The collective lifestyles framework : a contextual analysis of social practices, social structure and disease

Thèse diffusée initialement dans le cadre d'un projet pilote des Presses de l'Université de Montréal/Centre d'édition numérique UdeM (1997-2008) avec l'autorisation de l'auteur.

Peak residential electricity demand and social practices: Deriving flexibility and greenhouse gas intensities from time use and locational data

Peak residential electricity demand takes place when people conduct simultaneous activities at specific times of the day. Social practices generate patterns of demand and can help understand why, where, with whom and when energy services are used at peak time. The aim of this work is to make use of recent UK time use and locational data to better understand: (i) how a set of component indices on synchronisation, variation, sharing and mobility indicate flexibility to shift demand; and (ii) the links between people’s activities and peaks in greenhouse gases’ intensities. The analysis is based on a recent UK time use dataset, providing 1 minute interval data from GPS devices and 10 minute data from diaries and questionnaires for 175 data days comprising 153 respondents. Findings show how greenhouse gases’ intensities and flexibility to shift activities vary throughout the day. Morning peaks are characterised by high levels of synchronisation, shared activities and occupancy, with low variation of activities. Evening peaks feature low synchronisation, and high spatial mobility variation of activities. From a network operator perspective, the results indicate that periods with lower flexibility may be prone to more significant local network loads due to the synchronization of electricity-demanding activities.

Urban politics and the social practices of critique and justification:conceptual insights from French pragmatism

Recent times have witnessed a growing belief in urban spaces as 'assemblages' produced through interwoven and spatially differentiated forces that converge at particular sites. There is also continuing interest in the nature of neoliberal tendencies and the rise of post-politics and democracy in urban governance. These accounts typically lack attention towards the comprehensive conceptualization of the heterogeneous logics and mechanics of relations and negotiations between actors. This paper seeks to advance these perspectives by exploring the potential contribution of French pragmatism thinking to how social life is produced through practical dialogue between actors through critique, argumentation and justification. © The Author(s) 2012.

Digital Literacy: an analysis of social practices in cyberspace from the accessibility and frequency of use

This paper discusses the Digital Literacy and the importance of social practices of reading and writing nowadays. The research aims to analyze the accessibility of Digital Literacy of the residents from the satellite cities in Distrito Federal and the frequency of use of cyberspace to conduct reading and writing activities. According to Levy (1999), the transmutation of various means of communication (telephone, printed newspapers and post office, for example, in chat, digital newspapers and email, respectively) enabled the synchronous communication, interactivity and sharing of information between people from different places in the world, whether in oral form - as in video conferencing and telepresencial classroom - either in writing - as in most digital genres. It is this latter method - the writing, and hence the reading on the Internet - which has guided our discussion. According to Soares (2002), we live in a era of changes in the practices of reading and writing due to new forms of interaction between reader, author and text provided by the communication in the global computer network. Nothing better, therefore, than investigating how the user handles literacy in this new environment. The Digital Literacy, according to Xavier (2005), requires new ways of reading and writing. This means that time-honored practices of literacy, for example, should be rethought and reformulated in order to insert new ways of understanding the learning process - from handling the text to your perception, through the reading of written texts, engravings and icons linked to the electronic sphere. In this sense, the Digital Literacy, associated with multimodal genres, is present in the daily lives of several people from different social classes - particularly in large urban centers. So, facing this situation, we investigate if the residents of the satellite cities of DF have easy access to digital literacy and how often they make use of texts in cyberspace.

Social entrepreneurship practices and social change In Brazil: a qualitative study in three non-governmental organizations

Social Entrepreneurship (SE) has attracted growing interest from a wide variety of actors over the last 30 years, especially due to a general agreement that it could be an important tool for tackling many of the world’s social ills. In the academic sphere, this growing interest did not translate into a matured field of study. Quite the opposite, a quick look at this literature makes it evident that: SE has been consistently subjected to numerous theoretical discussions and disagreements, especially over the definition of the concept of SE which is often based on a taken-for-granted notion of social change; it has been more systematically investigated in restricted contexts, often leaving aside so called developing/emerging countries like Brazil and especially lacking in-depth qualitative studies; SE literature lags behind SE practices and few studies focus on how SE actually occurs in a daily and bottom-up manner. In order to address such gaps, this thesis examines how social entrepreneurship practices accomplish social change in the context of Brazil. In this investigation I conducted an inductive practice-based, qualitative/ethnographic study in three Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) located in different cities in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. Data collection lasted from February 2014 until March 2015 and was mainly done through participant observations and through in-depth unstructured conversations with research participants. Secondary data and documents were also collected whenever available. The participants of this study included a variety of the studied organizations’ stakeholders: two founders, volunteers, employees, donors and beneficiaries. Observation data was kept in fieldnotes, conversations were recorded whenever possible and were later transcribed. Data was analyzed through an iterative thematic analysis. Through this I identified eight recurrent themes in the data: (1) structure; (2) relationship with other organizational actors (sub-themes: relationship with state, relationship with businesses and relationship with other NGOs); (3) beliefs, spirituality and moral authority; (4) social position of participants, (5) stakeholders’ mobilization and participation; (6) feelings; (7) social purpose; and (8) social change. These findings were later discussed under the lens of practice theory, and in this discussion I argue and show that, in the context studied: (a) even though SE embraces a wide variety of different social purposes, they are intertwined with a common notion of social change based on a general understanding and aspiration for social equality; (b) this social change is accomplished in a processual and ongoing manner as stakeholders from antagonistic social groups felt compelled to and participated in SE practices. In answering the proposed research question the contributions of this thesis are: (i) the elaboration a working definition for SE based on its relationship with social change; (ii) providing in-depth empirical evidence which accounts for and explains this relationship; (iii) characterizing SE in the Brazilian context and reflecting upon its transferability to other contexts. This thesis also makes a methodological contribution, for it demonstrates how thematic analysis can be used in practice-based studies.

Activism, art and social practice : a case study using Jacques Ranciere’s framework for analysis

The question can no longer just be whether “art and social practice” or creative forms of activism are part of larger neo liberal agenda nor if they are potentially radical in their conception, delivery or consumption. The question also becomes: what are the effects of social practice art and design for the artists, institutions, and the publics they elicit in public and private spaces; that is, how can we consider such artworks differently? I argue the dilution of social practices’ potentially radical interventions into cultural processes and their absorption into larger neo liberal agendas limits how, as Jacques Rancière might argue, they can intervene in the “distribution of the sensible.” I will use a case study example from The Center for Tactical Magic, an artist group from the San Francisco Bay Area.

Students’ well-being and social connections

Description of Workshop/Poster Presentation This presentation will showcase CORE Connections – ‘Creating Opportunities for Resilience and Engagement’ – which is a whole-school approach to mental health promotion. While initially designed to prevent adolescent depression and substance abuse, current thinking suggests that competency enhancement (e.g., autonomy, competence, supportive networks) more widely improves students’ well-being, educational engagement, and learning outcomes. In the presentation, we will provide an overview of the CORE project, describe the CORE intervention, which is conceptualized as a dynamic and penetrating process of social practices, present some preliminary findings from the pilot phase of CORE, and conclude our presentation with an interactive section with the participants. This project will highlight a wellness focus that addresses social engagement within whole school cultures. Purpose of the Presentation Student mental and physical well-being has gained increasing attention. Our presentation will introduce the CORE project, which has a potential to decrease student depression, anxiety, and substance use, and to increase student self-esteem and learning outcomes. In this vein, our presentation will raise the public awareness of the salient role of social connection in student well-being. Specifically, a group of presenters will discuss the impact of social connection on students’ anxiety, mathematics achievement, and perceived racial discrimination. • We will present participants with an alternative way to conceptualize and approach mental health promotion within a school context. In contrast to prescribed programs that are commonly used in today’s schools, CORE is a whole-school approach that is flexibly integrated into all aspects of the classroom and school environment. Our aim is to illustrate the intervention principles of CORE while highlighting examples of mental health outcomes/transformation. • Underutilized in mental health promotion research, social network analysis provides critical information in understanding relationships between social cohesion (e.g., a student’s connectedness to others) and mental health outcomes. This session will showcase how focusing on and strengthening social connections in and out of school can contribute to student well-being, achievement, and mental health. Educational Objectives By the end of the presentation, participants will • obtain a general overview of the CORE program, • understand how psychological health and school performance relate to student well-being, • and understand how social connections in and out of school can contribute to student well-being. Interactive / Participatory Component We will invite audience members to discuss inhibitors and contributors to student well-being and the best ways for schools to help students feel safe, connected, and valued. Presentation Key Points • Overview of the CORE project • Theorization of social connection • Some empirical studies emerging from CORE • Presenter-audience interaction Evidence of Relevance and Utility to Participants Potential participants are adults with significant relationships with students, either as family members, community neighbors, educators, scholars, service providers, or policy makers. Our presentation will inspire these significant adults to construct a welcoming society to help improve student well-being.

‘Just choose the easy option’: Students talk about alcohol use and social influence

Previous research into young people’s drinking behaviour has studied how social practices influence their actions and how they negotiate drinking-related identities. Here, adopting the perspective of discursive psychology we examine how, for young people, social influences are bound up with issues of drinking and of identity. We conducted 19 focus groups with undergraduate students in Australia aged between 18 and 24 years. Thematic analysis of participants’ accounts for why they drink or do not drink was used to identify passages of talk that referred to social influence, paying particular attention to terms such as ‘pressure’ and ‘choice’. These passages were then analysed in fine-grained detail, using discourse analysis, to study how participants accounted for social influence. Participants treated their behaviour as accountable and produced three forms of account that: (1) minimised the choice available to them, (2) explained drinking as culture and (3) described resisting peer pressure. They also negotiated gendered social dynamics related to drinking. These forms of account allowed the participants to avoid individual responsibility for drinking or not drinking. These findings demonstrate that the effects of social influence on young people’s drinking behaviour cannot be assumed, as social influence itself becomes negotiable within local contexts of talk about drinking.

Social NUI: Social perspectives in natural user interfaces

Natural User Interfaces (NUI) offer rich ways for interacting with the digital world that make innovative use of existing human capabilities. They include and often combine different input modalities such as voice, gesture, eye gaze, body interactions, touch and touchless interactions. However much of the focus of NUI research and development has been on enhancing the experience of individuals interacting with technology. Effective NUIs must also acknowledge our innately social characteristics, and support how we communicate with each other, play together, learn together and collaboratively work together. This workshop concerns the social aspects of NUI. The workshop seeks to better understand the social uses and applications of these new NUI technologies -- how we design these technologies for new social practices and how we understand the use of these technologies in key social contexts.

The Gendered Social Organisation of Defence: Two Ethnographic Case Studies in the Finnish Defence Forces

In Finland the organising of defence is undergoing vast restructuring. Recent legislation has redefined the central tasks of the Finnish Defence Forces. At the same time, international security cooperation, economic pressures and new administrative paradigms have steered the military towards new ways of organising. National defence is not just politics and principles; to a large extent it is also enacted in day-to-day life in organisations. The lens through which these realities of defence are analysed in this study is gender. How is the security sector – and national defence as part of it – organised in the changing security environment? What is the new division of labour between different societal actors in the face of security challenges? What happens ‘at work’ within the military and the defence sector more broadly? How does gender affect the way in which defence is organised and understood, and how do the changes in the organising of security affect gender relations? The thesis searches for answers to these questions in the context of two organisational settings in the male-dominated defence sector. The case study on a Finnish peacekeeping unit in the Balkans opens a critical view on men’s social practices and the everyday life of crisis management organisations. In the second case study, reorganising of provisioning in the Finnish Defence Forces turns out to be a complicated process where different power relations and social divisions intermingle. Tallberg’s extensive ethnographic fieldwork in the two focal organisations has produced a detailed set of data that lays the basis for critical analysis and policy development in terms of defence organising, cooperation around peace and security issues, and gender equality in organisations. Observations and results are provided for understanding social networks, militarisation, authority relations, care, public-private partnerships, personnel policies, career planning, and humour.

Literatura boa é que eu gosto; ruim a que eu não gosto: fóruns de discussão literária da rede social ORKUT e a Teoria da Valoração uma análise crítica

Esta dissertação se insere nos estudos de Linguística e é vinculada à Análise Crítica do Discurso (FAIRCLOUGH, 1989, 2003) e à Linguística Sistêmico-Funcional (HALLIDAY, 1970, 1973), investigando o que é a qualidade literária para os internautas que interagem em fóruns de discussão do Orkut, à luz da Teoria da Valoração (MARTIN ; WHITE, 2005). De acordo com as categorias que abrangem o subsistema da Atitude da Teoria da Valoração (MARTIN ; WHITE, 2005), analisa-se como os leitores internautas se posicionam sobre a questão da qualidade literária e a ideologia que perpassa seus discursos. O conceito de ideologia adotado é o proposto por Thompson (2009), para quem o conceito deve ser compreendido a partir da noção de hegemonia e poder, ou seja, a ideologia necessariamente estabelece e sustenta relações de dominação, reproduzindo a ordem social que favorece indivíduos e grupos dominantes.O corpus desta pesquisa é composto de três amostras colhidas entre 15/07/2009 e 05/01/2010 correspondentes a uma discussão iniciada em comunidade relacionada a assuntos literários. A AMOSTRA 1 refere-se ao tópico Leitura difícil é sinal de qualidade?, da comunidade Literatura; a AMOSTRA 2, se refere ao tópico Qualidade do texto literário, da comunidade Discutindo... literatura e, por fim, a AMOSTRA 3 representa o tópico O que é um bom texto literário para você, também da comunidade Literatura. Cada discussão possui congruências e divergências quanto às representações sobre literatura e essas foram também analisadas. Não obstante, o que nos interessa é perceber como as ideologias perpassam seus discursos de acordo com os valores que os internautas atribuem a aspectos do texto literário. Foram escolhidos fóruns de discussão online do Orkut porque as interações em redes sociais constituem elemento novo das práticas sociais e, portanto, relevantes pontos de apoio para a investigação da criação de sentidos sobre o conceito de boa literatura. Investigar como a literatura, objeto de estudo acadêmico, é analisada em tais espaços cibernéticos é instigante, por não ser usual. Os resultados obtidos nessa pesquisa sugerem que o internauta reproduz o discurso acadêmico hegemônico acerca da qualidade literária ao debater a qualidade intrínseca do texto literário com a ressalva de manifestar seu contentamento ou descontentamento acerca de determinados textos literários e escritores, dado novo que revela uma característica deste espaço não institucional de discussão, em que os internautas se sentem à vontade para manifestar sua opinião

Imaginação social jesuítica do Padre Antônio Vieira no Maranhão do Século XVII

O padre Antônio Vieira é uma figura icônica do Barroco literário no Brasil do século XVII, visto por muitos como um dos grandes representantes da Companhia de Jesus. A presente tese busca contemplar um tema recorrente na historiografia jesuítica brasileira que trata do papel desempenhado pelos jesuítas na tentativa de construção de uma terrena cidade celeste segundo Neves, no novo mundo (Brasil colônia) e, particularmente, das práticas sociais (sobretudo, políticas, religiosas, ideológicas, jurídicas) do padre Antônio Vieira suas implicações e rupturas no Maranhão seiscentista sob o olhar do imaginário social. Através de três sermões proferidos no Maranhão, pretendemos analisar e dialogar sobre as imagens mais recorrentes na produção sermonística do Padre Antônio Vieira: como nosso objeto de pesquisa também é a produção imagética do sujeito Vieira, utilizamos como referencial teórico a noção ideológica de sujeito de Mikhail Bakhthin, as noções do Imaginário de Gilbert Durand e Gaston Bachelard, as teorias sobre o Imaginário Social jesuítico do antropólogo e pesquisador Luiz Felipe Baêta Neves e outros grandes teóricos, para nos ajudar a analisar essas imagens. Buscamos uma possível estrutura do imaginário social do padre Antônio Vieira durante sua presença no Maranhão a partir dos sermões analisados e levantamos os processos de ruptura e continuidade com os projetos do missionário e da Companhia de Jesus na formação da sociedade maranhense.