Program for the Spring 2016 MARAC Meeting: Archival Confluence: Connecting Theory and Practice

Conference Program

Towards a Bourdieusian analysis of the disabled body and practice: embodying negative symbolic capitals and the uneasy experience of hysteresis

Within the last few years, disabled people have become the target of government austerity measures through drastic cuts to welfare justified through the portrayal of benefit claimants as inactive, problem citizens who are wilfully unemployed. For all that is wrong with these cuts, they are one of many aspects of exclusion that disabled people face. Attitudes towards disability are deteriorating (Scope, 2011) and disabled people are devalued and negatively positioned in a myriad of ways, meaning that an understanding of the perceptions and positioning of disability and the power of disabling practices is critical. This thesis will examine how Bourdieu’s theoretical repertoire may be applied to the area of Disability Studies in order to discern how society produces oppressive and exclusionary systems of classification which structures the social position and perceptions of disability. The composite nature of disability and multiple forms of exclusion and inequality associated with it benefits from a multipronged approach which acknowledges personal, embodied and psychological aspects of disability alongside socio-political and cultural conceptualisations. Bourdieu’s approach is one in which the micro and macro aspects of social life are brought together through their meso interplay and provides a thorough analysis of the many aspects of disability.

Public and user participation in public service delivery: tensions in policy and practice

Social-scientific analysis of public-participation initiatives has proliferated in recent years. This review article discusses some key aspects of recent work. Firstly, it analyses some of the justifications put forward for public participation, drawing attention to differences and overlaps between rationales premised on democratic representation/representativeness and those based on more technocratic ideas about the knowledge that the public can offer. Secondly, it considers certain tensions in policy discourses on participation, focusing in particular on policy relating to the National Health Service and other British public services. Thirdly, it examines the challenges of putting a coherent vision for public participation into practice, noting the impediments that derive from the often-competing ideas about the remit of participation held by different groups of stakeholders. Finally, it analyses the gap between policy and practice, and the consequences of this for the prospects for the enactment of active citizenship through participation initiatives.

Student participation and disadvantage: limitations in policy and practice

The public policy of numerous nations, including Australia, articulates a clear expectation that schools will develop young people’s capacities to participate in civic society and its democratic structures and processes. A romantic policy rhetoric hides a reality that is both more complex and less well understood than is typically acknowledged. Young people’s democratic participation is subject to varying interpretations and implementation, and is employed to serve varying agendas. The role of schools in developing this participation is particularly subject to tensions and contradictions that can work to undermine and constrain the participation of marginalised young people. There is an abundance of research and policy literature on this topic. Yet, within this plethora of prescription and commentary, the key threads that might make a difference are not always clear. Moreover, there is little in this supposedly inclusive agenda that considers its implications for marginalised groups. This article provides a meta-analysis of the current policy and research landscape, examining the dominant discourses and their implications for young people’s participation. It focuses particular attention on the position of marginalised young people as it emerges from the literature and outlines an alternative agenda with the potential to challenge an overly complacent policy and practice context.

Assessment rubrics: towards clearer and more replicable design, research and practice

‘Rubric’ is a term with a variety of meanings. As the use of rubrics has increased both in research and practice, the term has come to represent divergent practices. These range from secret scoring sheets held by teachers to holistic student-developed articulations of quality. Rubrics are evaluated, mandated, embraced and resisted based on often imprecise and inconsistent understandings of the term. This paper provides a synthesis of the diversity of rubrics, and a framework for researchers and practitioners to be clearer about what they mean when they say ‘rubric’. Fourteen design elements or decision points are identified that make one rubric different from another. This framework subsumes previous attempts to categorise rubrics, and should provide more precision to rubric discussions and debate, as well as supporting more replicable research and practice.

Paths of professional development in music therapy: training, professional identity and practice

Music therapy is listed as a profession in the EU Regulated Professions Database. This has assisted the next steps towards recognition in relevant countries and regions. The author’s experience as an academic leader in music therapy training over more than two decades is used to reflect on the profession of music therapy within Europe through interrogation of concepts underpinning professional identity, training, and professional practice. Potential tensions between recognition and regulation of healthcare professions are presented and discussed. As all practice takes place in context, balancing training needs between techniques and skills, systemic national and regional policy, and institutional knowledge is crucial. Achieving this balance is not easy but is key to successful growth of practitioner knowledge, seeding student’s curiosity about context and systems from the dawn of training.

The naming of child homicide offenders in England and Wales: the need for a change in law and practice

Judicial decisions about whether or not to publicly name child homicide offenders have long ani- mated debate in the United Kingdom and internationally. This article draws on case law and in- depth interviews conducted with members of the English criminal justice system to critically analyse the viability of current domestic legislation in the context of the UK’s international human rights obligations. The article identifies ambiguities surrounding the definition of ‘public interest’ in law; the merits of equating the naming of child offenders with open justice, accountability and transpar- ency; and the increasing sabotage of the principle of rehabilitation. By identifying the complexities of this contentious area of judicial discretion, this article highlights the need for a rights-based approach to decisions about publicly naming children in conflict with the law.

Articulating memory and practice

Material RepresentationsWhat we propose here today is a reconfiguration of western ways of representationalist thinking. The purpose is to provide an alternative way of thinking about ideology and ontology in relation to culture. So what is this thinking based on representationalist world-views?Through an examination and critique of western notions of ideology, particularly those based on Lois Althusser’s account of ideology grounded in imaginary conditions of existence, we aim to propose an alternative way of thinking about ideology and ontology. Our argument relates specifically to art and culture and is demonstrated through theoretical argument and practice, how Indigenous art and culture allow us to conceive of an alternative understanding of ideology. The purpose is to attempt to overturn the amnesia condition that persists in Australia with regards to culture.

Cyber sisters: Buddhist women’s online activism and practice

While the churches are emptying, other virtual religious places as the religious websites seem to be filling up. The researcher focusing on religion and internet or digital religion as an object of study must seek answers to a number of questions. Is computer-mediated religious communication a particular communication process whose object is what we conventionally call religion? Or is it a modern, independent form of religious expressiveness that finds its new-born status in the web and its particular language? To examine the questions above, and others, the book collects more empirical data, claiming that the Internet will have a specific or novel impact on how religious traditions are interpreted. The blurring of previous boundaries (offline/online, virtual/local, illegitimate/legitimate religion) is another theme common to all the contributions in this volume.