1,721,008 research outputs found
Book review: Turning Ideas into Research: Theory, Design and Practice by Barbara Fawcett & Rosalie Pockett
No full textThere are many books about how to do social research, and the list continues to grow each year. Many of them double up with one another, covering very similar content and even structured in similar ways. It is not then an easy space for a new book to create a point of difference. However Fawcett and Pockett have clearly taken some time over the rationale for this text and the freshness in approach stands out..
The Meaning of Culture within Public Health Practice - Implications for the study of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health
No full textThis paper critically examines the conceptualisation of culture within public health practice, and considers implications for our understandings of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health status. There is no doubt that culture is a popular concept within public health, particularly in describing health differentials between populations distinguished by race, ethnicity and culture. However, this popularity is not matched by critical self-reflection upon the ways in which the concept of culture has been constructed within this space. This paper suggests a number of conceptualisations are apparent each reflecting a limited and problematic portrayal of the richness of culture
Toward cultural epidemiology : beyond epistemological hegemony
No full textIt is more than 10 years since the anthropologist DiGiacomo (1999) answered the question “Can there be a cultural epidemiology?” with disappointment, concluding ethnographic and epidemiological narratives are divergent not complementary. In the same year, the epidemiologist Krieger (1999, p. 1151) asked related questions about the epistemological foundations of epidemiology: “Epidemiology is–or is not—the basic science of public health. Epidemiology is—or is not—an objective science. Science and advocacy are—or are not—distinct and contrary endeavours.” Again in the same year the Indigenous researcher Smith (1999, p. 1) wrote, “From the vantage point of the colonized, a position from which I write, and choose to privilege, the term ‘research’ is inextricably linked to European imperialism and colonialism.” The act of conceptualizing and practicing cultural epidemiology thus brings with it a series of deep epistemological questions about the nature of knowledge production. The Western academy of health research assumes an intellectual and moral privilege to fill gaps in knowledge aimed at yielding improvements in health status. With such privilege comes responsibility, since the power to conceptualize health problems and their solutions deserves considerable critical, historical, and political reflexivity, particularly at the boundaries between dominant and oppressed cultural spaces..
Transnationalism and the Karen wrist-tying ceremony: An ethnographic account of Karen settlement practice in Brisbane
No full textWhen settling, people often use cultural schema from their original homeland to build familiarity in unfamiliar surrounds. This paper draws on ethnographic fieldwork conducted by the first author in Brisbane, with the Karen community from Burma, during which participant observation and interview methods were used. We present an ethnographic account of the Brisbane Karen wrist-tying ceremony. The ceremony acts as an insight into the challenges for Karen whilst settling into Australia. It reflects multiple accounts of history and tradition, but simultaneously speaks to emerging, contemporary Karen contexts. This research contributes to richer understandings of settlement: it frames transnational cultural practice as a flexible mode of integration, rather than an exclusionary mode of othering. We propose that the integrative discourse of the ceremony creates familiarity and social connection in local and diasporic spaces. This acts as a counter to the challenges of Karen settlement including the negotiations of local/global identity politics
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe 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
Review of Australian health related social work research 1990-2009
No full textSocial workers form a critical component of the Australian health workforce. Whilst their roles as practitioners are very strategic within the health system, less clear is their contribution to health research. This paper reviews the published record of social work research in Australian health from 1990-2009 in order to discern the patterns of the social work contribution to new knowledge in health. The results of this review indicate a tendency to focus on discursive commentary rather than empirical research as well as a less than expected focus on client studies. Given the rise of evidence based practice, there are potentially serious implications for social work in terms of how it positions itself as a contributor to new knowledge within the health field
Strong in the City: Toward a Strength Based Approach in Indigenous Health Promotion
No full textIssues Addressed: To describe the potential for strength based approaches in health promotion with the example of an urban Indigenous community\ud
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Method: Qualitative methods were used to describe an Indigenous perspective about community strength. The results were then used to inform a community development approach to health promotion.\ud
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Results: Five key strengths were described: 1) Extended Family; 2) Commitment to Community; 3) Neighbourhood Networks; 4) Community Organisations; and 5) Community Events. Working with these strengths, five kinds of resourcing strategies were pursued through various community development activities. These included: 1) professional support and development; 2) Networking Resources; 3) Management Support; 4) Specialist Support; and 5) Financial Support.\ud
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Conclusion: Standard needs assessment logic generally focuses our attention on gaps and weaknesses. This does not allow health promotion practice to acknowledge the existing social resources within communities which should be supported to promote better health. We suggest there are significant lessons here for community capacity building agendas, currently popular in social policy
Variations on the Author
Full text link“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
Full text linkWe 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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