Topic
Structure and agency
About: Structure and agency is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 1265 publications have been published within this topic receiving 63660 citations.
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TL;DR: Parker as discussed by the authors brings structure and agency to the foreground of the current tumult of public schooling in the United States, focusing on three structures that are serving as rules and resources for creative agency: derision about failing schools, a broad mobilization of multiculturalism, and an enduring nationalism.
Abstract: In this article, Walter Parker brings structure and agency to the foreground of the current tumult of public schooling in the United States. He focuses on three structures that are serving as rules and resources for creative agency. These are a discourse of derision about failing schools, a broad mobilization of multiculturalism, and an enduring nationalism. Drawing on Anthony Giddens's structuration theory, Parker examines how these discourses figure in redefining school reform, redefining school curricula, and requiring schools once again to serve nationalistic purposes.
31 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that the gendered analyses of governance and globalization should be integrated, because if we believe that globalization is not an immutable and irresistible force, our analyses of globalization can only be improved by a greater understanding of gendered ways in which these processes are constructed and regulated.
Abstract: This article argues that the gendered analyses of governance and globalization should be integrated, because if we believe that globalization is not an immutable and irresistible force, our analyses of globalization can only be improved by a greater understanding of the gendered ways in which these processes are constructed and regulated. This understanding can also help to overcome the false dichotomy between structure and agency by helping to make clear the many ways in which actors interact with global structures and processes. Drawing on the diverse bodies of work on globalization and governance, this article focuses on four inter-related areas that are relevant to the development of a gendered political economy of governance and globalization. First it examines the processes associated with globalization, because although identified primarily with the analysis of globalization alone, an understanding of this area forms a preliminary building block for any integrated analysis. The subsequent three cat...
31 citations
TL;DR: The authors discusses ways in which feminist scholars draw upon agency in relation to the complex subject matter of women's engagement in so-called 'fundamentalist' movements. But the question is raised whether this emphasis on agency does not risk evacuating structural constraints in the construction of subjectivity, thus neutralizing the productive tension between structure and agency.
Abstract: This article discusses ways in which feminist scholars draw upon agency in relation to the complex subject matter of women's engagement in so- called 'fundamentalist' movements. While postcolonial critiques generally reject the term 'fundamentalism', and in particular the way it is linked to Islam, feminist perspectives have a vested interest in looking at contemporary developments in different religions from the perspective of women's lives. Against the patriarchal reputations of fundamentalist movements, feminist scholarship increasingly tends to emphasize women's agency, thereby effectively breaking with widespread notions of 'false consciousness'. After briefly discussing two such examples, the question is raised whether this emphasis on agency does not risk evacuating structural constraints in the construction of subjectivity, thus neutralizing the productive tension, at the heart of women's studies, between structure and agency. In conclusion, the article joins other calls for new ways of thinking about subjectivity. In different ways and in relation to different subject matters, the question of agency has become a renewed focus of thought in feminist and social theory (McNay, 2000). The branches of a possible genealogy of the theor- etical concern with agency extend in many directions, including 'structure vs agency' debates, questions of the generation of subjectivity, issues of
31 citations
01 Jan 2008
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors provide an analysis of Austrian populism in contemporary Austrian politics, which is divided into two segments: the first explores the structural factors which have facilitated the rise of populism; the second is devoted to examining populist agency.
Abstract: This chapter seeks to provide an analysis of populism in contemporary Austrian politics. Conceptually, it is divided into two segments: the first explores the structural factors which have facilitated the rise of populism; the second is devoted to examining populist agency. While any account of Austrian populism will inevitably focus on the Freedom Party (FPO), it needs to be emphasized that this political phenomenon is much broader and continues to evolve.
31 citations
TL;DR: The use of auto/ethnography in leisure studies has been limited to a few key articles as discussed by the authors, but it has been explored in a wide range of leisure studies, including women's roller derby.
Abstract: IntroductionIn this article I bring writing, as method, to the fore of feminist leisure research. In doing so I examine the concept of resistance in the contemporary version of womens roller derby. I argue that this form of auto/ethnography can be taken up as a as a way of demonstrating "what the ideas of reading, writing, and text might contribute to social and cultural analysis" (Game, 1991, p. 3). Belonging and friendship are key themes in feminist leisure research (Gibson, Berdychevsky, & Bell, 2012; Glover & Parry, 2008), yet the experiences of the researcher and those who have "not belonged" have been marginal in these studies (for notable exceptions see Axelsen, 2009; Olive & Thorpe, 2011). And so my task has been to bring these experiences, and their related affects, into feminist leisure research as a way of revealing what is not often voiced in the field and as an example of writing women's bodies through relations of affect. This type of work is limited in the field of leisure studies broadly. Yet there are opportunities to question the relations of power that are so often taken for granted, both within the institutional setting of the university and within the leisure spaces occupied by women. Taking an auto/ethnographic approach to research makes explicit the multiplicities of identity that need to be negotiated in this marginal space. I am a researcher, a feminist, a participant. I am also a student and a writer. Through the use of personal narrative, my writing opposes singularity and the positivist assumption of a singular truth (Rinehart, 2005, p. 500) and in doing so moves away from debates about agency and structure to think differently about academic writing, resistance and empowerment in leisure research.To the question "What is auto/ethnography?" Ellis responds, "research, writing, story, and method that connect the autobiographical and personal to the cultural, social, and political" (2004, p. xix). Auto/ethnography and roller derby go well together. Both are risky, at times painful, at times immensely satisfying, and both allow the participant to know more about themselves, those around them, and the broader society they live in. Both roller derby and auto/ ethnography are "in progress." Roller derby is a "new," albeit revived version of an older sport, and there are several ways the sport is being played with different rules, governing bodies and philosophies. Auto/ethnography too can be understood and practiced in multiple ways. There is "no canned method" (Rinehart, 2005, p. 501) for writing auto/ethnographic research. This type of writing can be used as a mediation of affect to explore notions of "resistance" and "belonging" that are so often tied up with "alternative" sports and leisure practices (Rinehart & Sydnor, 2003). At the same time, I demonstrate the power relations at play for those of us, like myself, at the margins of academic research, and the potential of this marginal position to enable different and multiple notions of "researcher" and "feminist" identities. Masculine experiences (in leisure, the academy, and society more broadly) have been represented as the universal norm, marginalising women's experiences and identities (Irigaray, 1993, 2007). Scholars of feminist leisure studies have implicitly and explicitly sought to change this, bringing women's experiences to the fore and it is to these debates that I add my contribution.The use of auto/ethnography in leisure studies has been limited to a few key articles. In the UK journal Leisure Studies, I uncovered nine articles with "auto ethnography" listed as one of their key words. And in Henderson and Gibson's (2013) recent integrative review they found 9% of articles with a feminist leisure focus used auto/ethnography or ethnography. I do not aim to map out occurrences of the use of auto/ethnography in the wider literature (see Anderson & Austin, 2011 for an overview of auto-ethnography in leisure studies more broadly), but simply wish to point out the lack of research within the key leisure studies journals internationally. …
31 citations