ Κυρίλλου Ἀλεξανδρείας γιά τήν συναϊδιότητα τοῦ Υἱοῦ μέ τόν Πατέρα. Ὁ Υἱός, ὅπως καί ὁ Πατήρ, εἶναι Θεός. Ἄρα ὑπάρχει ἀϊδίως καί ἀχρόνως, δεδομένου ὅτι ἐκεῖνος εἶναι ὁ δημιουργός τοῦ χρόνου. Ἑπομένως, εἶναι συναΐδιος τοῦ Πατρός. Στό τρίτο Κεφάλαιο, γίνεται λόγος γιά τήν διδασκαλία τοῦ ἱεροῦ πατρός γιά τα κοινά φυσικά ἰδιώματα τῆς Τριαδικῆς θεότητας, τά ὁποῖα ὑπάρχουν καί στά τρία πρόσωπά της. Μέσα ἀπό τίς μαρτυρίες τῆς Ἁγίας Γραφῆς ἀποδεικνύεται κατά τόν Κύριλλο ἡ κοινή θέληση τοῦ Υἱοῦ μέ τόν Πατέρα λόγῳ τῆς ὁμοουσιότητας τῶν θείων προσώπων. Τό τέταρτο Κεφάλαιο καταλήγει στό συμπέρασμα ὅτι ὁ Υἱός εἶναι ἴσος πρός τόν Πατέρα, γιατί προέρχεται ἀϊδίως κατά φύση ἀπό αὐτόν, ἴσος καί ἀπαραλλάκτως ὅμοιος μέ αὐτόν. Στό πέμπτο Κεφάλαιο, τέλος, ἐκτίθεται ἡ διδασκαλία τοῦ ἱεροῦ πατρός γιά τά διάφορα ὀνόματα πού ἀποδίδονται στά πρόσωπα τῆς Ἁγίας Τριάδος καί διευκρινίζεται ὅτι αὐτά τά ὀνόματα, ὅπως Πατήρ καί Υἱός, εἶναι ἰδιαίτερα στό κάθε πρόσωπο. Σημαίνουν τήν σχέση πού ἔχει τό ἕνα πρόσωπο πρός τό ἄλλο καί δέν ἀφοροῦν ἐπ’ οὐδενί στήν οὐσία τῆς Τριαδικῆς θεότητας ἤ στά κοινά φυσικά ἰδιώματα. Στόν Ἐπίλογο γίνεται μία συνοπτική παρουσίαση τῶν συμπερασμάτων καί τῶν κύριων σημείων τῆς παρούσης Διπλωματικῆς Ἐργασίας. Τέλος σημειώνεται ἡ Βιβλιογραφία. Πρῶτα παρατίθενται οἱ Πηγές καί στήν συνέχεια, τά ἑλληνόγλωσσα καί ξενόγλωσσα Βιβλιογραφικά Βοηθήματα.The present dissertation deals with the teachings on God the Son or Logos of St Cyril of Alexandria in his seven Dialogues about the Holy and Consubstantial Trinity. The dissertation is divided in preface, introduction, five chapters, epilogue - conclusions and bibliography. The introduction makes a brief reference to the structure of the essay. The first chapter states the teachings of St Cyril that the Son is consubstantial to the Father (homoousios). The second chapter is divided in two units. The first one states the teachings of the archbishop of Alexandria that the Son is not a creation of the Father. The second unit refers to the teachings of St Cyril of Alexandria about the coeternity of God the Son and God the Father. The third chapter refers to the teachings of the holy father about the common natural features of the Trinity, which coexist in all the three divine persons. The fourth chapter comes to the conclusion that the Son is coequal to the Father, as he derives eternally by nature from him. Finally, in the fifth chapter, there is the teaching of the holy father about the various denominations that are attributed to the persons of the Holy Trinity, and it is clarified that these names, like Father and Son, are special about each person. They refer to the relationship between the persons and they have nothing to do with the essence of the Holy Trinity or their common hypostatic features. A brief presentation of the conclusions and the main points of the present dissertation is made at the epilogue. At the end there is a bibliographic catalogue. First the source material is cited and after that, the greek and foreign bibliography used for this essay

A Muscle-Specific p38 MAPK/Mef2/MnSOD Pathway Regulates Stress, Motor Function, and Life Span in Drosophila

SummaryMolecular mechanisms that concordantly regulate stress, life span, and aging remain incompletely understood. Here, we demonstrate that in Drosophila, a p38 MAP kinase (p38K)/Mef2/MnSOD pathway is a coregulator of stress and life span. Hence, overexpression of p38K extends life span in a MnSOD-dependent manner, whereas inhibition of p38K causes early lethality and precipitates age-related motor dysfunction and stress sensitivity, that is rescued through muscle-restricted (but not neuronal) add-back of p38K. Additionally, mutations in p38K are associated with increased protein carbonylation and Nrf2-dependent transcription, while adversely affecting metabolic response to hypoxia. Mechanistically, p38K modulates expression of the mitochondrial MnSOD enzyme through the transcription factor Mef2, and predictably, perturbations in MnSOD modify p38K-dependent phenotypes. Thus, our results uncover a muscle-restricted p38K-Mef2-MnSOD signaling module that influences life span and stress, distinct from the insulin/JNK/FOXO pathway. We propose that potentiating p38K might be instrumental in restoring the mitochondrial detoxification machinery and combating stress-induced aging

When learning becomes a fetish: the pledge, turn and prestige of magic tricks

It is our contention that the process of higher education could be read as a commodity and in both Marxian and Freudian assumptions, a fetish. Instrumental in this discussion are; Marx’s theorising of the commodity fetish (1867) that deceives by conflating the distinction between use and exchange value, and Freud’s (1927) re-visiting of his theory of fetishism, where he considers the fetish in the context of dealing with separation and loss in everyday life. This paper highlights how the consequence of fetishised behaviour has led to violent outcomes, such as the policy decision to introduce a ‘Teaching Excellence Framework’ (TEF). We argue that the TEF may bring about the death of learning in HE and diminish the role of academic staff. Nevertheless, influenced by Winnicott, Cixous and Biesta, we offer a more hopeful ‘Teaching that is Good Enough Framework’

Education then and now: making the case for ecol-agogy

The processes, settings and outcomes of human education have distinctive impact on the human and non-human world: this paper sets out to discuss what may have motivated the initiation of human education, how it has been maintained why the outcome has wide-ranging, and often negative, planetary impact. The analysis offers a multi-disciplinary account of education, from pre-history to the present, noting that humans, past and present are born into an ‘open world’ that requires world building or, niche construction. As a result, cultural and genetic evolution are out of synchronisation instigating an existential threat and the anxious experience of ‘adaptive-lag’ leading to the motive for continued niche construction. Education is presented as a particular type of niche construction requiring teachers and the use of symbolic verbal language to help learners move from simplistic ‘split’ thinking to the more mature position where the needs of self and others can be met

COVID-19 outbreak effects on job security and emotional functioning amongst women living with breast cancer

The outbreak of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has negatively impacted global economies and employment. In the UK, it is predicted that approximately eight million jobs were furloughed as a result of the outbreak and the associated restriction of movement or shielding measures. This study aimed to investigate the impact of changes in employment status on cognitive and emotional health as well as perceptions of work. Furthermore, it examined the relationships between women’s job security and anxiety, depression and cognitive function. Women living with breast cancer (N = 234) completed online questionnaires to measure their cognitive function, general emotional well-being, COVID-19 related emotional vulnerability (COVID-EMV), work ability and COVID-19 related perceptions of work. Our results revealed that threat to job security was predictive of depression and cognitive function in the entire sample Such that those with higher levels of perceived job security had lower depression and better cognitive function. Further, women who were furloughed or unable to continue work reported higher job insecurity compared to those who had worked throughout the pandemic. Greater rumination was also associated with worse anxiety and depression as well as poorer cognitive function. Finally, moderation analysis highlighted that women who had better cognitive functioning were less likely to experience anxiety when their job security was high. Given our findings, we suggest that employers provide women with accessible interventions to enhance cognitive and emotional resilience and thus help protect against the detrimental effects of job insecurity created by the COVID-19 outbreak