scholarly journals ELSEVIER’S SLAVES: THE WASHINGTON CONSENSUS IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES?

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 183-208
Author(s):  
TADEUSZ KLEMENTEWICZ

This paper investigates the mechanisms of subordinating the system of science and higher education to the needs of boosting capital in the conditions of a new business model characteristic of neoliberal capitalism. The author uses as a theoretical framework of critical studies of science and higher education systems developed in Poland by Krystian Szadkowski based on political economy (Simon Marginson and Gigi Roggero). The weakness of the recently implemented reform of Polish education, the essence of which is making the status of ‘scientist’ dependent on publication in high-ranking journals belonging to publishing corporations’ oligopoly, is that the natural and technical disciplines have been places on an equal evaluation footing with social sciences and humanities. This practice impoverishes the educational and critical functions of humanities, impoverishes the research questions, impoverishes the research methodology, and consequently, their cognitive values. The assessment of the quality of a social researcher’s work, to be reliable, should include several other components—the presence of an “invisible university” in international networks (e.g. measured by selected citation indicators), but also problematization and interpretative innovation, as well as an original contribution to the achievements of the discipline. Monographs mainly document this. Qualitative expert assessment is required for evaluation. Therefore, the publication of monographs in reputable Polish and foreign publishing houses should become a showcase of the Polish social researcher, rather than contributing journal papers. In the paper, the author synthesizes his various analyses of contemporary capitalism and the role that science and the research and development sector play in accumulating capital.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Rigby ◽  
Barbara Jones

This paper reflects on alternatives to the traditional form of doctoral thesis which are emerging to reflect a new approach to the valuation and designation of scientific outputs. We examine the changes and consider some implications. We suggest that the adoption of co-citation as underpinning principle for the measurement of knowledge structures has led to re-designation of the value of knowledge and knowledge producers in increasingly quantitative terms. We use notions of ‘institution’ and ‘logic’ to better understand such a change and its implications. Under a new logic that is gradually embedding itself across the higher education sector, the ‘constitutive rules’ concerned with the value of research now prioritize quantification, and tangibility of output, and quality is increasingly equated with citation. Whilst the scientific disciplines have traditionally been closer to this model, albeit with significant national variations, subjects within the Social Sciences and Humanities are now being affected. We present evidence from a small study of the UK higher education sector of university regulation of doctoral degree submission format in two disciplines in the Humanities and Social Sciences (History and Sociology). Our evidence shows the recent and gradual adoption of a practice, previously more common in scientific disciplines, that allows the doctoral thesis to be constituted by a series of publishable papers, known by a variety of names, the most common being ‘Thesis by Published Papers’, ‘Journal Format Thesis’, ‘Alternative Format Thesis’, and ‘Integrated Thesis’. As the thesis of the Social Sciences and Humanities – itself an important institution in the academic field - begins to reflect a greater emphasis upon quantity of knowledge outputs, a tension emerges with the most central of all scientific institutions, the peer-reviewed journal paper.


2020 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Jay Coakley

This article is organized around the idea that a person can be a part of kinesiology without being in kinesiology. Trained as a sociologist and never having a faculty appointment outside of a sociology department, I am an outsider in kinesiology. However, my participation in kinesiology and relationships with scholars in kinesiology departments have fostered my professional growth and my appreciation of interdisciplinary approaches to studying sports, physical activities, and the moving human body. The knowledge produced by scholars in kinesiology subdisciplines has provided a framework for situating and assessing my research, teaching, and professional service as a sociologist. The latter half of this article focuses on changes in higher education and how they are likely to negatively impact the social sciences and humanities subdisciplines in kinesiology. The survival of these subdisciplines will depend, in part, on how leaders in the field respond to the question, Kinesiology for whom?


Author(s):  
David Thompson

Much of the research into higher education and its role in work-based learning (WBL), and especially in supporting undergraduate students on placements, has focussed on longer term internships and sandwich courses. Research has also focussed on subject areas that have traditionally been associated with the above; for example, Business, Health, and Engineering. By contrast, the aim of this study was to gather data from students on a much shorter period of placement, categorised as a ‘short project’ (Brennan & Little, 1996). Furthermore, the data recovered was from students studying within the social sciences paradigm, undertaking an undergraduate degree in Education Studies (not teacher education). The social sciences and humanities more generally have not been discussed to any great extent within the context of research on placement or work-based learning (see Smith, Clegg, Lawrence, & Todd, 2007); the subject of Education Studies is not covered at all by previous research. This paper considers the different ways practitioners might blend learning and support university students’ experiential and academic learning in this short project format. The results suggest that even a relatively short period of structured placement can be of significant benefit to students although for many respondents, face-to-face contact in the form of lectures and tutorials is still an important component of a blended approach to WBL.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
David K. Wiggins

This essay reflects on the status of kinesiology amidst the current pandemic and Black Lives Matter movement. Utilizing the metaphor coined by mathematician and physicist Freeman Dyson, I contend that the continued success of kinesiology is more plausible if we prepare more visionary birds, those with broader range and a variety of interests, to supplement the more narrowly focused frogs who currently dominate the field. Implicit in the essay is the contention that the field would benefit if it took a more interdisciplinary approach to the study of physical activity, sport, exercise, and other human movement forms as advocated by the American Kinesiology Association and individual scholars in the field. More specifically, I argue that the social sciences and humanities should be provided a more prominent place in kinesiology curriculums and serve as an academic core for all students in the field, irrespective of career aspirations and goals.


2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 309
Author(s):  
Nina Kulenović

The paper is part of wider research into the status of explanation in the debate on the scientific status of anthropology – wherein one of the key assumptions is that there is a strong correlation between theoretical and methodological structures which would make them inseparable, and that explanation or explanatory potential, is the point of convergence which can be used to test for the possibility of separating theoretical and methodological structures in the first place. To test this idea, a line of debate between methodological holism and methodological individualism – one of the longest running and most complex debates in the social sciences and humanities – was considered. The historical background of the debate has been highlighted, and its relevancy and implications in the controversy about the explanatory capacity and scientific status of sociocultural anthropology.


Author(s):  
Pedro Enrique García Ruiz

Uno de los aspectos dominantes en los desarrollos de las ciencias sociales y las humanidades en la actualidad es la adaptación de enfoques naturalistas. Los programas naturalistas rechazan el estatuto de lo humano que había defendido tradicionalmente la filosofía al sostener que la conciencia es reducible a un hecho contingente y, por lo tanto, puede comprenderse desde un criterio meramente objetivista. El filósofo francés Jean-Marie Schaeffer llama a esta postura la “tesis de la excepción humana” y sostiene que la fenomenología de Edmund Husserl es el último ejemplo de esta postura. Trataremos de mostrar que el antinaturalismo tan característico de la fenomenología husserliana es sostenible pese a la crítica de Schaeffer. En este sentido, buscamos explorar brevemente la posibilidad y sentido de una fenomenología naturalizada.One of the key aspects in the development of the social sciences and humanities today is the adaptation of naturalistic approaches. Naturalists programs reject the status of the human that had traditionally defended philosophy holding that consciousness is reducible to a contingent fact and, therefore, can be understood from a purely objectivist approach. The French philosopher Jean-Marie Schaeffer calls this approach the “thesis of human exception” and argues that the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl is the latest example of this approach. Try to show that the anti-naturalism so characteristic of Husserlian phenomenology is sustainable despite criticism of Schaeffer. Here, looking briefly to explore the possibility and way of a naturalized phenomenology.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Quan-Hoang Vuong

Valian rightly made a case for better recognition of women in science during the Nobel week in October 2018 (Valian, 2018). However, it seems most published views about gender inequality in Nature focused on the West. This correspondence shifts the focus to women in the social sciences and humanities (SSH) in a low- and middle-income country (LMIC).


Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 49
Author(s):  
Mohamed Amine Brahimi ◽  
Houssem Ben Lazreg

The advent of the 1990s marked, among other things, the restructuring of the Muslim world in its relation to Islam. This new context has proved to be extremely favorable to the emergence of scholars who define themselves as reformists or modernists. They have dedicated themselves to reform in Islam based on the values of peace, human rights, and secular governance. One can find an example of this approach in the works of renowned intellectuals such as Farid Esack, Mohamed Talbi, or Mohamed Arkoun, to name a few. However, the question of Islamic reform has been debated during the 19th and 20th centuries. This article aims to comprehend the historical evolution of contemporary reformist thinkers in the scientific field. The literature surrounding these intellectuals is based primarily on content analysis. These approaches share a type of reading that focuses on the interaction and codetermination of religious interpretations rather than on the relationships and social dynamics that constitute them. Despite these contributions, it seems vital to question this contemporary thinking differently: what influence does the context of post-Islamism have on the emergence of this intellectual trend? What connections does it have with the social sciences and humanities? How did it evolve historically? In this context, the researchers will analyze co-citations in representative samples to illustrate the theoretical framework in which these intellectuals are located, and its evolution. Using selected cases, this process will help us to both underline the empowerment of contemporary Islamic thought and the formation of a real corpus of works seeking to reform Islam.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Beatriz Marín-Aguilera

Archaeologists, like many other scholars in the Social Sciences and Humanities, are particularly concerned with the study of past and present subalterns. Yet the very concept of ‘the subaltern’ is elusive and rarely theorized in archaeological literature, or it is only mentioned in passing. This article engages with the work of Gramsci and Patricia Hill Collins to map a more comprehensive definition of subalternity, and to develop a methodology to chart the different ways in which subalternity is manifested and reproduced.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document