Showing papers on "Theme (narrative) published in 1987"

Toward a modeling theory of physics instruction

Abstract: An analysis of the conceptual structure of physics identifies essential factual and procedural knowledge which is not explicitly formulated and taught in physics courses. It leads to the conclusion that mathematical modeling of the physical world should be the central theme of physics instruction. There are reasons to believe that traditional methods for teaching physics are inefficient and substantial improvements in instruction can be achieved by a vigorous program of pedagogical research and development.

Big-Noting: The Heroic Theme in Australian War Writing

Abstract: 1915 and all that Spreading the word Books of the tribe The art of self-advertisement Dissenting voices Sons of Anzacs The second AIF in The War Vietnam survived

The Concept of God after Auschwitz: A Jewish Voice

Abstract: When, with the honor of this award, I also accepted the burden of delivering the oration that goes with it, and when I read in the biography of Rabbi Leopold Lucas, in whose memory the prize is named, that he died in Theresienstadt, but that his wife Dorothea, mother of the donor, was then shipped on to Auschwitz, there to suffer the fate that my mother suffered there, too, there was no resisting the force with which the theme of this lecture urged itself on my choice. I chose it with fear and trembling. But I believed I owed it to those shadows that something like an answer to their long-gone cry to a silent God be not denied to them.

How Original is Machiavelli? A Consideration of Skinner's Interpretation of Virtue and Fortune

Abstract: M ACHIAVELLI'S UNDERSTANDING OF virtue and fortune is central to his originality as a political philosopher, but the degree and character of that originality is a much debated question. In one of the most influential recent interpretations, Quentin Skinner argues that the context for Machiavelli's discussion of virtue and fortune is provided by the Italian humanists of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Augustinian Christianity, Skinner argues, had viewed fortune as a lawlike force of divine necessity that left little or no room for human freedom.' According to Skinner, the humanists by contrast reverted to the "classical belief that the human predicament is best seen as a struggle between man's will and fortune's willfulness. "2 In this view, Skinner claims, fortune is no longer seen as the "inexorable force of providence," but as a "capricious power" of irrational happenstance. By exerting the "creative powers" of his will against this flux, man is "able to shape" and "control his own destiny," "mould his own fate," and "remake his social world to fit his own desires."3 Understanding the humanists' revival of this classical theme compels us, Skinner believes, to abandon the "textbook" view that Machiavelli's argument is entirely sui generis. But this will also enable us to see Machiavelli's originality more clearly, as when, for example, he departs from the "more orthodox defenders of republican liberty" by rejecting the "conventional Christian" meaning of virtue.4

Writing a thesis : a guide to long essays and dissertations

Abstract: PART ONE: "The approach" 1. Why scholars write 2. Am I stupid enough? 3. The fear of eccentricity 4. The lure of theory 5. Choosing a theme 6. Arranging it 7. The writing bloc 8. Discovery 9. Interviews 10. Bad arguments PART TWO "Techniques" 11. Questions of style 12. The art of quoting 13. Editong a text 14. Manuscripts and their uses 15. Making a bibliography 16. Other theses, other books 17. Acknoledgement 18. Teaching and being taught 19. Classes and seminars 20. Learning a language 21. Publishing Notes for further reading

Sauer and "Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth"

Abstract: Published slightly more than thirty years ago, "Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth" has assumed a prominent place in geographical literature and research. Correspondence between Carl 0. Sauer and William L. Thomas, the originator of the idea for the symposium, reveals how the structure, themes, and choice of participants evolved. Reviews are the basis to determine contemporary assessment of the book. It is influential in global-scale integrative thinking about the environment. T HINKING on a global scale in an integrative fashion about mankind's effects of his occupance on the earth is commonplace and second nature in the 1980s. But it was not always so. The shift from a local to a global viewpoint through the intermediate regional and continental scales has been slow and halting. One of the first and most influential examples of a holistic, integrative interpretation of the past, present, and future was "Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth," a collection of essays published thirtyone years ago.1 The volume validated the interdisciplinary approach, heightened the environmental consciousness of the English-speaking world, and exerted an unprecedented influence on the development of a unified approach to environmental issues. Since 1956, more than 10,000 copies of this seminal volume have been sold, a fact that attests to its continued influence and freshness as "one of the most impressive contributions to the man/ nature theme produced in the United States."2 Although the essays in "Man's Role" were not written exclusively by geographers (only fifteen of the fifty-three contributors were geographers) or intended to cater solely to their needs, the volume has held an important, highly visible place in the discipline. Paradoxically its central message-the importance of the interplay between mankind and the environment as a focus of study-was ignored, if not rejected by geography during the 1950s and 1960s. Initially geographers equated environment with the sterile philosophical debate about determinism and possibilism, and they later were enticed by the mysteries of the new positivism. Meanwhile, other branches of knowledge adopted the orphaned approach. F. Kenneth Hare remarked * I wish to acknowledge the helpful suggestions of many persons, including David Hooson, Brian Blouet, James J. Parsons, and Peter Haggett, who read the manuscript. ' Man's Role in Changing the Face of the Earth (edited by William L. Thomas; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956). 2 Daniel W. Gade, The Growing Recognition of George Perkins Marsh, Geographical Review 73 (1983): 341-344, reference to 341. * DR. WILLIAMS is a lecturer in geography, School of Geography, and a Fellow of Oriel College at the University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom OX1 3TB. This content downloaded from 207.46.13.72 on Sun, 07 Aug 2016 05:26:59 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms SAUER AND "MAN'S ROLE" in 1969, "Sometimes I think that geography as a science deliberately steps out of phase with the climate of the times."3 In the article I examine the origin of the idea and its subsequent mutation into "Man's Role" through a consideration of the scope, structure, themes, and participants in the symposium that preceded the publication of the collection. Research involved an examination of unpublished correspondence of the contributors and organizers, particularly Carl O. Sauer, chairman of the symposium, and William L. Thomas, organizer of the conference and editor of the collection.4 In addition, the examination deepens understanding of the thoughts and feelings of Sauer, one of the most fertile and agile geographical minds to flourish in North America. His intellectual influence beyond the discipline has probably been unrivaled in geography.5 Finally I assess the influence of the collection on subsequent inquiries about mankind and the earth. ORIGIN OF "MAN'S ROLE" On 1 October 1953, William L. Thomas, a geographer who was assistant director of the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, invited Sauer to be chairman of a conference on the theme, man's impact as a dynamic agent in changing the face of the earth, in June 1954. Sauer accepted and the fruitful cooperation began. The origin of the idea is well documented, although evolution and delineation of its final form and particular flavor have not been appreciated. In 1949 the foundation financed the XXIX International Congress of Americanists in New York, and from that experience came the idea for a massive assessment of anthropology. Thomas worked with Alfred L. Kroeber during 1950 to plan for an international symposium on anthropology in June 1952, to which approximately eighty scholars were invited to a discussion, stimulated by fifty "inventory" papers distributed in advance of the meeting. The proceedings were taped and then were transcribed and edited for publication, something that had probably never been done previously in academic circles.6 Encouraged by the success of that conference, Thomas proposed one on the theme of man's role to be hosted by the New York Academy of Science. The purpose was for geography and anthropology to establish themselves in the academy. Only later when the plans for the symposium outgrew the financial and organizational capacity of the academy and after the National 3F. Kenneth Hare, Environment: Resuscitation of an Idea, Area No. 4 (1969): 52-55, reference to 53. 4Sauer Papers, Bancroft Library Archives, University of California, Berkeley, California. 5 Michael Williams, "The Apple of My Eye": Carl Sauer and Historical Geography, Journal of Historical Geography 9 (1983): 1-28; J. Nicholas Entrikin, Carl O. Sauer, Philosopher in Spite of Himself, Geographical Review 74 (1984): 378-408. 6 Anthropology Today: An Encyclopedic Inventory (prepared under the chairmanship of A. L. Kroeber; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953); An Appraisal of Anthropology Today (edited by Sol Tax and others; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1953). 219 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.72 on Sun, 07 Aug 2016 05:26:59 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms THE GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW Science Foundation provided a subsidy of $15,000 for conference organization and publication did the Wenner-Gren Foundation become the sponsor and host.7 SCOPE OF THE SYMPOSIUM From the beginning Thomas clearly envisaged Sauer as "the logical person to give impetus to such a vast undertaking."8 In terms of Sauer's abhorrence of large, organized structures and "professionalized" academe, he surprisingly replied almost immediately that he was "anxious" to participate and was honored to have such a key position, although he was "aghast, excited and somewhat scared" by the responsibility. He fulfilled his promise to write in detail and installments with a sustained fierce torrent of advice, questions, reflections, and personal reminiscences for the next twenty months.9 Sauer's first remarks about the proposed conference were both practical and philosophical. To stage it within eight months was not possible because of his commitments and probably those of others and also because the matter was on his mind, which was "the kind of mind that needs time." He thought the proposed program admirable but needed stiffening with a historical accent to counter the reductionist tendencies of the social scientists. Here he was articulating his long-standing, deeply held feelings about the role of time and the perversion of the true spirit of academic inquiry by social scientists. The inclusion of anthropologists might rectify the problem, but he contended that young anthropologists were becoming social scientists, attempting to theorize and universalize, rather than culture historians. Participation by Europeans was helpful because they "know the past is living and that it can be made to speak to us." The word dynamic in the title worried him. It was an academic catchword for persons who thought all processes were short-run and recurrent and who considered themselves free "from the past, the sons of Daedalus who are confident that we have new knowledge that enables us to start from here and now, to whom anything that happened before them is antiquarian."'0 Thomas ultimately accepted all these suggestions in pursuit of his goal to promote the symposium that Sauer had already dubbed Man's Impact on Changing the Face of the Earth. Conceptual planning for the conference was delayed in order to include the historical element. Thomas suggested that it be incorporated by staging a similar but smaller conference on man's Pleistocene habitat. Sauer was ecstatic: changes from the Pleistocene to the present were pertinent to his current work on early man and the diffusion of culture at a global scale. He predicted that the conference would make scientific history as an inventory 7 William L. Thomas to Michael Williams, 15 December 1981; Man's Role, footnote 1 above, xxi-

Measuring the Universe: Cosmic Dimensions from Aristarchus to Halley

Abstract: Albert Van Helden 1985 London and Chicago: Chicago University Press viii + 203 pp price £7.50 (paperback) ISBN 0 226 84882 5 Until the advent of the telescope, quantitative estimates of cosmic dimensions were based more on prevailing philosophical notions than on sound observational data. The development of many preconceptions, their transmission and influence on succeeding generations are a recurrent theme of this volume.

Gendercide: The Implications of Sex Selection

Abstract: "Will women become obsolete?" The theme of this book is the need for and utility of reliable methods of sex selection. It is written "from a feminist perspective." Warren defines gendercide as "the deliberate extermination of persons of a particular sex." While this neologism is indeed "sex-neutral," it hints at the book's moral certitude in addressing the questions surrounding preconceptive and postconceptive sex selection. The author seeks to protect and defend women's choices, whether to abort an unwanted, "wrong sex" fetus or to participate in affirmative action programs to reverse son-preference and sexism in our society. Specific counterstrategies to male domination are encouraged. The book has eight chapters, which, despite their brevity, are surprisingly comprehensive. Objections to sex selection are divided into consequentialist (social) and nonconsequentialist (moral) camps. Unattractive precedents to sex selection, including witch hunts and widow sacrifices, are examined, and the question whether more males would mean more

Clausewitz's Elusive Center of Gravity

Abstract: : The 1986 edition of FM 100-5, Operations, is significant with respect to our discussion here because it provides the Army for the first time with a set of "concepts central to the design and conduct of campaigns and major operations." Found in Appendix B, they include the theoretical concepts of the "center of gravity," "lines of operations," and the "culminating point." The manual thus now provides the Army with a good starting point for discussion, but the definition of center of gravity there presented cries for refinement. If it is indeed the "key to all operational design," as FM 100-5 claims, then soldiers are going to have to start using the term correctly and with uniform understanding. The concept of the center of gravity (the German term is schwerpunkt) forms a principal building block in Clausewitz's edifice On War. In order to understand this we must consider his mechanistic view of war. Clausewitz develops this theme quite early on in Chapter 1 of Book One with a definition of war. It is important to realize that, though the manuscript we know as On War was in fact an unfinished draft, this first chapter is regarded as the most refined and complete. It forms the touchstone for the rest of the work.

Two types of narrative theology

Abstract: Narrative theology, reflection on religious claims embedded in stories, is one of the most significant currents of late twentieth century thought. H. Richard Niebuhr initiated the conversation when he wrote in 1941 of "The Story of Our Lives." If his theme lay undeveloped for several decades, it burst onto the theological scene in the early 1970s.1 Demurrers followed, and we now recognize the limits of the metaphor "narrative."2 Still, scholarly interest has not waned. Books and articles keep coming: on narrative in the Bible, narrative and theology, narrative and morality, narrative tradition, narrative practice, even narrative truth. The conversation, it appears, is as lively as ever. And if it has produced lasting contributions, it is because of the quality of the minds it has managed to attract: Paul Ricoeur, Hans Frei, David Tracy, George Lindbeck, Stanley Hauerwas, Julian Hartt, Sallie McFague, Johann Baptist Metz.3 While the potential of narrative theology is widely recognized, few seem to have noticed a nasty tension in the ranks. In fact, two distinct camps are now visible, and the relations between them are anything but cordial. No wonder. Each thinks itself fighting for nothing less than the continued existence of the Christian tradition. Finding names for the two groups is difficult. "Chicagoans" and "Yaleys" might do, as these are the locations of the respective head-

Economic Behaviour in Adversity

Abstract: Conflict, disaster, and destruction despite their historical and current significance have not yet been adequately studied from the economic point of view. "Economic Behaviour in Adversity" brings together ten important essays, several previously unpublished, dealing with the choices people make in times of disaster and conflict. These essays help explain the possibilities and limits of human cooperation under severe environmental pressure. Part I, "Disaster and Recovery," contains previously unpublished studies of major historical catastrophes, among them the Black Death of the fourteenth century, the Civil War in Russia that followed the Bolshevik revolution, and the mass bombing of Germany and of Japan during World War II. Accompanying the historical studies are several analytical papers that interpret the disaster experience. The essays in Part II, "Cooperation and Conflict," represent innovative theoretical analyses based on a common theme that cooperation and conflict are alternative strategies whereby individuals, groups, and different forms of social organization struggle with one another for evolutionary survival. Ultimately, these essays indicate, the political economy of the human species is an instance of Darwin's "economy of nature.""

W. Somerset Maugham : the critical heritage

Abstract: This set comprises of 40 volumes covering nineteenth and twnetieth century European and American authors. These volumes will be available as a complete set, mini boxed sets (by theme) or as individual volumes. This second set compliments the first 68 volume set of Critical Heritage published by Routledge in October 1995.

A handbook for dance in education

Abstract: Prefaces Aknowledgements Introduction Theme 1. Introduction to the body Theme 2. Introduction to weight and time Theme 3. Introduction to space Theme 4. The flow of weight in the body in space and time Theme 5. Adaption to a partner Theme 6. The instrumental use of the body and technique Theme 7. Dynamics through basic effort actions Theme 8. Occupational rhythms Theme 9. Shape in movement Theme 10. Dynamic rhythms and effort translation Theme 11. Orientation in space Theme 12. Body, action, effort and space affinities Theme 13. Elevation Theme 14. Group feeling and group composition Theme 15. Group formations Theme 16. Meaning, expression communication and embodiment Theme 17. The relationship between the sixteen themes Appendices: 1. A further statement of the theory of effort 2. A further statement of the theory of space Bibliography Index

Contours of Canadian thought

Abstract: The leaps of knowledge in nineteenth-century science shook the foundations of religious and humanistic values throughout much of the world. The Darwinian Revolution and similar developments presented enormous philosophical challenges to Canadian scientists, philosophers, and men of letters. Their responses, many and varied, form a central theme in this collection of essays by one of Canada's leading intellectual historians.McKillop explores the thought of a number of English-Canadian thinkers from the 1860s to the 1920s, decades that saw Canada's entry into the modern age. We meet Daniel Wilson, an educator and ethnologist for whom the pursuit of science was a form of poetic engagement, requiring the poet's sensibilities; John Watson, one of the world's leading exponents of objective idealism, whose philosophical premises helped to undermine the very religious tradition he sought to bolster; and William Dawson LeSueur, an apostle of Positivism, whose spirited defence of critical inquiry and evolutionary social ethics led him towards an entirely contradictory position.In addition to profiles of individuals, McKillop considers the ways in which their ideas operated in the context of Canadian institutions including the universities and the press. From these prospectives emerges a detailed analysis of the life of the mind of English Canada in an age of questioning, of doubt, and of struggle to reorient the intellectual and philosophical positions of a quickly changing society.

Three-Dimensional Goal Description

Abstract: In this chapter the three-dimensional goal description that has been introduced previously is explained and discussed on the basis of the “Freckleham” theme.

Schumann's Im Legendenton and Friedrich Schlegel's Arabeske

Abstract: References to Friedrich Schlegel, arguably the chief early Romantic critic/philosopher, are few in discussions of music. Yet Schlegel was an intriguing figure: at once the architect of the theory of Universalpoesie, crusader for the Roman, writer of enigmatic fragments that number in the thousands, and author of Lucinde, a little book of evil repute that is itself a fragment. Perhaps the noted Germanist Erich Heller has described him best, as a "complex simpleton and profoundly prophetic fool."' Less polished and lucid an author than his brother August Wilhelm, and not as anxious to embrace music as Novalis, Tieck, Wackenroder, or Hoffmann, Friedrich Schlegel has been consigned to a passing reference in the introductory chapters of monographs on Romanticism, or to specialized studies by literary scholars. It is true that Schlegel was reluctant to view music as a "progressive" art in the same sense that poetry might aspire to that ideal; while he was certain that music could embody a "sentimental theme," he was less convinced that this might be cast in a "fantastic form," his other requisite for the Romantic artwork.2 Still, he addressed a number of

The autonomy of technology

Abstract: The main purpose of this paper is to argue against some of what Ellul is claiming Although I do not offer a general critique of his views, the arguments I consider below speak to a central theme in Ellul’s work, the autonomous status of technology and its impact on society On the other hand, there are other features of Ellul’s views I find suggestive One of these is his belief that technology has a way of precipitating certain economic results I address a small aspect of this claim in the second part of the paper But first, I am concerned to examine the claim for autonomy In particular, I argue that speaking of the “autonomy of technology” commits one to a fundamentally wrong way of addressing issues in technology studies

Ronald Reagan's “Revival”: Voluntarism as a Theme in Reagan's Civil Religion

Abstract: American Presidents since Washington have contributed to the maintenance and transformation of the nation 's civil religion. In his 1967 essay Bellah found the principal themes of this transcendent secular religion in the major public addresses of Presidents of the United States. In this paper I look at one of the contributions of Ronald Reagan to the American civil religion-his public utterances on voluntarism ("private initiative"). Four major themes in Reagan's pronouncements on voluntarism are described: the volunteer 'spirit, " activism, "big government," and revival. The heroism of volunteers and the idea of community/neighborhood are two other themes which are discussed. Taken together, these themes tell a simple mythic story about sin and salvation in American society.

The Decline of the Castle

Abstract: 1 Introduction 2 Fifteenth-century contrasts 3 Warfare in England and France 4 A rival - the courtyard house 5 A martial face 6 Accelerating decay 7 A continuing theme 8 Destruction 9 Nostalgia

Edgar Allan Poe : the critical heritage

Abstract: This set comprises 40 volumes covering nineteenth and twentieth century European and American authors. These volumes will be available as a complete set, mini boxed sets (by theme) or as individual volumes. This second set compliments the first 68 volume set of Critical Heritage published by Routledge in October 1995.

Character, Progression, and the Mimetic-Didactic Distinction

Abstract: I. Some Problems and Hypotheses This inquiry arises out of my attempts to solve what I initially took to be two different critical problems; its conclusions result from my seeing that the resolution of each could have implications for the resolution of the other; and its claim to significance rests both on those conclusions and on what they imply about the way we might rethink some basic concepts in the theory of narrative, specifically, character, theme, and progression. The first problem is rather widely recognized: for all the advances that students of narrative have made in the last twenty-five years or so, we do not yet have a satisfactory theory of literary character.' To cite just a few points of debate, critics argue over whether characters are appropriately conceived of as persons, as the meeting points of thematic issues, or as linguistic entities, and over whether they are more or less important than plot. The second problem is less widely recognized, arising as it does out of the neo-Aristotelian critical tradition (also known as Chicago school criticism), which, for better or worse, has been only a minor movement in twentieth-century criticism. This problem has two faces. First, although critics in this tradition have cogently demonstrated the methodological faults of much thematic interpretation, and although their arguments have been repeated down through the years, the flow of thematic readings has continued unstanched.2 In large measure, the neo-Aristotelians are able to perceive the flaws of thematic reading and to make forceful arguments against it by virtue of a single principle of their system: there is a sharp distinction between works organized mimetically--that is, to represent characters in action for the sake of the emotions generated by that representation--and those organized thematically--that is, to represent characters in action for the sake of some ideational purpose, such as convincing the audience of the truth of some proposition or ridiculing objects external to the representation. The distinction is so sharp that for the neo-Aristotelians virtually all works fall into one class or the other. The first face of the problem looks like this: if the principle really does enable these antithematist arguments to be so forceful (and we will be looking at one shortly), why are they not

Theme Teacher Candidate Selection An Overview

Abstract: Selection of teacher candidates is cen tral to current debates about improving teacher quality. Applegate's overview provides a discussion of four issues that have continued to plague decision mak ...