Constructing risk across timescales and trajectories: Gay men's stories of sexual encounters

This paper explores the way risk is constructed in the stories gay men tell of their sexual experiences. It focuses on how tellers use such stories to portray themselves both as rational actors and as legitimate members of their social groups by reconstructing the ‘orderliness’ of sexual encounters. An analysis of a corpus of stories derived from a diary study of gay male sexual behaviour in Hong Kong using current theories of discourse analysis reveals how narrators organize their experiences along two primary vectors of engagement: a sequential vector along which the trajectory of the sexual encounter is presented as a chain of occurrences, each occurrence contingent upon previous ones and warranting subsequent ones, and a hierarchical vector along which processes perceived on longer timescales are portrayed as exerting pressure on the ways processes on shorter timescales unfold. Examining how men portray these vectors in their accounts of risk behaviour can help us better understand both the situatedness of risk behaviour and the ways it is linked to larger social practices, identity projects and community histories

Fictions for representing and generating semiotic consciousness: the crime story and educational inquiry

This essay appraises the work of fiction in representing and generating semiotic consciousness in education by examining three intertextual continuities between crime fiction and stories of educational inquiry. First, many reports of educational research resemble detective stories in their quests to determine the (or a) “truth” about something that is problematic or puzzling and this essay describes some of the ways in which the characteristic investigatory methods of fictional detectives resemble forms of educational inquiry. Second, the characteristic ways in which detective stories generate interpretations are compared with the textual strategies deployed in producing meanings and narratives in educational inquiry. Third, recent transformations of both detective fiction and educational inquiry are shown to be comparable — and intertextually linked — manifestations of cultural and semiotic shifts associated with postmodernity. I conclude by suggesting that authors of “anti-detective” crime fiction might provide more appropriate models of educational inquiry than do fictional detectives.

Crime stories: posnerian pragmatism, Rawlsian pure procedural justice, and the fictional problem

There are many different ways in which law and truth may be said to be related. It is perhaps in the criminal trial that connections between them are of most significance. An orthodox way of describing a criminal trial is that the criminal procedure is seeking to establish the truth concerning some past event, and that success of the procedure is measured by how close its outcome converges with that truth. Criminal justice presents the community with challenging dilemmas in this regard, such as those arising from the notion of double jeopardy. This paper discusses the Rawlsian notions of 'imperfect', 'perfect' and 'pure' procedural justice, and suggests against Rawls that it is pure procedural justice that best represents what we want from a criminal justice system. Good procedure makes good criminal law. A comparison is made with the writings of Habermas and Posner, and given that pure procedural justice eschews transcendental truths, some brief comments are made on the convergence of that position with the realm of the fictional.

Stories from beyond the frame dilemas and contradictions of photojournalism in a digitized and globalized world

To engage in the practice of photojournalism is to occupy a position of privilege, because the practice involves entering, albeit for a short while, the lives of others. But with this privilege comes the burden of representation. In this sense I believe that photojournalism is currently in crisis. This crisis concerns the decontextualization of the image in media outlets and the relegation of the photojournalist to the role of merely a hunter/gatherer rather than a storyteller. In other words, photojournalists have become alienated from the process of re-presentation of their own stories. To some extent it has always been thus.

Mystery and movement: doing more with dominoes

John Gough explains how to turn an ordinary set of dominoes into games of mystery, movement and strategy.

Stories seldom told: paediatric nurses` experiences of caring for hospitalized children with special needs and their families.

Stories seldom told: paediatric nurses' experiences of caring for hospitalized children with special needs and their families

Aims of the study. This study explored paediatric nurses' experiences of caring for children with special needs and their families in an acute care setting. The aim of the study was to increase understanding of nurses' experiences of caring for these children and their families. The study was designed to reveal the caring practices embedded within these relationships through exploring nurses' stories.

Study design/methods. Gadamerian hermeneutic phenomenology and feminist research principles were the approaches used to guide the study. Interviews were held with experienced paediatric nurses and interpretation of interview transcripts using a Gadamerian hermeneutic phenomenological approach resulted in the identification of four themes.

Findings. The four themes revealed were: Special Relationships; Multiple Dimensions of Who is Expert; Development of Trust Between Nurses and Families; and Feelings of Frustration and Guilt.

Conclusions. The study emphasized the context-specific nature of relationships between nurses and children and their families. The nurses spoke about the difficulties they encountered in their practice and some of the ways that they dealt with these problems. They discussed the things that they valued and those that made them feel guilty and frustrated. In doing so, they revealed their warmth, strength, humanity and caring.