'Law of their own': notes on legal alterity in early nineteenth-century Ireland

This article investigates intersections between legal and literary discourse in Ireland in the early 19th century, and explores how judicial tropes, in particular that of an “alternative judiciary”, shape perceptions of Irish identity as well as cultural expression. Whilst Ireland and the Irish were typically characterized as lawless, this article examines the ubiquitous presence of alternative legal systems, focusing on the writings of Thomas Moore (1779–1852) and William Carleton (1794–1869). These representations, and the questions of authority and legitimacy that they provoke, are considered within critical debates about the development of literary forms in Ireland, and the inherent relationship that legal alterity evokes between textual and judicial authority.

Attitudes, norms, identity and environmental behaviour: Using an expanded theory of planned behaviour to predict participation in a kerbside recycling programme

In an effort to contribute to greater understanding of norms and identity in the theory of planned behaviour, an extended model was used to predict residential kerbside recycling, with self-identity, personal norms, neighbourhood identification, and injunctive and descriptive social norms as additional predictors. Data from a field study (N = 527) using questionnaire measures of predictor variables and an observational measure of recycling behaviour supported the theory. Intentions predicted behaviour, while attitudes, perceived control, and the personal norm predicted intention to recycle. The interaction between neighbourhood identification and injunctive social norms in turn predicted personal norms. Self-identity and the descriptive social norm significantly added to the original theory in predicting intentions as well as behaviour directly. A replication survey on the self-reported recycling behaviours of a random residential sample (N = 264) supported the model obtained previously. These findings offer a useful extension of the theory of planned behaviour and some practicable suggestions for pro-recycling interventions. It may be productive to appeal to self-identity by making people feel like recyclers, and to stimulate both injunctive and descriptive norms in the neighbourhood.

The rhetoric of acculturation: When integration means assimilation

Viewing traditional acculturation literature through a social constructionist lens, the present paper identifies a number of limitations with this research. A discourse analytic approach to acculturation is offered as a means of addressing some of these issues. Drawing on examples taken from British print media debate surrounding the issue of faith schooling in the UK, an analysis is presented which illustrates the manner in which, though optimally positioned within acculturative moral hierarchies directed towards the legitimization of both pro- and anti-faith schooling debates, integration rhetoric often conceals the (re-)production of a more implicit assimilationism. Findings are discussed in terms of their implications for hegemonically structured acculturative power relations. This exploratory analysis provides the basis for reflection on the benefits of a discursive approach to acculturation. Moreover, the dependence of integrationist discourse on a series of socio-spatial resources is considered and, following on from Dixon and Durrheim's (2000) discursive re-conceptualization of place-identity, is taken to signify the need for a more environmentally 'grounded' approach to acculturation.

Does chronic illness place constraints on positive constructions of identity? Temporal comparisons and self-evaluations in people with schizophrenia

It is often suggested that people in potentially threatening situations might engage in self-enhancing temporal comparisons that allow them to view themselves and their experience in a more positive light. Data from semistructured interviews with 12 individuals in the UK diagnosed as having schizophrenia were content analyzed to explore patterns of temporal comparison. The study found that the onset of schizophrenic symptoms created a new baseline in participants' representations of their past, with different types of temporal comparisons occurring before and after this point. Although comparisons with past selves after onset supported the suggestion that people may select and construct their past in such a manner that permits them to see their present circumstances more positively and envisage a better future, comparisons with past selves before onset were more negative. The findings suggest that the Theory of Temporal Self-Appraisals (Ross I Wilson, 2000) needs to be elaborated to include people who have experienced major life changes. (c) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Music, Magic, and the Mythic: The Dynamics of Visual and Aural Discourse in Souleymane Cissé’s Yeelen

The 1980s saw a wave of African films that aimed to represent, on both local and international screens, a sophisticated pre-colonial Africa, thus debunking notions of the continent as primitive. Toward this aim the films inscribed the conventions of oral performance within their visual styles, denying spectator identification with the protagonists and emphasising the presence of the narrator. However, some critics argued that these films exoticised Africa, while their use of oral performance’s distancing effect echoed the ‘scientific’ distance structured by the ethnographic film, in which African societies were represented as ‘the other’. Souleymane Cissé’s Yeelen exemplifies this tension, transposing into cinematic form oral storytelling techniques in the depiction of a power struggle within the covert cult of the komo, a Bambara initiation society unfamiliar to most non-Bambara viewers. This paper demonstrates how the film negotiates this tension via music, which interpellates the international spectator by eliciting a greater identification with the protagonists than that determined at a visual level, while encoding a verisimilitude to rituals that may otherwise be read as the superstitious practices of ‘the other’. In this way, music and image in Yeelen operate as parallel, though often overlapping, discourses, bridging the gap between the film’s culturally specific narrative and formal components, and its international spectators.

Home Confined Consumers: Identity Continuities and Discontinuities

Consumers confined to the home through disability or long term illness are unable to access the marketplace directly and consume through the socialization process. The consumption situation of home bound individuals is the concern of this study, specifically, issues of consumer (re) socialization and consumer identity post home confinement. The research focuses on possessions, with respect to meanings, role and the process of socialization in relation to identity. Findings indicate that the nostalgic consumption of possessions offers the ability to (re)construct the self- identity after confinement. Additionally, possessions afford opportunities to maintain continuity with former ableist identities after the discontinuity of enforced marketplace withdrawal. An individual case study illustrates this point.