Narrative identity and offender rehabilitation

The rehabilitation of offenders is an evaluative and capability-building process and is concerned with promoting primary goods and managing risk. At the heart of this process is the construction of a more adaptive narrative identity and the acquisition of capabilities to enable offenders to secure important values in their postrelease environments. In this article, the authors examine the idea of narrative identity and its relationship to values and to assessment and treatment.

The impact of hypoglycaemia on quality of life and related patient-reported outcomes in Type 2 diabetes : a narrative review

As a common side effect of insulin treatment for diabetes, hypoglycaemia is a constant threat and can have far-reaching and potentially devastating consequences, including immediate physical injury as well as more pervasive cognitive, behavioural and emotional effects. Moreover, as a significant limiting factor in achieving optimal glycaemic control, exposure to hypoglycaemia can influence diabetes self-management.

Although hypoglycaemia is known to occur in Type 2 diabetes, its morbidity and impact on the individual are not well recognized. The aim of the current review is to examine published evidence to achieve a synthesis of the scope and significance of the potential detriment caused by hypoglycaemia to individuals with Type 2 diabetes. The implications of these observations for treatment and research have also been considered.

A narrative review was performed of empirical papers published in English since 1966, reporting the effect of hypoglycaemia on quality of life and related outcomes (including generic and diabetes specificquality of life, emotional well-being and health utilities) in Type 2 diabetes.

Research demonstrates the potential impact of hypoglycaemia on the lives of people with Type 2 diabetes, from an association with depressive symptoms and heightened anxiety, to impairment of the ability to drive, work and function in ways that are important for quality of life. Few studies consider hypoglycaemia as an explanatory variable in combination with quality of life or related primary endpoints. As a consequence, there is a pressing need for high-quality research into the overall impact of hypoglycaemia on the lives of people with Type 2 diabetes.

Early career teaching : learning to be a teacher and staying in the job

This article provides insights into the ways that teacher education programs might equip early career teachers beginning their professional identity. Situated in Melbourne (Australia), it discusses tertiary music education preparation for the profession and recognises the value and importance of having critical friends and mentors as a beginner teacher. By using narrative reflection both lecturer and graduate allow their voices to be heard as they make a contribution to understand the challenges new teachers face when building their professional identity and ‘staying in the job’. The discussion provided by the graduate, outlines her experience and engagement regarding the ‘positives’ and ‘negatives’ as she establishes her professional identity. Concerns and issues raised may be similar to those experienced by others. The lecturer contends that ongoing research with graduates is necessary when preparing pre-service students as they begin developing their teacher identity and remain within the profession after graduation.

Heteroglossia : a space for developing critical language awareness?

This paper reports on research into the challenges of implementing a critical writing pedagogy within a teacher education program in Australia. Participants in this study are student teachers enrolled in a compulsory subject, “Language and Literacy in Secondary School”, a subject requiring them to develop a knowledge of the role of language and literacy across the secondary school curriculum and to show personal proficiency in literacy as part of graduate outcomes for teacher education dictated by the State Government of Victoria. To develop an understanding of the way that language has shaped their lives, students write a narrative about their early literacy experiences – a task which they all find very challenging, especially in comparison with the formal writing of other university subjects. Rather than simply reminiscing about their early childhood, they are encouraged to juxtapose voices from the past and the present, and to combine a range of texts within their writing. Later in the semester they revisit these accounts of their early literacy experiences and, in a separate piece of writing, endeavour to place these accounts within the contexts of theories and debates they have encountered in the course of completing this unit. The students’ writing provides a small window on how they are experiencing their tertiary education and their preparation as teachers, including the managerial controls that are currently shaping university curriculum and pedagogy. We argue that such heteroglossic texts (Bakhtin, 1981) prompt students to stretch their repertoires as language-users, enabling them to develop a socially critical awareness of language and literacy, including the literacy practices in which they engage as university students.

Inventing (a) life: deconstruction and the praxis and poiesis of narrative

Deconstruction often sits awkwardly between the realm of literary studies and criticism, and philosophy proper. This paper explores the contribution that a deconstructive literacy might have for those engaged in writing narrative, as a practice and a product. Taking up Kristeva's reading of Arendt, and the Aristotelian categories of praxis and poiesis, it will be argued that the act of narrating life amounts to both the actual generation of the life it purports to describe, while also being a praxis in itself, one that need not produce anything, since the very act of engaging in/with it, leaves atraceless trace that itself is 'full of meaning'. Narrative, however, will not rest in either pole of Aristotle's binary structure. For Arendt, Kristeva will remind us, narrative is an activity that is very 'human', where we engender not just zoe, mere physiological life, but bios, a living that is not colonised by ends alone, and instead finding in itself a value, a fulfilment in its own process. Applied to the activity of story-making (autobiographical or otherwise), and also to pedagogical practice in the academy, this dual potential of narrative (at once to produce and to be an end unto itself) reframes the Beruf (calling) of creative writing. Deconstruction, in other words, assists us in appreciating the very ethical consequences of the labour of deciding where and when the story begins and ends, and who the protagonist is. Recalling us to the ontological implications of the thought of différance, this paper will attempt to demonstrate how the action of articulating the edges of story can be read as akin to that which turns the
featureless flux of time into bios, or human life that, according to Arendt, is what goes missing under totalitarianism.

Enhancing narrative coherence in simulated interviews about child abuse

Purpose – Simulated child interviews, where adults play the role of a child witness for trainee investigative interviewers, are an essential tool used to train investigators to adhere to non-leading, open-ended questions. The aim of this study is to examine whether the use of a training procedure that guides persons playing the role of a child in simulated interviews results in interviewees producing more coherent narratives (measured by the number of story grammar details).

Design/methodology/approach – A total of 80 police officers individually engaged in ten-minute interviews, whereby an untrained (colleague), or trained respondent, played the role of the child interviewee. For each child respondent condition, the interviews varied according to child age (five or eight years).

Findings – As predicted, trained respondents reported a higher proportion of story grammar elements and a lower proportion of contextual information than the untrained respondents, as well as more story grammar elements in response to open-ended questions. However, there were limitations in how well both groups tailored their story grammar to the age of the child they were representing.

Originality/value – These findings demonstrate that our training procedure promotes a more coherent interviewee account, and facilitates a response style that is more reinforcing of open-ended questions.

African kings (HAUNTING voices, TRIBAL drums)

African Kings is an instrumental piece utilizing African voices and instruments. Haunting and atmospheric.