131 research outputs found
âStepping away from the computer and into the sweats': The construction and negotiation of exercise identities in a Norwegian public company
While research has found that a developed exercise identity enables individuals to view exercise participation as self- reinforcing, the social barriers to such exercise identity development and participation have not been fully addressed. The subsequent aim of this study was to explore some of the social complexities at play in terms of how company employees construct and manage their exercise identities within a work place setting. A case-study method was used to address the research issue over a nine-month period. The case to be studied included a sample of 72 employees from a Norwegian public company who participated in an on-going work-based exercise programme called âExercise for allâ. The principal means of data collection comprised participant observation, individual interviews and exercise logbooks. The data were subject to inductive analysis. The primary barriers to exercise participation included high levels of social comparison in a competitive working context, particularly in relation to âcompetent colleaguesâ, and feelings of guilt associated with partaking in ârecreationalâ activities during work hours. Strategies engaged with to overcome and negotiate such obstacles included justifying participation through a health-related discourse, and constructing a more distinct âworker-exerciserâ identity
Kiyang-yang, a West-African Postwar Idiom of Distress
In 1984, a healing cult for young barren women in southern Guinea Bissau developed into a movement, Kiyang-yang, that shook society to its foundations and had national repercussions. âIdiom of distressâ is used here as a heuristic tool to understand how Kiyang-yang was able to link war and post-war-related traumatic stress and suffering on both individual and group levels. An individual experience born from a traumatic origin may be generalized into an idiom that diverse sectors of society could embrace for a range of related reasons. We argue that, for an idiom to be understood and appropriated by others, there has to be resonance at the level of symbolic language and shared experiences as well as at the level of the culturally mediated contingent emotions it communicates. We also argue that through its symbolic references to structural causes of suffering, an idiom of distress entails a danger for those in power. It can continue to exist only if its etiology is not exposed or the social suffering it articulates is not eliminated. We finally argue that idioms of distress are not to be understood as discrete diagnostic categories or as monodimensional expressions of âtraumaâ that can be addressed
Deep hanging out in the arts: an anthropological approach to capturing cultural value
This article presents the findings of an Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) funded project carried out from September 2013 to March 2014 by five researchers at the University of Leeds (UK), who paired off with five audience-participants and engaged in a process of âdeep hanging outâ (Geertz 1998) at events curated as part of Leedsâ annual LoveArts festival. As part of AHRCâs Cultural Value project, the overarching aim of the research was to produce a rich, polyvocal, evocative and complex account of cultural value by co-investigating arts engagement with audience-participants. Findings suggested that both the methods and purpose of knowing about cultural value impact significantly on any exploration of cultural experience. Fieldwork culminated in the apparent paradox that we know, and yet still donât seem to know, the value and impact of the arts. Protracted discussions with the participants suggested that this paradox stemmed from a misplaced focus on knowledge; that instead of striving to understand and rationalize the value of the arts, we should instead aim to feel and experience it. During a process of deep hanging out, our participants revealed the limitations of language in capturing the value of the arts, yet confirmed perceptions of the arts as a vehicle for developing self-identity and -expression and for living a better life. These findings suggest that the Cultural Value debate needs to be reframed from what is currently an interminable epistemological obsession (that seeks to prove and evidence the value of culture) into a more complex phenomenological question, which asks how people experience the arts and culture and why people want to understand its value. This in turn implies a re-conceptualization of the relationships between artists or arts organisations and their publics, based on a more relational form of engagement and on a more anthropological approach to capturing and co-creating cultural value
Analytical approach to bit-string models of language evolution
A formulation of bit-string models of language evolution, based on
differential equations for the population speaking each language, is introduced
and preliminarily studied. Connections with replicator dynamics and diffusion
processes are pointed out. The stability of the dominance state, where most of
the population speaks a single language, is analyzed within a mean-field-like
approximation, while the homogeneous state, where the population is evenly
distributed among languages, can be exactly studied. This analysis discloses
the existence of a bistability region, where dominance coexists with
homogeneity as possible asymptotic states. Numerical resolution of the
differential system validates these findings.Comment: To appear in Int. J. Mod. Phys.
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