Theme (narrative)

About: Theme (narrative) is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 13050 publications have been published within this topic receiving 159511 citations. The topic is also known as: narrative theme.

Theory of hybrid dynamical systems and its applications to biological and medical systems.

Abstract: In this introductory article, we survey the contents of this Theme Issue. This Theme Issue deals with a fertile region of hybrid dynamical systems that are characterized by the coexistence of conti...

Transpersonal Psychology: Defining the Past, Divining the Future

Abstract: Retrospective analysis of definitions published 35 years suggests the major subject areas of the field can be summed up in three themes: beyond-ego psychology, integrative/holistic psychology, and psychology of transformation. Theme frequency analysis reveals that early emphasis on alternative states of consciousness has moderated into a broader approach to human transcendence, wholeness, and transformation. This expanded definition of transpersonal psychology suggests the field has much in common with integral psychology. As a comprehensive, historically based content summary, this tripartite definition contributes a small but vital piece to the foundation of a transpersonal vision that is spreading across the globe. While transpersonal psychology still needs to embody the inclusiveness and diversity that it represents, its vision is one of great relevance to the contemporary human condition. Artistic inspiration is best expressed by creating art rather than by making explanations. It is in this sense that transpersonal psychology, with its uplifting vision, has had difficulty defining itself. Yet, just as the soul of an artist’s muse can be divined from a body of work, a clearer picture of transpersonal psychology can be drawn from looking at how it has expressed itself through its approximately first 35 years (i.e., all but one of the definitions in the corpus date from the period 1969–2003). We inquire not only into the definition of the field, but also into its character: what are the themes that make it up, how have these themes unfolded, and as we follow its arc through time, what can we imagine for the future of transpersonal psychology? Where is the field spreading? How well does it embody what it represents? This article summarizes the findings from four related studies: a thematic analysis of a corpus of definitions of transpersonal psychology published over a 35-year period, a thematic analysis of relevant portions of Boucouvalas’ (1980) in-depth

Observers Observed: Essays on Ethnographic Fieldwork

Abstract: History of Anthropology is a new series of annual volumes, each of which will treat an important theme in the history of anthropological inquiry. For this initial volume, the editors have chosen to focus on the modern cultural anthropology: intensive fieldwork by "participant observation." "Observers Observed" includes essays by a distinguished group of historians and anthropologists covering major episodes in the history of ethnographic fieldwork in the American, British, and French traditions since 1880. As the first work to investigate the development of modern fieldwork in a serious historical way, this collection will be of great interest and value to anthropologist, historians of science and the social sciences, and the general readers interested in the way in which modern anthropologists have perceived and described the cultures of "others." Included in this volume are the contributions of Homer G. Barnett, University of Oregon; James Clifford, University of California, Santa Cruz; Douglas Cole, Simon Frazer University; Richard Handler, Lake Forest College; Curtis Hinsley, Colgate University; Joan Larcom, Mount Holyoke College; Paul Rabinow, University of California, Berkeley; and the editor.

Hegel: Three Studies

Abstract: This short masterwork in twentieth-century philosophy provides both a major reinterpretation of Hegel and insight into the evolution of Adorno's critical theory. The first study focuses on the relationship of reason, the individual, and society in Hegel, defending him against the criticism that he was merely an apologist for bourgeois society. The second study examines the experiential content of Hegel's idealism, considering the notion of experience in relation to immediacy, empirical reality, science, and society. The third study, "Skoteinos," is an unusual and fascinating essay in which Adorno lays out his thoughts on understanding Hegel. In his reflections, which spring from his experience teaching at the Goethe University in Frankfurt, questions of textual and philosophical interpretation are intertwined.Rescuing the truth value of Hegel's work is a recurring theme of the critical theory of the Frankfurt School, and nowhere is this goal pursued with more insight than in these three studies. The core problem Adorno sets for himself is how to read Hegel in a way that comprehends both the work and its historical context, thereby allowing conclusions to be drawn that may seem on the surface to be exactly opposed to what Hegel wrote but that are, nevertheless, valid as the present truth of the work. It is the elaboration of this method of interpretation, a negative dialectic, that was Adorno's underlying goal.Adorno's efforts to salvage the contemporaneity of Hegel's thought form part of his response to the increasingly tight net of social control in the aftermath of World War II. In this, his work is related to the very different attempts to undermine reified thinking undertaken by the various French theorists. The continued development of what Adorno called "the administered world" has only increased the relevance of his efforts.

Marketing Applications of MDS: Assessment and Outlook

Abstract: M ULTIDIMENSIONAL scaling (MDS) has played an important role in modern marketing analysis. Since 1938, when Richardson published an abstract of the first application of MDS,1 numerous applications of the technique have been described in various social science publications. During the 1960s and 1970s, in particular, several important descriptions of marketing applications of MDS procedures have appeared in the literature. To invoke the theme of the recent cigarette commercial, it would seem that we "have come a long way, baby." Or, have we? Just what of significance has MDS contributed to marketing analysis over the past several years? Just as importantly, what is the future outlook for these techniques and what problems are most in need of research?