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Symbolic Role (symbolic + role)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Law and Criminology	33%
Humanities and Social Sciences	33%

Selected Abstracts

Dispersal Powers and the Symbolic Role of Anti-Social Behaviour Legislation

THE MODERN LAW REVIEW, Issue 5 2008
Adam Crawford, Article first published online: 21 AUG 200
This article considers the development and use of dispersal powers, introduced by the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003, and situates these within the context of wider legislation and policy initiatives. It explores the ways in which the powers have been interpreted by the courts and implemented by police and local authorities. The article critically analyses the manner in which the powers: introduce ,public perceptions' as a justification for police encroachments on civil liberties; conform to a hybrid-type prohibition; constitute a form of preventive exclusion that seeks to govern future behaviour; are part of a wider trend towards discretionary and summary justice; and potentially criminalise young people on the basis of the anxieties that groups congregating in public places may generate amongst others. It is argued that the significance of dispersal orders derives as much from the symbolic messages and communicative properties they express, as from their instrumental capacity to regulate behaviour. [source]

European Union Constitution-Making, Political Identity and Central European Reflections

EUROPEAN LAW JOURNAL, Issue 2 2005

It analyses both the temporal and spatial dimensions of constitution-making and addresses the problems of political identity related to ethnic divisions and civic demos. It starts by summarising the major arguments supporting the Union's constitution-making project and emphasises the Union's symbolic power as a polity built on the principles of civil society and parliamentary democracy. The EU's official rejection of ethnically based political identity played an important symbolic role in post-Communist constitutional and legal transformations in Central Europe in the 1990s. In the following part, the text analyses the temporal dimension of the EU's identity-building and constitution-making and emphasises its profoundly future-oriented structure. The concept of identity as the ,future in process' is the only option of how to deal with the absence of the European demos. Furthermore, it initiates the politically much-needed constitution-making process. The following spatial analysis of this process emphasises positive aspects of the horizontal model of constitution-making, its elements in the Convention's deliberation and their positive effect on the Central European accession states. The article concludes by understanding the emerging European identity as a multi-level identity of civil political virtues surrounded by old loyalties and traditions, which supports the conversational model of liberal democratic politics, reflects the continent's heterogeneity and leads to the beneficial combination of universal principles and political realism. [source]

The borderline syndrome in psychosomatic dermatology Overview and case report

JOURNAL OF THE EUROPEAN ACADEMY OF DERMATOLOGY & VENEREOLOGY, Issue 4 2004
W Harth
ABSTRACT The borderline syndrome is one of the most severe disturbances of psychosomatic dermatology. Patients with borderline syndrome are situated ,on the border' of psychosis, neurosis and personality disorders. The skin as a borderline organ carries a symbolic role. The clinical picture includes artefactual skin diseases due to self-mutilation by conscious or unconscious cutting, and rubbing, scratching or para-artefactual manipulations of pre-existing dermatoses. Leading symptoms of the borderline syndrome are poor impulse control, emotional instability and poor ego strength with low frustration tolerance and unstable personal relationships. We present the case of a 38-year-old female patient with borderline syndrome suffering from para-artefactual skin diseases of the face and a massive hyperhidrosis of the hands and feet. Within 9 months she was treated in four acute psychiatric hospitals and by 12 psychiatrists and psychotherapists. Early and accurate diagnosis and high-quality, sophisticated long-term therapy are necessary. [source]

Remembering the auca: violence and generational memory in Amazonian Ecuador

THE JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE, Issue 4 2009
Casey High
In Amazonian Ecuador and beyond, indigenous Waorani people have received considerable attention for their history of revenge killings during much of the twentieth century. In pointing to the heterogeneous forms of social memory assigned to specific generations, the article describes how oral histories and public performances of past violence mediate changing forms of sociality. While the victim's perspective in oral histories is fundamental to Waorani notions of personhood and ethnic identity, young men acquire the symbolic role of ,wild' Amazonian killers in public performances of the past. Rather than being contradictory or competing historical representations, these multiple forms of social memory become specific generational roles in local villages and in regional inter-ethnic relations. The article suggests that, beyond the transmission of a fixed package of historical knowledge, memory is expressed in the multiple and often contrasting forms of historical representation assigned to particular kinds of people. Résumé En Amazonie équatorienne et ailleurs, les peuples autochtones Waorani ont bénéficié d'une attention considérable pendant une bonne part du XXe siècle pour leur histoire de vendetta. En pointant l'hétérogénéité des formes de mémoire sociale associées à différentes générations, l'auteur décrit la façon dont les histoires orales et les performances publiques des violences passées médient des formes changeantes de socialité. Tandis que le point de vue de la victime dans ces récits oraux est fondamental dans les notions de personnalité et d'identité ethnique des Waoranis, les jeunes gens acquièrent le rôle symbolique des tueurs amazoniens « sauvages » lors de performances publiques évoquant le passé. Plutôt que des représentations historiques contradictoires ou concurrentes, ces multiples formes de mémoire sociale se muent en rôles générationnels spécifiques dans les villages locaux et en relations interethniques régionales. L'auteur suggère qu'au-delà de la transmission d'un bagage immuable de connaissances historiques, la mémoire s'exprime dans les formes multiples et souvent très différentes de représentation historique attribués à certaines catégories de personnes. [source]

Normalizing bilingualism:The effects of the Catalonian linguistic normalization policy one generation after1

JOURNAL OF SOCIOLINGUISTICS, Issue 3 2008
Michael Newman
This study examines the evolution of language attitudes of linguistically diverse adolescents in urban Catalonia a generation after the instauration of Linguistic Normalization, official language policies favoring Catalan. Woolard (1984, 1989) and Woolard and Gahng's (1990) classic Catalan/Spanish matched guise studies are used as a baseline. Current data come from a modified and expanded replication of those original studies. Findings show: (1) differences in attitudes between youths of Spanish and Catalan background have softened; (2) disparities in Status and Solidarity have evened out; (3) language choice can be highly gendered; and (4) bilingual proficiency is now valued by and for both communities. The support for bilingualism and the easing of divisions are understood as signs of increased ,linguistic cosmopolitanism,' a stance that looks beyond parochial own-group communities and favors bridging linguistic boundaries. The significance is that minority languages can be valued when they take on such symbolic roles. [source]

PERFORMING GOVERNANCE: A PARTNERSHIP BOARD DRAMATURGY

PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION, Issue 4 2007
TIM FREEMAN
This paper explores the governance of complex public sector partnerships through a detailed case study of a Joint Commissioning Partnership Board (JCPB) in the South East of England. It argues that a theoretical and empirical focus on the instrumental roles of boards has resulted in an under-appreciation of their symbolic purposes, especially in the context of the governance of inter-organizational relationships. The paper considers the performative dimension of partnership governance, highlighting the role of the symbolic in institutional enactment. Following a brief overview of governance in public sector partnerships, the case study site for the empirical research is introduced. The instrumental and symbolic roles of management boards are considered from a new institutionalist perspective and a dramaturgical analysis of institutional enactment undertaken to explore interplays of the symbolic and instrumental in strategy formation. Some implications for our understanding of the symbolic in partnership governance are discussed. [source]