Neurodivergence Enminded/Embodied: Living with Severe Traumatic Brain Injury

Author(s): Douglas E. Kidd / Language(s): English Issue: 01/2018

This article positions my experiences as a severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) survivor relative to other TBI survivors and in context of persons with disabilities (PWDs) living in the United States and the world. This autoethnographical account (by autoethnography I understand a method or form of social research that serves the purpose of exploring personal experiences of the researcher) examines the life of a neurodivergent individual whose brain functions in ways that deviate significantly from social norms. I explore profound changes to my identity and the resultant social disconnection I encounter since acquiring a severe TBI more than a decade ago. The profound alterations to my identity affect my ability to process, and then adjust, to the demands of my surroundings. As I decode, decipher and process the world, at times my brain damage triggers and/or produces episodes of temporal dissonance. As these shifts in timing occur, they have tremendous impact on my emotional stability. Despite these outward difficulties, I celebrate my altered awareness of time and new identity as a disabled person. Connecting relevant critical trauma studies scholarship to the themes addressed here, the article examines how moving through trauma, coma and amnesia to a new life with cognitive, emotional, psychological, and physical impairments importantly enriches expression of my humanity. I will demonstrate the salient aspects of my new life – emotional sensitivity and volatility – may on the surface seem detrimental and undesirable; however, these qualities greatly enhance my identification with and empathy for others, which in turn drive my artistic, social, cultural and political expression, along with my quest for community.

Mind and Body Transformations through Visual Art

Author(s): Ann Millett-Gallant / Language(s): English Issue: 01/2018

This essay narrates my experiences as a congenital amputee and survivor of traumatic brain injury (TBI) through analysis of artwork. With art history and art therapy, I have cathartically mediated conscious and corporeal loss. I will analyse key visual examples to illustrate my disability, trauma and mind/body transformations. The article maintains that trauma is not an isolated event, but a conscious, collective and dynamic phenomenon.

Invincible yet Vulnerable: Race, Disability and Trauma in South Africa after Oscar Pistorius

Author(s): Nontsasa Nako / Language(s): English Issue: 01/2018

When the global sporting icon, Paralympian and Olympian Oscar Pistorius was accused of killing his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp on the morning of Valentine’s Day in 2013, one of his many defences was, simply put, that his disability made him do it. An expert witness for the defence made the connection between disability and violence that suggested that disabled people are particularly prone to ‘over-react’ as it were because they feel especially vulnerable. This defence provides the link between the two extremes claimed by Pistorius’s public persona, that of invincibility and vulnerability – extreme physical ability epitomized by sterling sporting prowess and fear of victimisation because of his physical limitation. The formula proposed by this defence is that extreme vulnerability results in extreme aggression. Here I want to analyse what this claim suggests about prevailing social attitudes toward disability and disabled people, particularly in post-apartheid South Africa – or more accurately in post-TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Commission) South Africa. In this article I propose that the corrosive legacy of TRC created rich ground for white victimization and popularised the medical model of trauma.

Светлана М. Толстая на 80 години

Author(s): Mariya Kitanova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 37/2018

Речник на народната духовна култура на българите

Author(s): Dimitrina Lesnevska,Radoslava Lesnevska / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 37/2018

Борислава Петкова. "Да направим Земя и хора". Разказът за сътворението и грехопадението в българската култура

Author(s): Maria Šniter / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 37/2018

Varia – kontynuacje – antycypacje: Postsekularyzm jako sposób reanimacji lektury postkolonialnej? O granicach i paradoksach secular criticism

Author(s): Alina Mitek-Dziemba / Language(s): Polish Issue: 37/2018

Even though it is difficult to imagine a phenomenon more closely intertwined with the processes of colonization and decolonization than secularism, there are scant references to it in the postcolonial writing and accompanying critical theory. The critics’ reticence seems hardly justifiable considering the fact that secularization processes have been in the centre of the hottest political and ideological debate for more than a decade now, while their critical examination and evaluation appears inevitable due to the ongoing process of undermining the historical view of the religious vs secular divide by alternative ways of ordering the public space in non-Western societies, especially as the latter have also become, on the immigrants’ arrival and vocal presence, a powerful factor in the political game played out within Western countries. As the violent course of events after 9/11 has prompted most of the postcolonial critics to perceive Western democracy and secularism in the black-and-white mode by inscribing it in the Eurocentric and colonial framework, the secular-religious opposition has become one of the postcolonial studies’ fundamental dichotomies that it seeks to transgress and overcome, even though the attempt may well be in vain. Consequently, the term “postsecular,” despite all the subtlety with which it was introduced into the fields of philosophy, theology, sociology and literature, has come to indicate a posture of critical aversion to the secularist order as quintessential for the Western modernity and Enlightenment project and opting for the radical division between the public reason and the need for faith. The aim of the article is thus to examine the meanings ascribed to the terms such as “postsecularism” and “postsecular spirituality” in postcolonial theory, as well as to evaluate the attempts at their application to the field of literary studies.

THE BATTLE FOR REGIONAL DOMINANCE BETWEEN THE KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA AND

Author(s): Valeri Modebadze / Language(s): English Issue: 3/2018

This article describes the rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia for achieving regional hegemony in the Middle East. Both states have an ambition to be the leader of the Islamic world and there is a constant struggle between them to dominate Middle East and spread their influence in neighboring countries. Both countries fund militant Islamic movements abroad and are engaged in fierce battle for regional dominance. After the establishment of theocratic regime in Iran, the kingdom of Saudi Arabia vehemently opposed Teheran’s ambitions to export revolutions and increase its influence in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia is determined to counter the Iranian revolutionary threat and constantly opposes Teheran’s ambitions to dominate the Arab World. Saudi Arabia and Iran often accuse each other of fueling sectarian violence by backing Shia and Sunni militias in Iraq, Yemen, Syria and Lebanon. Both countries try to avoid direct confrontation with each other. Instead of direct conflict, both sides fight each other indirectly and provide varying degrees of support to different camps in nearby conflicts.

Mimesis i anthropos albo o przymusie naśladownictwa. Dawkins – Tarde – Girard

Author(s): Dobrosława Wężowicz-Ziółkowska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 19/2018

Memetics is one of contemporary, posthumanist theories of culture. It postulates that the fundamental mechanism of replicating non-genetic information is imitation (Dawkins) and thus social life and culture exist as a result of our minds’ susceptibility to the units of imitation, known as memes. This article presents a critical synthesis of the stance memeticians take on human mimetism, and through exploration of other concepts (philosophical, sociological, anthropological, psychological and neurobiological) reinforces memetics’ basic premise that human beings are mimetic animals.

Спектакълът на изисканото хранене заедно. Нови форми на празничност в София и преобръщане на употребите на публичното пространство

Author(s): Velislava Petrova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 4/2018

The article focuses on two forms of appropriation of the urban space by new forms of festivity organized around food consumption. Although the new forms intervene with public space and use its ideology, these practices rather question the general access to it. Usually, they are organized as private events but following the logic of new capitalism, they insist on a higher, often non-commercial, purpose that adds value to the experience. This may be the demonstrative struggle against wastefulness or aestheticization of food consumption in the public space as a form of creating experiences. The new media play a key role in the experiencing and producing of these events: from their disclosure and access to the organization of their visual identity.

Храна и публичност: срещи в празника

Author(s): Rayna Gavrilova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 4/2018

The proposed paper is an attempt to examine and discuss the relation between social interactions, festivity, and food in the beginning of twenty-first-century Bulgaria. Topics of interest are the specific forms of public space and the participation during two types of events: the festivals of individual towns and the political kurbans. The article examines the extent to which the communal celebrations have “enter[ed] the service of economic and political propaganda” (Habermas). Both types of events are organized “from the top” – they are planned, financed and practically performed by people who possess political power. Furthermore, they both include certain forms of distribution of free food; thus, the author comes to the conclusion that the consumption of offered food and drinks binds the participating individuals in a somatic and emotional mutual experiencing the celebration. Commensality is a form of participation, which by definition is voluntary and unarticulated inclusion. The citizens are a quiet audience (public, n. in Bulgarian) of the activities presented on stage but enthusiastic participants in the shared meals.

„Kwestia żydowska” w literaturze religijnej. Analiza treści modlitewnika Machzor li-Jom Kipur

Author(s): Agata Rybińska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 1/2018

The analysis of the prayer contained in the Hebrew-Russian prayer book allows to describe the linguistic image of God and his people — Israel/Jews. Appealing to the patriarchs, to the covenant between God and Israel, to the Torah, Jerusalem and temple worship, that is, the centuries-long Jewish religious tradition, are cultural codes, and at the same time key components of Jewish identity. They are a point of reference in considering so called the Jewish question, taking into account primarily the Jewish perspective, not the Christian one.

Ролята на фотографията. Бурел век по-късно

Author(s): Petya B. Dimitrova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2019

In the early 20th century, the Bulgarian anthropogeographer Krum Dronchilov, Ph.D. conducted field research in the 23 villages located near the road between Dragoman and Tran. His publication “Burel. Anthropogeographic Studies” is at the root of a second research which I conducted in 2017 – 2018 – “Burel a Century Later: Changes in the Region (a Comparison with an Anthropogeographic Research of 1923)”. The second research as well as this article mark the main changes registered in the region and my observations regarding the positions of researcher and respondents in the 21st century. In order to present the second research in a modern, efficient and intriguing way, the use of audio and visual methods in collecting and presenting the material should be considered a necessary element. The expectations related to the audio-visual established in the 21st century lead to changes in the structures and conceptualization of the scientific texts. In unison with this thesis, the selection of Burel’s photographs in the article is not a mere supplement but a foundation upon which I build my comments.

Единайсет минути „бездеятелен“ отдих на ден

Author(s): Katerina Gadjeva / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2019

The free time was one of the most important results of the political and economic changes in Bulgaria during the 1960s; it was a peculiar “reward“ for the people who had put all their strength in the hard and wearisome work typical of the previous decade. But although it was presented as “free“, the time people had after the working day or working week was not free of ideological control at all; just the opposite, there were directives, plans and norms for it as well. According to them, only the activities orientated to the physical, intellectual, spiritual and social development of the character were considered “free time“. The article interprets photographs published in some of the popular periodicals in Bulgaria by means of which ideology constructed the idea of a correct organization of the free time of the citizens of socialistBulgaria in the 1960s. The article focuses not on the documentary but on artistic images and attempts to trace the process of transformation of certain everyday practices into beautiful views “advertising“ the ideologically legitimate activities.

Анатол Анчев. Фолклорът на работниците от едно звено на каналджийска бригада. София, 2017

Author(s): Ivanka Petrova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 1/2019

POUR UNE APPROCHE INTERDISCIPLINAIRE DE L’ETUDE DES « TECHNOLOGIES MILITANTES » : L’EXEMPLE DES TRACTS DU MOUVEMENT « ANTI-CPE » DE 2006

Author(s): Paolo Stuppia / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2018

As it a neglected boundary object of the scientific fields, the leaflet is most often relegated to a simple tool for illustrating political struggles, overlooking the viewpoint of its materiality, of its manufacturing and dissemination, and the multiplicity of its uses. Based on a PhD dissertation of 2014 about the leaflets of a french student protest, the one called “against-CPE” of 2006, the aim of this article is showing how an interdisciplinary approach can help to build a methodology to collect, define and analyze the multiple facets of this still relatively unknown “activist technology”.

LA CREATION D’UN RESEAU SCIENTIFIQUE POUR DEVELOPPER L’INTERDISCIPLINARITE: L’EXEMPLE DU RESEAU "EVALUATION FORMATION EMPLOI"

Author(s): Catherine Béduwé,Sandrine Croity-Belz,Catherine Soldano / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2018

This contribution is a feedback on the creation of a network of researchers from various disciplines in the social sciences (Economics, Sociology, Social Psychology and Education Sciences). The object of research is that of the relations between training and employment and the evaluation of these relations by public policies. It is common to the disciplines but each apprehends it in a specific way. It has evolved as scientific exchanges and mutual knowledge progressed. This requires researchers to be involved sustainably in a collective and specific work, which is not easy to value. If so, it leads to an interdisciplinary production that brings innovation and knowledge.

« DEUX OU TROIS CHOSES QUE JE SAIS D'ELLE ». REFLEXIONS SUR L'INTERDISCIPLINARITE DANS L'ETUDE DE LA GLOBALISATION EDUCATIVE : L'EXEMPLE DE LA RECEPTION D'UN PALMARES INTERNATIONAL

Author(s): Xavier Pons / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2018

This article provides a reflexion on how interdisciplinarity can help thinking current governance changes in education. On the basis of a particular case – the reception in the French policy debate of an international ranking much commented (the Pisa Survey from the OECD) – and thanks to a research device implemented during nine years through two different research studies, it highlights three major contributions of interdisciplinarity: the struggle against simplifying thoughts, the move of the researcher’s focus and the testing of new hypotheses.

QUAND L’INTERDISCIPLINARITE S’IMPOSE : CONTOURNEMENT D’UN REFUS DE TERRAIN PAR LA PROSOPOGRAPHIE

Author(s): Marion Demonteil / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2018

This paper addresses the practical modalities of entry into interdisciplinarity. Starting from a specific case of rejection from the field, it shows how the use of the historical discipline’s tools shapes the construction of a sociological research object. Following a rejection from the field, this research had to get historical distance, which lead our study from a questioning on the effects of new public management to a socio-history of administrative control at the crossroads of history and the sociology of action. The exploratory possibilities offered by prosopography, and more specifically by optimal matching, are illustrated from the material of a survey devoted to the general inspectors of the French ministry of Culture between the 1960s and today.

ÉTUDE DES CRISES POLITIQUES INTERNATIONALES ET INTERDISCIPLINARITE : LE CAS DU 11 SEPTEMBRE 2001

Author(s): Thomas Meszaros,Clément Morier / Language(s): French Issue: 2/2018

This study aims to work the concept of “political crisis” using interdisciplinary tools. It is based on a case study, the crisis of the September 11 attacks, analyzed according to two complementary approaches. First, the breakdown of the sequences of this crisis makes it possible to identify the development of the intensity of the phenomenon over time, and its phases, in order to observe the behavior of the different types of actors involved in the crisis. Then, we have to study the dynamic “morphology” that shapes the deployment of the crisis, from the point of view of the aggressor but also from the target, using René Thom’s Catastrophe Theory. This accounts for the internal functioning of these actors, and also, shows crisis management opportunities for the target of these attacks. The purpose of this work is to put forward the relevance of interdisciplinarity to think political crises, and to put interdisciplinarity into practice in order to improve the knowledge of a phenomenon in a specific field (political crisis), by studying with another one.