1,050 research outputs found
Doing it differently: Engaging interview participants with imaginative variation
No full textImaginative variation was identified by Husserl (1936/1970) as a phenomenological technique for the purpose of elucidating the manner in which phenomena appear to consciousness. Briefly, by engaging in the phenomenological reduction and using imaginative variation, phenomenologists are able to describe the experience of consciousness, having stepped outside of the natural attitude through the epochē. Imaginative variation is a stage aimed at explicating the structures of experience, and is best described as a mental experiment. Features of the experience are imaginatively altered in order to view the phenomenon under investigation from varying perspectives. Husserl argued that this process will reveal the essences of an experience, as only those aspects that are invariant to the experience of the phenomenon will not be able to change through the variation.
Often in qualitative research interviews, participants struggle to articulate or verbalise their experiences. The purpose of this article is to detail a radical and novel way of using imaginative variation with interview participants, by asking the participants to engage with imaginative variation, in order to produce a rich and insightful experiential account of a phenomenon. We will discuss how the first author successfully used imaginative variation in this way in her study of the erotic experience of bondage, discipline, dominance & submission, and sadism & masochism (BDSM), before considering the usefulness of this technique when applied to areas of study beyond sexuality
BDSM - Bondage and Discipline; Dominance and Submission; Sadism and Masochism
No full textTurley, EL ORCiD: 0000-0003-2563-6622This chapter will outline the history of the psychological and psychiatric focus on BDSM, emphasising the psychopathological framework within which it has been cast. Mainstream psycho-medical theoretical perspectives will be contrasted with current, non-pathologising research, leading to an examination of the current debates around BDSM. This will include a discussion of the debate between the different conceptualisations of BDSM, and the implications for practitioners of consensual BDSM in terms of discrimination, legal status, and self-concept. Finally, the chapter will consider future directions for BDSM, with particular reference to claims for sexual citizenship and the fate of different ‘sexual stories’ in the light of the nature of taboo
The persistence of populations facing climate shifts and harvest
No full textMany species are expected to shift their geographic distribution as climates change, and yet climate change is only one of a suite of stressors that species face. Species that might, in theory, be able to shift rapidly enough to keep up with climate velocity (the rate and direction that isotherms move across the landscape) may not in actuality be able to do so when facing the cumulative impacts of multiple stressors. Despite empirical reports of substantial interactions between climate change and other stressors, we often lack a mechanistic understanding of these interactions. Here, we developed and analyzed a spatial population dynamics model to explore the cumulative impacts of climate with another dominant stressor in the ocean and on land: harvest. We found that critical rates of climate velocity and harvest depend on the growth rate and dispersal kernel of the population, as well as the magnitude of the other stressor. This allowed us to identify conditions under which harvesting and climate velocity can together drive populations extinct even when neither stressor would do so in isolation. Except in these extreme cases, we also found that the interaction between the declines in biomass caused by climate velocity and harvest is approximately additive. Finally, we have shown that threshold harvest rules can be effective management tools to mitigate the interaction between the two stressors, while protected areas can either help or hinder,depending on how harvesters reallocate their effort. We also have parameterized the model for black rockfish (Sebastes melanops) to demonstrate the model’s broad applicability.Received 22 December 2014; revised 25 February 2015; accepted 4 March 2015; final version received 8 May 2015; published 23 September 2015.Peer reviewe
The Social World of BDSM - A Descriptive Phenomenological Investigation
No full textLangdridge and Butt (2004) describe the beginning of the 21st century as a time for sexual stories. Sexual practices such as bondage, discipline, sadism and masochism (BDSM) are now becoming more evident in society and BDSM related themes are apparent in mainstream films and television programmes such as ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ (Burr 2006). Weiss (2006) reports that media representations of BDSM are on the increase, however, Barker, Iantaffi & Gupta (2007) argue that it is the BDSM imagery, rather than the sexual practises, that have become more socially acceptable, while ‘real’ BDSM remains an illegal and pathologised practice
Ritorno a Thornfield. La "storia segreta" di Adèle Varens in Thornfield Hall di Emma Tennant
No full textIn the line of the Neo-Victorian movement within postmodern literature, in 2002 British author Emma Tennant (1937-2017) re-wrote Charlotte Brontë’s 1847 Jane Eyre as Thornfield Hall. Even though its subtitle, The Hidden Story of Jane Eyre, anticipates a new appendix to Jane’s widely known adventures, the novel is in fact centred on Adèle Varens, “the French dancer’s bastard”. In particular, Tennant’s narrative looks back at the Brontean novel by exploring the Parisian milieu in which the young Adèle breathes the air of the Révolution and learns how to resist the patriarchal and political established order; and yet, later on, she seems to forget the teachings she drew from Céline Varens, her mother, and her world in a problematic intertextual twist that questions the presence of the Other – once again represented by Bertha Antoinette Mason, echoing Jean Rhys’s 1966 masterpiece Wide Sargasso Sea – but ultimately/inevitably pays homage to Brontë’s classic
Handheld-Impedance-Measurement System with seven-decade capability and potentiostatic function
No full textThis paper describes design and test of a new impedance-measurement system for nonlinear devices that exhibits a seven-decade range and works down to a frequency of 0.01 Hz. The system is specifically designed for electrochemical measurements, but the proposed architecture can be employed in many other fields where flexible signal generation and analysis are required. The system employs an unconventional signal generator based on two pulsewidth modulation (PWM) oscillators and an autocalibration system that allows uncertainties of less than 3% to be obtained over a range of 1 kΩ to 100 GΩ. A synchronous demodulation processing allows the noise superimposed to the low-amplitude input signals to be made negligibl
'Like nothing I’ve ever felt before’: understanding consensual BDSM as embodied experience
No full textThis paper aims to illustrate how the consensual sexual practice of BDSM (bondage, discipline, dominance and submission and sadism and masochism) can be interpreted as a method of embodied exploration. It will detail the various ways that engaging in BDSM, either as the dominant/top or submissive/bottom partner, is able to enhance feelings of corporeality and explore bodily relationships with the world and with other people. For many practitioners, BDSM places the body into central focus, and this work will elucidate the ways that this can be conceptualised as ‘embodied exploration’. Taken from a project examining the erotic experience of BDSM, this research adopted an existential phenomenological approach. Existential philosopher Merleau-Ponty argued that the body is not simply another object in the world, but that people are inextricably linked to the world through their bodies as body-subjects. Nine participants were recruited for the study, and variation in self-identified sexual role, gender, sexual orientation and age was deliberately sought for the sample. Template analysis, a method of hierarchically organising and structuring thematic findings, was used to analyse the interview data of the research participants. The salient themes relating to BDSM as embodied exploration are discussed in this paper with particular reference to unfamiliar physical and emotional sensations, imposed corporeal limitations and experience a sense of embodied liberation
Material movement in the near eastern epipalaeolithic: implications of the shell and stone beads of direkli cave, Turkey
No full textBaysal, Emma L. (Trakya author)Direkli Cave is an Epipalaeolithic site in the central Taurus mountain range in southeastern Turkey that was used by mobile hunter-gatherer communities. The assemblage of beads from the cave, made primarily from shell (marine and freshwater) and stone, shows new evidence both that bead materials were brought to the site from the shores of the Mediterranean and that the material culture of the site has relationships to the Levant, northern Mesopotamia, and inner Anatolia. This article questions how such a bead assemblage should be interpreted in the light of existing evidence for the Near Eastern and Anatolian Epipalaeolithic and what it adds to our understanding of the better known contemporary Natufian culture of the Levant. It considers the long-distance movement of materials, interregional material cultural influences, and the way the Epipalaeolithic period is conceptualized more broadly
Adaptation strategies of coastal fishing communities as species shift poleward
No full textIn this period of environmental change, understanding how resource users respond to such changes is critical for effective resource management and adaptation planning. Extensive work has focused on natural resource responses to environmental changes, but less has examined the re- sponse of resource users to such changes. We used an interdisciplinary approach to analyse changes in resource use among commercial trawl fish- ing communities in the northwest Atlantic, a region that has shown poleward shifts in harvested fish species. We found substantial community- level changes in fishing patterns since 1996: southern trawl fleets of larger vessels with low catch diversity fished up to 400 km further north, while trawl fleets of smaller vessels with low catch diversity shrank or disappeared from the data set over time. In contrast, trawl fleets (of both large and small vessels) with higher catch diversity neither changed fishing location dramatically or nor disappeared as often from the data set. This analysis suggests that catch diversity and high mobility may buffer fishing communities from effects of environmental change. Particularly in times of rapid and uncertain change, constructing diverse portfolios and allowing for fleet mobility may represent effective adaptation strategies.Peer reviewe
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