This paper argues that two fundamentally incompatible shifts are taking place in higher education institutions in the UK, and beyond: Firstly, there is a move towards appreciation of, and focus on, interdisciplinary teaching, learning and research. Secondly, the university institution is undergoing neoliberal reforms, in the spirit of New Public Management. It is argued that the latter leads to an intensification of pressures to specialise into increasingly narrow disciplinary niches, which in terms is detrimental to the possibilities for interdisciplinary cooperation. (...) introduction of a feminist ethics of care into the university, as suggested by the feminist slow scholarship movement, is proposed as a possible solution to what is perceived to be negative developments in the higher education sector. (shrink)

ArgumentBy the mid-eighteenth century, governors of the major European states promoted the study of nature as part of natural-resource based schemes for improvement and economic self-sufficiency. Procuring beneficial knowledge about nature, however, required observers, collectors, and compilers who could produce usable and useful descriptions of nature. The ways governments promoted scientific explorations varied according to the form of government, the makeup of the civil society, the state's economic ideologies and practices, and the geographical situation. This article argues that the roots (...) of a major natural history initiative in Denmark-Norway were firmly planted in the state-church organization. Through the clergymen and their activities, a bishop, supported by the government in Copenhagen, could gather an impressive collection of natural objects, receive observations and descriptions of natural phenomena, and produce natural historical publications that described for the first time many of the species of the north. Devout naturalists were a common species in the eighteenth century, when clergymen and missionaries involved themselves in the investigation of nature in Europe and far beyond. The specific interest here is in how natural history was supported and enforced as part of clerical practice, how specimen exchange was grafted on to pre-existing institutions of gift exchange, and how this influenced the character of the knowledge produced. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to investigate external whistleblowers’ experiences of workplace bullying by superiors and colleagues, and to analyze how the bullying was influenced by factors such as the support they received from government or NGOs, and whether colleagues understood the reasons for the whistleblower’s actions. For bullying by colleagues, we also examined to what extent this was influenced by superiors’ behavior towards the whistleblower. We reviewed the relevant literature on workplace bullying and whistleblowers’ experiences of negative or (...) retaliatory actions and developed three hypotheses, which we tested using data gathered from Korean external whistleblowers. Results revealed that external whistleblowers experienced work-related bullying by superiors and social relation-related and person-related bullying by colleagues more frequently, and found it more distressing, than other types of workplace bullying. Superiors’ bullying was a dominant factor affecting bullying by colleagues. Colleagues’ understanding of the reason for the whistleblower’s actions was significant in reducing bullying frequency while support from government and NGOs was not significant in reducing it. Based on these findings, practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

The stigma of reporting wrongdoing at work: When doing right is perceived as wrong The act of reporting unethical, illegal and illegitimate practices at work, whistleblowing, can be associated with a stigma for the individual in question. This article presents the stigmatizing position of reporting wrongdoing at work, types of wrongdoing and individual antecedents. Since empirical studies have shown very few systematic results regarding individual differences, one way to decrease societal stigma can be to relate the act of reporting to (...) other known acts that are perceived upon as more positive within society. We therefore also discuss similarities and differences between the idea of whistleblowing and other concepts such as Organizational Citizenship Behaviour, in-role, and extra-role behaviour before we make some concluding remarks. (shrink)

How are contexts made and narrated? This article addresses the question of how to identify relevant contexts for understanding a work of natural history, in this case The First Natural History of Norway, published in two volumes in 1752 and 1753. In addition to offering a rich and complex description of Norwegian nature, this historical work serves as an important source for investigating the ways in which nature was perceived in the kingdom of Denmark-Norway in the middle of the eighteenth (...) century. Nature was manifold, serving as a source of aesthetic pleasure, economic gain, religious reverence, and political power. It is argued that to understand the different natures presented in this book, we need to relate them to more than one context. But how do we determine the relevant contexts? The approach explored in this article is to read the book closely in search of the specific audiences that are addressed. By focusing on the ways audiences are addressed, it is argued, we can make better historical accounts of how natures are conceived and change in relation to different contexts. (shrink)

In an advertisement for water filter cartridges, we see a tumbling waterfall. The caption reads, "Like nature, Brita is beautifully simple." What kind of thinking is this? Is nature an objective reality that, in its beautiful simplicity, is unaffected by time, culture, and place? The word _nature _itself: what do we actually mean by it? These are some of the riveting questions examined by Peter Coates as he demonstrates that nature, like us, has a history of its own. Beginning (...) with Roman times, Coates investigates the ideological and material factors that have influenced human perceptions of, attitudes toward, and uses of nature—notably religion and ethics, science, technology, economics, gender, and ethnicity. Nature is seen among its rich panoply of meanings as a physical place, as the collective phenomena of the world, as an essence or principle that informs the workings of the world, as an inspiration and guide for people and a source of authority governing human affairs, and as the conceptual opposite of culture. By examining these aspects of nature, Coates leads us on a spectacular tour of the central intellectual forces of Western civilization. The book is essential reading for those who seek an understanding of the history of ideas and the role of nature in that history. (shrink)

La experiencia del valor -- El problema del sentido del lenguaje valorativo en la axiología contemporánea -- Una hipótesis sobre el sentido valorativo -- La exigencia estimativa -- Nota sobre mostración y sentido estimativo -- La plurivocidad de "bueno." -- Confusiones axiológicas -- Razón y valor: el problema de la fundamentación en el debate axiológico -- Objetividad y valor -- La dificultad de elegir -- La jerarquía axiológica -- Valor y objeto de estética -- El factor estimativo y antropológico en (...) las ciencias sociales.--Implicaciones axiológicas en la fundamentación de la ciencias humanas -- El problema del valor en el primer Wittgenstein: a propósito de Tractatus logico-philosophicus, 6.4-6.421 -- Tendencias contemporáneas de la filosofía moral británica -- La axiología de Francisco Romero. (shrink)

Diese Festschrift für Michael Fischer ist ein Patchwork und eine wunderbare Mischung aus Wissenschaft, Persönlichem, Freundschaft und Genuss. Sie setzt sich aus unterschiedlichen und vielseitigen Texten, Zeichnungen und Bildern zusammen, von Menschen, die ihn begleitet haben, manche viele Jahre, manche nur eine kurze, aber entscheidende Zeit. Studentinnen und Studenten, die von ihm gelernt haben, Kolleginnen und Kollegen, die mit ihm Ideen entwickelt, Projekte initiiert und geforscht haben, Freunden aus Kunst und Kultur, Theater, Oper und den Bühnen des Lebens, nämlich: Eric (...) Hobsbawm, Claudio Magris, André Glucksmann, Wolf Singer, Johannes Hahn, Volker Gerhardt, Thomas Fischer, Rudolf (+) und Gundl Hradil, Helga Rabl-Stadler, Gerard Mortier, Jürgen Flimm, Brita Steinwendtner, Veit Heinichen, Peter Ruzicka, André Tubeuf, Thomas Oberender, Stefan Zweifel, Hermann Lübbe, Eduardo Chitas, Wilhelm Donner, Hans Eichhorn, Reinhard Kacianka, Tina Perisutti, Ulrich H. J. Körtner, Markus Hengstschläger, Henriette und Conrad Ulrich-Hürlimann, Michael Hagner, Thomas Macho, Johann Weyringer, Birgit Recki, Walther Ch. Zimmerli, Andreas Cesana, Kurt Seelmann. (shrink)