Humanities & Social Sciences

This book offers a new interpretation of the rich narratives of Arab secularism, contending that secularism as a set of ideas and a social movement is destined to loom large on the political and legal horizon of most Arab states. Youssef M. Choueiri provides a study of three moments in the development of secularism in the Arab World, the Machiavellian, the Alfierian and the Gramscian. It is within such a scope that secularism in its interaction with state-building projects, women’s emancipation and religion is treated as an intellectual current and a discursive entity embedded in the political process of its diverse societies. Through the chapters, Choueiri demonstrates how secularism occupies a pivotal presence in the religious and political life of the Arab world, exploring such interrelated configurations as indigenous contributions, diverse reforms and the impact of Western states. He concludes that secularism has become a moral prerequisite and a required vehicle in creating the necessary conditions for the success of democracy in the Middle East. Narratives of Arab Secularism tackles the complexity and contemporary ramifications of the subject in a way that no previous single study has been able to. It will be relevant to both students and academics dealing with topics related to the Middle East including religion, politics, anthropology and history.

The open access book provides a critical account of parenthood in Polish society. It uses a qualitative perspective to show how mothers and fathers engage with parenthood and also function in the labour market. Parenting in contemporary Poland is not only affected by individual preferences and choices, but significantly by the institutional context, in particular the family policy system, as well as socio-cultural norms of how men and women should fulfill parental roles. The author distinguishes between different kinds of work done in connection to parenthood and shows how the existing institutional system reinforces gender and other forms of social inequalities even in a post-communist state like Poland. The author demonstrates that Polish society has different expectations and institutional norms related to work and gender norms compared to those in long-standing democracies in Europe and elsewhere. The book also shows that the experiences of parenthood in Poland are different between men and women, between single and coupled parents, and based on economic and other resources. This book is of interest to social science students and researchers of family studies, parenting, sociology of work, and social structure in post-communist societies.

This book aims at contributing to the scientific and academic discourse as regards to the ‘what’ and ‘why’ of youth ministry. Too often, youth ministry has been approached from a mainly practical point of view, almost asking how we keep young people off the streets. Its methodology has often not included the theological and theoretical presuppositions that lie behind this ministry. Previous scientific reflection has been determined by a one-dimensional and almost exclusive point of view. In comparison with existing literature, this book does not focus so much on the ‘how’ of youth ministry. It innovates a different approach. The book challenges the existing exclusive approach and develops an inclusive, congregational and missional understanding of and approach to youth ministry.From a particular perspective on the understanding the main objectives of Practical Theology, the author endorses the so-called movement of ‘what is supposed to be going on’. He adds the outcome of an empirical round table discussion with some 16 leaders in this field on the descriptive and interpretive movements within the subject field: what is going on and why is it going on? The book will form the standard for any new research with regard to youth ministry. The book’s contribution lies on the level of sound theological reasoning and argumentation (supported by many scholars) for an inclusive congregational understanding of ministry as an integral part of every congregation being missional in being and doing. Youth, children, adolescents and emerging adults, are just as integral a part of every congregation within which they live and serve.

Unique cross-cultural and multimedial approach to class identity and precarity in literature, theatre, and film Contemporary culture not merely reflects ongoing societal transformations, it shapes our understanding of rapidly evolving class realities. Literature, theatre, and film urge us to put the question of class back on the agenda, and reconceptualize it through the lens of precarity and intersectionality. Relying on examples from British, French, Spanish, German, American, Swedish and Taiwanese culture, the contributors to this book document a variety of aesthetic strategies in an interdisciplinary dialogue with sociology and political theory. Doing so, this volume demonstrates the myriad ways in which culture opens up new pathways to imagine and re-imagine class as an economic relation, an identity category, and a subjective experience. Situated firmly within current debates about the impact of social mobility, precarious work, intersectional structures of exploitation, and interspecies vulnerability, this volume offers a wide-ranging panorama of contemporary class imaginaries.

Triathlon boomt. Der kräftezehrenden Verbindung von ­Schwim­men, Radfahren und Laufen verschreiben sich auch in der Schweiz immer mehr Menschen. Längst besitzt der Sport prominente Aushänge­schilder. Anbieter konkurrieren mit ­immer herausfordernderen Wettkämpfen und verschieben so die Machbarkeitsvorstellungen von Athletinnen und Athleten. Triathlon verändert den Alltag: Er wird zu einem umfassenden Lebensstil. Seiner Aufschlüsselung widmet sich dieses Buch aus einer kulturwissenschaftlich-anthropologischen Per­spektive. Die Autorin macht die eigenen Erfahrungen als Triathletin zum Ausgangspunkt einer ethnografischen Untersuchung. Sie gibt Einblicke in Selbstbilder, Körperkonzepte und Szenenwissen, in Emotionen und Rituale auf der Suche nach den Grenzvorstellungen und zeigt die Erfahrungsdimensionen von Körper, Bewegung und Raum im Rahmen dieser sportlichen Trias in ihrer Vielschichtigkeit auf. Was die Wechselzone und das Trainingslager mit methodischen Erhebungen zu tun haben, ist ebenso Thema wie Finisher-­T-Shirts, die eine Geschichte von vergangenen Leistungen erzählen. So hilft Babypuder nicht nur beim Anziehen eines ­Neoprens, sondern signa­lisiert Wissensbestände, Lebensstile und Exklusivität, durch die das Triathletendasein bezeugt wird. Die Studie fragt zudem, wie Leistungsvorstellungen, Streckenerleben und Technologien zusammenhängen, analysiert die entstehenden Bedeutungs­zuschreibungen, zeigt Varianten von Schmerzen auf und legt offen, wie der Ironman Hawaii zu einem modernen ­Mythos wer­den konnte.

Drawing on two years of ethnographic research in the north-eastern borderlands of Bangladesh, this book focuses on the everyday struggles of indigenous farmers threatened with losing their land due to such state programmes as the realignment of the national border, ecotourism, social forestry and the establishment of a military cantonment. In implementing these programmes, state actors challenge farmers’ right to land, instituting spaces of violence in which multiple forms of marginalisation overlap and are reinforced. Mapping how farmers react to these challenges emotionally and practically, the book argues that these land conflicts serve as a starting point for existentially charged disputes in which the survival efforts of farmers clash with the political imaginations and practices of the nation-state. The analysis shows that losing land represents more than being deprived of a material asset: it is nothing less than the extinction of ways of life.

Aunque la palabra pluri- o policentrismo aún no figura en el Diccionario de la Real Academia Española, el concepto ya está integrado en la política lingüística panhispánica de las instituciones académicas. Según la RAE, “se consideran plenamente legítimos los diferentes usos de las regiones lingüísticas, con la única condición de que estén generalizados entre los hablantes cultos de su área y no supongan una ruptura del sistema en su conjunto”. Sin embargo, a la hora de valorar en este sentido la variación lingüística del español, se termina el consenso y se abre la discusión. Este volumen ofrece un panorama amplio de las diferentes posiciones para saber qué se entiende exactamente por “pluricentrismo” en la teoría lingüística y hasta qué punto las normas ejemplares del español se elaboran y se modernizan sobre la base de este concepto.

How can the emancipatory values of social work be reconciled with society’s digital transformation? This book examines the ethical issues associated with the growing use of digital technologies, drawing on the findings of five research studies conducted in various fields of social intervention: socio-professional integration, street outreach with youth, inclusive education, and sexual and reproductive health. Beyond this diversity of settings and perspectives, it highlights the heterogeneity of professional stances and positions in response to a common question: how can the empowerment of individuals and communities be supported and promoted in the context of massively digitized intervention? Each chapter is followed by an interview that gives a voice to one or more professionals or affected individuals, in order to foster a dialogue between academic analyses and reflections drawn from practice.

Die einen schreiben Bücher, die anderen verlegen sie. Was aber, wenn Autoren in fiktionalen Werken über Verleger schreiben? Werden sie als freundlich und unterstützend oder eher als feindselig und ausbeuterisch porträtiert? In welcher Beziehung stehen sie zu anderen Akteuren des Literaturbetriebs, welche narrativen Funktionen übernehmen sie im Text? Alessandra Goggio nimmt sich diesen in der Literaturwissenschaft bisher kaum beachteten Fragen an und versucht - anhand von Beispielen aus der deutschsprachigen Gegenwartsliteratur - die spezifischen Darstellungs- und Fiktionalisierungsverfahren zu erörtern und im Rahmen der sogenannten »Literaturbetriebsliteratur« zu deuten.

The Netherlands is home to one million citizens with roots in the former colonies Indonesia, Suriname and the Antilles. Entitlement to Dutch citizenship, pre-migration acculturation in Dutch language and culture as well as a strong rhetorical argument (‘We are here because you were there’) were strong assets of the first generation. This ‘postcolonial bonus’ indeed facilitated their integration. In the process, the initial distance to mainstream Dutch culture diminished. Postwar Dutch society went through serious transformations. Its once lilywhite population now includes two million non-Western migrants and the past decade witnessed heated debates about multiculturalism. The most important debates about the postcolonial migrant communities centered on acknowledgement and the inclusion of colonialism and its legacies in the national memorial culture. This resulted in state-sponsored gestures, ranging from financial compensation to monuments. The ensemble of such gestures reflect a guilt-ridden and inconsistent attempt to ‘do justice’ to the colonial past and to Dutch citizens with colonial roots. Postcolonial Netherlands is the first scholarly monograph to address these themes in an internationally comparative framework. Upon its publication in the Netherlands (2010) the book elicited much praise, but also serious objections to some of the author’s theses, such as his prediction about the diminishing relevance of postcolonial roots.

The 1970s and 1980s saw a revolution in Japanese literary criticism. A new generation of scholars and critics, many of them veterans of 1960s political activism, arose in revolt against the largely positivistic methodologies that had hitherto dominated postwar literary studies. Creatively refashioning approaches taken from the field of linguistics, the new scholarship challenged orthodox interpretations, often introducing new methodologies in the process: structuralism, semiotics, and phenomenological linguistics, among others. The radical changes introduced then continue to reverberate today, shaping the way Japanese literature is studied both at home and abroad. The Linguistic Turn in Contemporary Japanese Literary Studies is the first critical study of this revolution to appear in English. It includes translations of landmark essays published in the 1970s and 1980s by such influential figures as Noguchi Takehiko, Kamei Hideo, Mitani Kuniaki, and Hirata Yumi. It also collects nine new essays that reflect critically on the emergence of linguistics-based literary criticism and theory in Japan, exploring both the novel possibilities such theory created and the shortcomings that could not be overcome. Scholars from a variety of disciplines and fields probe the political and intellectual implications of this transformation and explore the exciting new pathways it opened up for the study of modern Japanese literature.

Die Frage, was staatliche Strafe ihrer Essenz nach eigentlich ist und ob und wie sie sich rechtfertigen lässt, ist alt und frustrierend. Häufig wird ihr mittels Verweisen auf vermeintlich intuitive Gewissheiten aus dem Weg gegangen. Nichtsdestotrotz ist die staatliche Strafe bis heute Gegenstand heftiger Debatten. Sie werfen ein Schlaglicht auf eine Institution, deren Natur und Rechtfertigung in ihrem Kernbereich vage geblieben sind. Vor diesem Hintergrund nimmt Kristina Peters die Straftheorie Hegels in den Blick und bringt sie in einen Dialog mit aktuellen Entwürfen. Wo hat sich die Debatte weiterentwickelt? Wo bestehen alte Probleme fort? Wo war die Diskussion vielleicht schon einmal weiter? Kurz: Sollten sich diejenigen, die sich der schwierigen Aufgabe stellen, eine tragfähige moderne Straftheorie zu entwickeln, überhaupt noch mit Hegel auseinandersetzen?

Human Genetics; Theory of Medicine/Bioethics; Ethics

Via three exemplary chapters the authors present the results of the DFG-funded research project entitled ‚Man Rent or Land Rent? Significance and function of land transfer for the practice of lordship of kings, lay lords and ecclesiastics in north-east Scotland in the later Middle Ages‘. This volume tried to offer a modified perspective on the organisation of the political society in late Medieval Scotland, formed through the bottom-up view of regional lordship and its respective sources. Scottish history should not only be told from the perspective of crown, magnates and the sources produced by and for them but bottom-up: There are large enough quantities of mostly underused sources stemming from clerical institutions, nobility and the burghs, which can further enhance our knowledge of the political structure and the socio-economic composition of the kingdom.

Industry 4.0 - Transforming the Future Beyond Manufacturing - Volume 2, Human-Centred, Organizational and Societal Transformations explores the human, organizational, territorial, and societal dimensions of digital transformation. Bringing together contributions on workforce change, organizational resilience, SMEs, higher education, skills development, public infrastructure, smart cities, cultural sustainability, data governance, privacy, and ethical digital services, the volume shows how Industry 4.0 and Industry 5.0 reshape not only production systems but also the ways people work, learn, collaborate, and govern. By linking human-centred digitalization, social innovation, sustainability, and responsible data practices, it offers a broader view of digital transformation as a socio-technical process and a valuable reference for researchers, educators, policymakers, and practitioners seeking more resilient, inclusive, and socially responsible pathways of innovation.