1,721,020 research outputs found
‘Disease is a crime; and crime a disease now unknown’: Changing Views of Crime in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-century Culture
No full textThis paper highlights a dramatic change that took place in the conceptualisation of crime during the course of the modern age due to the shift from a worldview that pivoted on religion to one that has been increasingly informed by scientific thought. The association between crime and sin, prevalent in the medieval and early-modern ages, gradually weakened throughout the nineteenth century, giving way to a corresponding nexus between crime and disease (notably insanity
and epilepsy), which in turn came to be scrutinised as the cause of antisocial
behaviour. This nexus became particularly relevant in those late nineteenth-
century, pseudo-scientific texts that pivoted on the concepts of atavism,
heredity, and degeneration. To study the development of the discourses of crime – also in relation to detection and punishment – this paper analyses both literary and pseudo-scientific sources
Modelling Bistabilities that Link Macro and Microscopic Biological Phenomena
No full textA survey of population dynamics and neutral theory of evolutio
Representing and Narrativizing Science
No full textThe assumption that literature, and not only science, is a cognitive system, and that science, and not only literature, is a system of representation provides the conceptual framework for exploring how knowledge is represented in scientific writing and in literary texts which tackle scientific theories. Language is used by scientists to articulate working hypotheses, illustrate methods, describe stages of research, and show results. The discursive modes and rhetorical strategies used in conveying theories and discoveries to specialist and non-specialist audiences show that scientific writers pursue clarity, efficacy, and rigour but are also sensitive to the lure of literariness. Figures of speech in narratives of science challenge the classification of scientific language as denotative and of literary language as connotative. Tropes transport scientific concepts from a literal to a non-literal plane, adding layers of meaning and engendering polysemy.
Creative writers intrigued by science fictionalize it and, while giving a literary shape to scientific ideas, draw attention to the medium of communication. They appropriate scientific concepts, representing them for their own purposes in a particular form and language. In literary representations of science, multiple components coexist: the fictional and narrative one, made manifest through the plot and the characters, and the explanatory and argumentative one, conveyed through the exposition of scientific methods and theories. Literature thriving on science consciously employs language both creatively and instrumentally in order to mould scientific knowledge according to the requisites of literary writing. Scientists rely on language to formulate, fix, and convey assumptions, hypotheses, and methods. Writing of science searches for aesthetically accomplished ways of expressing scientific concepts. Because scientific notions are mediated by language, they are constantly exposed to new forms of verbalization which disclose new meanings. Translating in accessible or creative ways what has been defined in scientific terms proper entails actively taking part in the production of and response to scientific knowledge. Multiple forces work together dynamically: the exposition of scientific methods and theories through explanation and argumentation; narrativization and fictionalization through different modes of emplotment and reference to characters; self-reflexivity and meta-discourse, evidenced in a conscious use of language as a medium that transforms scientific knowledge in representation
Discourses and Narrations in the Biosciences
No full textDiscourses and Narrations in the Biosciences investigates the forms of writing in which scientific claims are formulated and announced. Argumentative strategies, compositional rules, and figurative expressions in communication and narrativization of scientific knowledge are the focus of interdisciplinary contributions by humanities and science scholars.
The first part of the book, dedicated to ‘Rhetorical and Epistemological Aspects of Science Writing’, addresses how scientific pursuits and methods feed into multi-level texts that generate responses within science, society, and culture. The second part, entitled ‘Bioscientific Discourses and Narrations’, examines popularizations and fictionalizations of science in relation to diversity, deviancy, ageing, illness, reproduction, the evolution of humankind, mathematical models of biomedical systems, and the myth of the heroic scientist.
Assessing the narrative impetus and command of literary and meta-discoursive strategies shown by contemporary science writers enhances understanding of the methods and conventions through which the biosciences produce knowledge
Science, Discoursivity, and Narrativity
No full textScience writing has evolved in response to changes in methods, stylistic conventions, and rhetorical strategies used to enunciate concepts and findings. The narrative impetus exhibited by contemporary science writers is the focus of this chapter, especially in relation to popularization and fictionalization of scientific discourses
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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