1,720,964 research outputs found
Social norms, what a drag: gender, sexuality, and drag king communities
No full textThis research seeks to understand how drag king performers characterise and give meaning to kinging communities. I examine the ways performers conceptualise and symbolically manage their gender and sexual identities on and off stage. Moreover, I analyse the ways in which kings envision their identities in relation to dominant gender and sexuality norms. My field observation and in-depth interview data indicates that kings are a more heterogeneous group than contemporary scholarship suggests. In fact, kings perform for a variety of reasons and are stylistically diverse. The data also indicates that kinging communities are hierarchically organised resulting in discrimination against transgender and racial/ethnic minority kings. I conclude with the argument that identity construction occurs in relation to interconnected social structures and performers conceptualise and manage their identities within these structures. Moreover, many of these kings envision this identity management as a mechanism for deconstructing hegemonic gender and sexuality
"Heroic Crime Fighters" A Phenomenological Analysis of Police Officers' Idealistic Role Construct
No full textThis research seeks to understand how public police officers phenomenologically construct and conceptualize their occupational role. Most research has overlooked officers’ intimate constructions of reality. The present study addresses this gap in the literature by presenting an inductive analysis of how police officers define their role, capturing officers’ intimate constructions of their life-world, while acknowledging the contradictions and tensions that characterize this role construct. My interview data indicates that officers define their role in terms of an ideal construct that is oftentimes at odds with their lived reality. Moreover, the data suggests that there is a discontinuity between officers’ definition of reality, the nature of their lived experienced, and the institutionalized definitions of reality espoused by the media, the public and the courts which, ultimately, fosters feelings of powerlessness among the officers. I conclude with discussion about the implications of holding onto this role construct and offer potential policy initiatives
Residential Burglary in Guelph: Looking at the Physical and Social Predictors of Break and Enters
Full text linkThe rate of residential break and enters in Canada has been declining according to official statistics, but has increased according to self reports of victims. Since the 1970s, considerable attention has been given to preventing break and enters by altering the physical environment. However, studies that assess the effects of physical design have produced mixed results. The data for this study were drawn from Guelph Police Service break and enter records, and property site assessments were performed using Google Earth and Street View. Drawing from rational choice and routine activities perspectives, physical and social features of burgled and non-burgled single detached dwellings were assessed to determine which features predicted break and enter victimization. Results suggest little empirical support for place-based crime prevention strategies such as Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design
Unpopular Abolition: Analysis of Canadian Parliament's 1976 Debate to Abolish Capital Punishment
No full textThe subject of capital punishment receives a great deal of scholarly attention, with emphasis focusing increasingly on its abolition. But very little is known about how governments rationalize the decision to abolish this law, despite public opinion often opposing abolition. This thesis attempts to fill this gap in the literature by exploring Canada’s process of abolishing capital punishment, and how Members of Parliament justified passing legislation that was opposed by a majority of Canadians. Findings based on thematic content analysis reveal that many Members of Parliament employed strategic policy framing in their speeches in attempts to convince members of the legislature to also support their position regarding abolition. Because the issue of capital punishment necessitated a free vote, proponents of abolition used the parliamentary debate to diminish the significance and relevance of public opinion. This thesis concludes by discussing the implications of these findings
Arrested Development: The Mr. Big Sting as a Failed Social Problem
Full text linkThe use of the Mr. Big sting undercover policing tactic by Canadian police services has led to debate and controversy among civil libertarians, legal actors, and academics. It has not, however, led to widespread discussion or concern amongst the general public. Using a social constructionist framework, this study investigates why Mr. Big stings have failed to become a widely recognized social problem in Canada. An ethnographic content analysis of print media discourse reveals that weak claims-making led to this problem’s failed emergence. Unable to support complex, specialized problem claims, it is suggested that the media’s preference for simplicity left it unable to adequately present claims that sought to establish Mr. Big stings as problematic. These findings suggest that the media may be ill-suited to fulfilling its democratic role in promoting accountability among police and other public intuitions
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
Business Improvement Areas and the Justification of Urban Revitalization: Using the Pragmatic Sociology of Critique to Understand Neoliberal Urban Governance
No full textBusiness Improvement Areas (hereafter BIAs) have become a central feature of urban revitalization across North America, Australia, Western Europe, and South Africa. Urban scholars describe BIAs as a neoliberal form of urban governance insofar as these quasi-state organizations use private sector strategies to make changes to public spaces. Despite growing literature highlighting BIAs’ neoliberal form of power, there is little understanding of the influence these organizations have during urban revitalization decision-making processes. Drawing on interviews, participant observation, and document analysis from two BIAs in London, Ontario, I use the pragmatic sociology of critique to study interactional settings where BIAs engage in normative and morally-laden discussions about urban revitalization. I specifically focus on the Downtown London BIA’s involvement in the revitalization of a four-block downtown street called Dundas Place as well as the Old East Village BIA’s involvement in the neighbourhood’s residential development planning process. I argue that the production of BIA spaces is contingent on interactional settings where social actors engage in dialogue, debate, and negotiation. This is not to discount BIAs’ political and economic forms of power; rather, I argue these forms of power cannot be separated from socio-cultural forms of power enacted during interactional decision-making processes. In addition to showing the justificatory strategies used by BIAs, I show how BIA-related decision-making processes are influenced by their organizational interests and limited by certain institutional arrangements
Perceptions of a Policing Career Among Twenty-First Century Youth
No full textTo-date relatively little research has explored the perceptions that influence young peoples' interest in policing as a career. This study examined if perceptions of policing are interconnected with desire to be an officer. Overall, the results were inconclusive; however, it was determined that young people interested in a policing career hold moderately accurate perceptions of policing with regards to the application and hiring process, officer salary, the daily tasks performed by officers, and issues of gender. But, these young people have a limited understanding of longstanding issues of race/ethnic discrimination within policing. The implications of this research undertaking for policing organizations and academics are discussed
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
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