Social Diversity (social + diversity)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


Exploring Access and Equity in Higher Education: Policy and Performance in a Comparative Perspective

HIGHER EDUCATION QUARTERLY, Issue 2 2007
Patrick Clancy
A comparative analysis of how access and equity are defined and how policies have evolved reveals a number of commonalities and differences between countries. The overall trend is a movement from the priority given to ,inherited merit' in the admission process through a commitment to formal equality, towards the application of some modes of affirmative action for selected under-represented groups. This overall convergence, which is accompanied by a growing appreciation of the complexity of social identities, is complemented by significant national specificity in respect of the social categories which are used to define social diversity. In the absence of appropriate comparative measures of participation a Higher Education Participation Index is developed to facilitate cross-country comparisons. A review of current attempts to measure equity in access to higher education points to the need to develop a programme of comparative research which focuses on the social characteristics of students who are currently enrolled in higher education. [source]


Political and social drivers for access to the countryside: the need for research on birds and recreational disturbance

IBIS, Issue 2007
GRAHAM BATHE
The introduction of a statutory right of access to open country and registered common land in England and Wales in 2005 was a major milestone in a campaign traceable to the 19th century, with views strongly polarized between social classes and political parties, and between land owners and campaigners. More recently, access has also been recognized as a factor contributing to quality-of-life, public health, social diversity and rural economic issues. The mapping of access land revealed that 55% of it is also designated Site of Special Scientific Interest, where wildlife is legally conserved. This has generated a need to assess the implications of access in each case, and take measures to ensure nationally and internationally important features are protected, drawing on sound scientific principles. Early research, although competently undertaken, often failed to address population-scale effects significant at the designated-site level, enabling disputes and polarized ,beliefs' to be articulated. Hence, in addition to drawing up formal and transparent procedures for evaluating impacts and resolving difficulties, funds were released and a major programme initiated, commissioning applied research of direct relevance to the implementation of the legislation. This has pushed forward the boundaries of knowledge in a field which is both difficult and expensive to study. By gradually replacing ,belief' with evidence, this represents a case study in resolving environmental disputes. [source]


Internationalisation, Diversity and the Humanities Curriculum: Cosmopolitanism and Multiculturalism Revisited

JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION, Issue 3 2007
JAMES DONALD
This article stages a dialogue between cosmopolitanism and multiculturalism in order to think through what is at stake in demands that universities should produce graduates who are sensitive to social diversity and attuned to the contemporary realities of globalisation. The argument is that, although ,graduate attributes' are no doubt an effective management tool in a massified higher education system, they can also be used to focus attention on what dispositions it is reasonable and desirable to expect graduates to develop. The arguments about cosmopolitanism of Jeremy Waldron and Martha Nussbaum are considered. [source]


From Casta to Californio: Social Identity and the Archaeology of Culture Contact

AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Issue 3 2005
BARBARA L. VOSS
In culture contact archaeology, studies of social identities generally focus on the colonized,colonizer dichotomy as the fundamental axis of identification. This emphasis can, however, mask social diversity within colonial or indigenous populations, and it also fails to account for the ways that the division between colonizer and colonized is constructed through the practices of colonization. Through the archaeology of material culture, foodways, and architecture, I examine changing ethnic, racial, and gendered identities among colonists at El Presidio de San Francisco, a Spanish-colonial military settlement. Archaeological data suggest that military settlers were engaged in a double material strategy to consolidate a shared colonial identity, one that minimized differences among colonists and simultaneously heightened distinctions between colonists and local indigenous peoples. [source]


Re-thinking the complexities of ,culture': what might we learn from Bourdieu?

NURSING INQUIRY, Issue 1 2007
M. Judith Lynam
In this paper we continue an ongoing dialogue that has as its goal the critical appraisal of theoretical perspectives on culture and health, in an effort to move forward scholarship on culture and health. We draw upon a programme of scholarship to explicate theoretical tensions and challenges that are manifest in the discourses on culture and health and to explore the possibilities Bourdieu's theoretical perspective offers for reconciling them. That is, we hope to demonstrate the need to move beyond descriptions ,of' culture to an understanding of cultures as dynamic, and to show ways cultural practices create contexts that have the potential to foster or impede health. In our early research, largely undertaken in Canada's multicultural context, we sought to make visible the ways in which culture shaped conceptions of health and influenced health practices of immigrant groups. In recent years this focus has expanded to include populations that reflect the cultural and social diversity of our region. From the outset we attempted to move towards a conception of culture as negotiated, unifying, transformative and dynamic. While this position continues to hold appeal we are continually reminded that, despite our leanings towards constructivism, there is salience to the notion of culture as having enduring elements. It is this tension between the view of culture as embodied and enduring and culture as constructed and dynamic that we seek to examine. We explore whether Bourdieu's theoretical perspective offers promise for reconciling these apparently competing views. Using exemplars from our research we share insights that Bourdieu's work has offered to our analyses, thereby enabling us to move towards a view of culture that holds in tension these apparently contradictory positions of culture as both essence (albeit unstable, negotiated) and constructed. [source]


A Picture of the Floating World: Grounding the Secessionary Affluence of the Residential Cruise Liner

ANTIPODE, Issue 1 2009
Rowland Atkinson
Abstract:, A quarter century of financial deregulation, robber-baron corporatism and growing income polarisation has enabled the spatial partitioning of urban space into new and complex arrangements of micro-neighbourhood governance and privatism. These archipelagos of fortress homes and neighbourhoods increasingly lie outside the spaces of conventional state and city government. Yet while residential spaces of urban affluence have been unable to fully remove contact with the social diversity of the public realm, nomadic forms of super-affluence, flowing around a global,national urban system, have generated a form of networked extra-territoriality,a social space decoupled from the perceived risks and general dowdiness of the social world beneath it. This paper examines this space via the curious case of The World, a large residential cruise ship which, as its name suggests, roams the oceans and ports of the globe. Our title is taken from the name given to Japanese paintings of the new affluence and fantasy of life lived by the affluent and artists in late nineteenth century Japanese cities (O Ukiyo E, or pictures of the floating world). We suggest that The World forms a similarly disconnected realm, not only literally afloat, also detached from the reality of a world that has been strategically left behind. [source]


Counselling Psychology in Canada: Advancing Psychology for All,

APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY, Issue 1 2007
Richard A. Young
La psychologie du counseling au Canada est examinée à l'aide de la matrice SWOT. Quatre forces sont identifiées: l'identité, le paradigme, l'ensemble des compétences ainsi que l'éducation et la formation. Les tensions entre les trois premières forces sont aussi considérées comme des faiblesses. Les opportunités externes à la psychologie du counseling comprennent les changements de la société, la diversité sociale et la santé. Parmi les menaces auxquelles la psychologie du counseling au Canada est confrontée, sont identifiés le contexte universitaire avec les contenus de formation, la compétition avec d'autres groupes professionnels et les pressions externes visant à définir la pratique de la psychologie du counseling. L'un des objectifs pour la psychologie du counseling au Canada est de rendre la psychologie disponible à un large éventail de la population par de nombreux moyens. L'Association Internationale de Psychologie Appliquée peut travailler à accroître cette aire d'application et prendre le Canada comme modèle pour développer ce champ dans d'autres pays. Counselling psychology in Canada was examined using a SWOT analysis. Four strengths were identified: identity, paradigm, skill set, and education and training. Tensions within the first three of these strengths were also considered weaknesses. External opportunities for counselling psychology included changes in society, social diversity, and health. Among the threats to counselling psychology in Canada are the university context for training programmes, competition with other professional groups, and pressure from external influences on how to define counselling psychology practice. The vision for the future of counselling psychology in Canada is based on the principle of making psychology available to a wide range of the Canadian population through a variety of means. The International Association of Applied Psychology can work to enhance this area of professional psychology and can look to Canada for support and models in developing this field in other countries. [source]


Civilization in Color: The Multicultural City in Three Millennia

CITY & COMMUNITY, Issue 4 2004
Xavier De Souza Briggs
How should democratic societies and the cities that propel them respond to increased social diversity? Surprisingly few studies compare cities on their capacity to manage social diversity or offer historical views of the bases for co-existence among identity groups. Studies of this crucial theme that do offer comparative reach are limited to higher-level analyses (e.g., of race and nation making in the modern global order) or partial views (e.g., of economic inequality by race or ethnic politics in contemporary cities). This study, an exercise in theory building, examines three large, history-making, and famously diverse cities that relied on distinct designs for society to accommodate diversity: ancient Rome, medieval Cordoba, and contemporary Los Angeles. Comparisons across such huge spans of time and major culture shifts yield lessons obscured in current debates over inequality, multiculturalism, or the need for tolerance. Three of the most important lessons relate to the power of integrative societal projects much larger than cities; the co-existence throughout history of separatism or cultural mosaic patterns alongside active cross-cultural exchange and hybridization; and the need to bound pluralistic ideals within a strong, locally viable public order. In earlier periods of history, autocracy provided such order for standout pluralist cities and the civilizations they led. Come, come whoever you are. Ours is not a caravan of despair. ,Rumi, 13th-century Persian poet [source]