Search results for "ilo"

On some difficulties of putting in dialogue animal rights with anthropological debates: a historical view in three episodes

2018

In this paper, I try to identify the reasons why the dialogue between sociocultural anthropology and animal rights theories and movements continues to be difficult and scarce. At first sight this weakness of communication is surprising, if one looks at the amount of anthropological studies on human/animal relationships, in most cases pointing to how animals are considered in many cultures as non- human subjects or persons. For understanding the roots of this state of affairs, I compare the ways anthropologists and animal rights theorists and activists have engaged with the issue of the differences and commonalities between human beings and nonhuman animals. For this aim, I contrast the sear…

Schelling, esotericism and the meaning of life

2019

Abstract F.W.J. Schelling argues in his middle period work Philosophical Inquiries into the Nature of Human Freedom that will should be understood as the most fundamental constitutive element of reality. Though it is often downplayed in recent scholarship, Schelling derived his most central ideas for this work more or less directly from the theosophy of Jacob Boehme. I will argue that far from peripheral and antiquated curiosity, Schelling´s esoteric influences constitute the very foundation of his middle period thought. Schelling´s affinity to esotericism enabled him to develop a form of pantheism, which is not tied to the familiar problematic aspects of traditional Christian and post-Chri…

“Not in Possession of Any Weltanschauung”: Otto Neugebauer’s Flight from Nazi Germany and His Search for Objectivity in Mathematics, in Reviewing, an…

2016

Two major factors have to be considered to account for Neugebauer’s “Weltanschauung”, in particular his apparent or real rejection of philosophical or political judgments. On the one hand, Neugebauer, as a mathematician and a historian, had to cope, with the double character of mathematics as a science in its continuity and universality, independent of time, and of mathematics as a characteristic and fundamental product of each individual culture. On the other hand emphasis has to be put on Neugebauer being torn between organizational work (institution building, reviewing, editing) and historical research. One has to consider the vicissitudes of Neugebauer’s long and eventful life, which wa…

Alexandre Brierre de Boismont and the limits of the psychopathological gaze

2018

One of the most remarkable implications of psychological medicine in the transition from the 18th to the 19th century was the advent of a new way of looking at the human being and new tools for analysing not only behaviour and individual experience, but also historical events, collective behavioural patterns or complex cultural achievements. Unsurprisingly, the deployment of this gaze could not advance without there being a series of disputes and controversies about its reach and the limits to its indiscriminate application. Focusing on the figure of French alienist Alexandre Brierre de Boismont and on the controversial cases of hallucinations and suicide, this article addresses the confli…

Empiricism and Relationism Intertwined: Hume and Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity

2016

Einstein acknowledged that his reading of Hume influenced the development of his special theory of relativity. In this article, I juxtapose Hume’s philosophy with Einstein’s philosophical analysis related to his special relativity. I argue that there are two common points to be found in their writings, namely an empiricist theory of ideas and concepts, and a relationist ontology regarding space and time. The main thesis of this article is that these two points are intertwined in Hume and Einstein.

Anti-Semitism and Progressive Era Social Science. The case of John R. Commons

2016

This paper explores Common’s views toward Jews in order to assess whether his published writings contain assertion that today would be stigmatized as anti-Semitic. The evidence we provide shows that Commons’ racial characterization of Jews was framed within a broad and indiscriminate xenophobic framework. With other leading Progressive Era social scientists, in fact, Commons shared the idea that the new immigration from Eastern and southern Europe would increase competition in the labor market, drive down wages, and lead Anglo-Saxon men and women to have fewer children, since they would not want them to compete with those who survive on less. Within this general xenophobic context, Commons …

Für eine Germanistik der Schnittstellen

2013

Chapter 12. Focus, prosody, and subject positions in L3 Spanish

2018

Looking towards the Future of Language Assessment: Usability of Tablet PCs in Language Testing

2016

[EN] This research addresses the change in how the Spanish University Entrance Examination can be delivered in the future. There is a wide acknowledgement that computer tests are very demanding for the delivering institutions which makes computer language testing difficult to implement. However, the use of tablet PCs can facilitate the delivery at even lower cost than the regular computer based language testing. 183 students in their last year of high school took a computer based language test which included reading, writing, listening and speaking. The research aspects were 1) whether they feel at ease with the tablet PC exam; 2) if they felt that visual aspects were accessible and 3) whet…

In nomine patris: Discursive strategies and ideology in the Cosa Nostra family discourse

2017

Abstract The article investigates how Cosa Nostra family discourse is characterized by a series of discursive strategies that give shape to specific ideological structures. By analysing a TV interview to the son of Bernardo Provenzano, boss of Cosa Nostra, it is possible to understand how the criminal values and practices are maintained and reproduced within the father–son relationship. Specifically, we show how the son justifies, legitimises or denies the criminal actions of his father. The ideology of Cosa Nostra seems to be based on the inter-generational cultural continuity of its members, on the family as main locus of adherence, reductionism of its mediatic image, amoralism as father–…