1,720,963 research outputs found
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
Religion and the COVID-19 Pandemic in Southern Africa
Full text linkThis book investigates the role of religion in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic in Southern Africa. Building on a diverse range of methodologies and disciplinary approaches, the book reflects on how religion, politics and health have interfaced in Southern African contexts, when faced with the sudden public health emergency caused by the pandemic. Religious actors have played a key role on the frontline throughout the pandemic, sometimes posing roadblocks to public health messaging, but more often deploying their resources to help provide effective and timely responses. Drawing on case studies from African indigenous knowledge systems, Islam, Rastafari and various forms of Christianity, this book provides important reflections on the role of religion in crisis response. This book will be of interest to researchers across the fields of African Studies, Health, Politics and Religious Studies
Religion and COVID-19 Vaccination in Zimbabwe
No full textThe threat of COVID-19 to the lives of people created an opportunity for nations to come together for solutions. However, dissimilar nations had different priorities and urgency. Zimbabweans in the diaspora provided ‘disconcerting vaccination voices’ between the global and local contexts. Broadly, the experiences of religious Zimbabweans during the COVID-19 pandemic in Zimbabwe were pro-COVID-19 vaccination whether through voluntarism or coercion. For diasporic Zimbabweans in the United Kingdom, particularly Pentecostals, the panacea to COVID-19 was in prayer. They prioritised prayer over other means like vaccines. Besides the underlying issues of racism, inequality and discrimination against Zimbabweans in the developed society, this chapter focuses on the disconcerting vaccination voices and their impact on either diasporic Zimbabwean vaccine acceptance or hesitancy
Becoming ‘members of a new race’ : Redefining Rastafari Alternative African Masculinities in Zimbabwe
No full textOften identified as a minority new religious movement (NRM) in society, Rastafari has been misunderstood, misinterpreted and underplayed in scholarship as compared to other religious traditions. This chapter seeks to critically engage selected works of Ezra Chitando in the context of Rastafari perspectives on gender, health and human sexuality in Zimbabwe against the backdrop of the ‘one love’ principle in the movement. The study posits that Rastafari presents an ambivalent case on issues of gender, climate change, health and human sexuality. The study grappled with the question: Is there a disparity between Rastafari philosophy and practice of ‘one love’ pertaining to gender, climate change, health and human sexuality? The research used Afrocentricity as a theoretical framework and a combination of a critical review of published works and documentary analysis of print and electronic media for data collection. The study established that on the one hand, Rastafari is making a steady progress towards promoting gender equality by carving Alternative African Masculinities in the family and the public sphere. On the other hand, the challenges that remain pertain to Rastafari views on human sexuality and sexual and reproductive health. In particular, the anti-homosexuality stance and skepticism towards the use of contraceptives, catapult the ambivalence of the sacred in Rastafari. The study concludes that just as the works of Chitando seek to ensure that ‘all may live’ by any means necessary, promoting transformative African Mas- culinities would be the best way forward for Rastafarians to ‘become members of a new race’, thereby reliving the legacy of Emperor Haile Selassie I in 21st century Zimbabwe
Blogging, journalism and the public sphere: assessing the value of the 'blogosphere' as a new form of the public sphere : a case study of the Mail & Guardian Online's Blogmark
No full textThe study seeks to investigate whether weblogs can act as virtual public spheres, where people can meet to discuss issues of interest to them. It uses the Mail & Guardian Online’s Blogmark as a case study. Weblogs – highly interactive online journals comprised of links and postings in reverse chronological order – are fast becoming an avenue of choice for many internet users wanting to share opinions and news with others online. Because of their unique read-and-write characteristics, some have equated them to the 18th century coffeehouses, around which the early forms of citizen involvement in public affairs began in early capitalist Europe. Despite their growing popularity, however, not much scholarly work has been dedicated to the practice of blogging in Africa, and particularly in South Africa. The study’s theoretical framework is drawn from Jürgen Habermas’s concept of the public sphere. While noting some of the criticisms of the Habermasian model, it is argued that the concept is instrumental in our understanding of the relationship between the media and democracy. The study, however, adopted a re-worked model of the concept of the public sphere. This model argues for the need to have a multiplicity of public sphericules (instead of one single public sphere as advocated by Habermas), around which individuals can congregate to discuss issues of common concern to them. Using a combination of qualitative content analysis, self-completion questionnaires and a semi-structured interview, the study found Blogmark to be an example of how emerging internet genres such as weblogs can be vehicles of citizen involvement in public life. A range of issues were discussed in the blog, from politics, race and ii i gender issues, to personal anecdotes, relationships, and sex. However, while some posts exhibited high levels of interactivity, with many bloggers joining in to offer their opinions, some read like online monologues. The study argues that although blogging is a practice that is still limited to a few privileged individuals, with the everrising size of the ‘blogosphere’, weblogs such as Blogmark are making a small but not insignificant contribution to the number of voices that can be heard in the public realm
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
Blogging, journalism and the public sphere: assessing the value of the 'blogosphere' as a new form of the public sphere : a case study of the Mail & Guardian Online's Blogmark
Full text linkThe study seeks to investigate whether weblogs can act as virtual public spheres, where people can meet to discuss issues of interest to them. It uses the Mail & Guardian Online’s Blogmark as a case study. Weblogs – highly interactive online journals comprised of links and postings in reverse chronological order – are fast becoming an avenue of choice for many internet users wanting to share opinions and news with others online. Because of their unique read-and-write characteristics, some have equated them to the 18th century coffeehouses, around which the early forms of citizen involvement in public affairs began in early capitalist Europe. Despite their growing popularity, however, not much scholarly work has been dedicated to the practice of blogging in Africa, and particularly in South Africa. The study’s theoretical framework is drawn from Jürgen Habermas’s concept of the public sphere. While noting some of the criticisms of the Habermasian model, it is argued that the concept is instrumental in our understanding of the relationship between the media and democracy. The study, however, adopted a re-worked model of the concept of the public sphere. This model argues for the need to have a multiplicity of public sphericules (instead of one single public sphere as advocated by Habermas), around which individuals can congregate to discuss issues of common concern to them. Using a combination of qualitative content analysis, self-completion questionnaires and a semi-structured interview, the study found Blogmark to be an example of how emerging internet genres such as weblogs can be vehicles of citizen involvement in public life. A range of issues were discussed in the blog, from politics, race and ii i gender issues, to personal anecdotes, relationships, and sex. However, while some posts exhibited high levels of interactivity, with many bloggers joining in to offer their opinions, some read like online monologues. The study argues that although blogging is a practice that is still limited to a few privileged individuals, with the everrising size of the ‘blogosphere’, weblogs such as Blogmark are making a small but not insignificant contribution to the number of voices that can be heard in the public realm
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
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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