<p> This theoretical study seeks to continue the work initiated by Freud in 1918 on the taboo of virginity by assessing (a) the place of virginity in Lacan's theory on femininity and (b) the question of whether virginity can be considered a myth in Lacanian terms. Feminine virginity is the object of this research, with a focus on heterosexual feminine virginity in contemporary U.S. culture. The approach selected is psychoanalytical and uses the theory of Jacques Lacan, a 20th-century French psychoanalyst. As Lacan never refers to virginity or to the Freudian taboo of virginity, his work offers a space for new research.</p><p> Virginity is presented in its historical context, followed by a recounting of the various proofs of virginity utilized&mdash;to demonstrate the lack of scientific accuracy. A review of current information disseminated in the U.S. media on the topic of virginity provides an account of two movements in fierce opposition. It is then proposed that virginity is a cultural concept, and the review of literature continues with an assessment of virginity in psychoanalysis. Freud's work on taboo and his article "The Virginity Taboo" (Freud, 1918/2006c) set the stage for a total of six psychoanalytical papers that address feminine virginity. The theoretical tools used for this research consist of Freud's greatest contribution, the unconscious, and his work on feminine sexuality. Lacan's psychoanalytical project is presented in its historical context, and concepts relevant to this study are defined. Further, an elaboration of the role and purpose of myths in psychoanalysis, with a review of the contributions from Freud, L&eacute;vi-Strauss, and Lacan, provides the basis for the discussion. </p><p> This research led to two major conclusions. First, virginity plays no role in sexual difference in Lacanian theory; to the contrary, it negates sexual difference. Second, virginity is a myth that refers to the impossible response to the Other's desire. Virginity belongs to the imaginary, inasmuch as it is a semblance placed over feminine jouissance in the failed attempt to inscribe the feminine <i>all</i> into the symbolic, under the phallic function.</p>

There is an inherent tension between self and society in human life. Such a tension is also embodied in the way people talk. The dissertation is a demonstration of how Chinese deal with that tension via Chinese collectivist and self-interest talk in solving social problems. A case study is presented from the perspective of the CMM theory. Several important theoretical issues are also discussed, as to how can we achieve the validity of a text analysis, and what should be the basic unit of analysis in communication studies, and in what ways are Grice's (1975) conversational maxims inadequate in accounting for human communication. The dissertation answers those questions on the basis of a study of a Chinese mediation case.

<p> Building upon an emerging literature of educational biopolitics, this dissertation develops and thinks through some concepts to explore the prevailing forms of educational life (constituted <i>b&iacute;os</i>) that schools commonly promote in the service of constituted power and, alternatively, the kinds of educational life (constituent <i>b&iacute;os</i>) that call constituted power into question and portend new possibilities and alternative arrangements of being. In considering the kinds of life that schools typically allow and disallow, this philosophical dissertation poses the following educational problem: schools have long celebrated and reproduced a limited and corrosive formulation of educational life (constituted <i>b&iacute;os</i>) while foreclosing constituent forms. Moreover, the emergent social, political and epistemological strengths of students marginalized in the configuration of constituted power&mdash;the component parts of constituent <i>b&iacute;os </i>&mdash;are routinely deemed inferior in schools and often regarded as a contaminating threat that must be eliminated. Using the concepts of constituent and constituted <i>b&iacute;os</i> as units of analysis, this study explores how progressive and critical educational approaches, such as culturally relevant teaching and resistance theory, also fail to account for and appreciate constituent forms of educational life. In order to offer a more nuanced understanding of the relation between forms of life and schools, this study offers an <i> autonomist biopolitics of education</i>. With this orientation, constituent <i> b&iacute;os</i> is recognized as the foundational and constitutive motor to which schools are constantly reacting and attempting to &ldquo;deal with.&rdquo; Such a perspective might help educators be more attuned and responsive to the constituent dimensions of social ontology.</p>

<p> The primary focus of this qualitative grounded theory study was the reasons for the ability or inability of expatriate workers and their families to adjust and adapt to foreign cultures. The goal for this study was to investigate experiences of the whole expatriate family unit, including the children, to identify factors that could contribute to a successful expatriation assignment as well as develop a theory or model that could be used to help guide the success of the expatriate family tour time and decrease expatriate workers&lsquo; failure to complete their assignments. The qualitative grounded theory method was used to analyze the whole of each expatriate family unit&lsquo;s experiences; however, hermeneutic phenomenology as theory was integrated into the study to get to the deeper meanings of families&lsquo; actions, responses, memorabilia shared, and body language as stories were told in conversations and in response to open-ended questions. Seven family units participated in this study, for a total of 23 participants, to include children from age 7 (with parents&lsquo; approval), and contributed to the findings of three main themes, a concept of an expatriation adaptation model, and a list of factors that are essential to global expatriation processes. The theoretical framework that guided the study consisted of family systems theory and cultural leadership theory constructs. The findings resulted from a triangulated data collection process to include questionnaire, one-on-one interviews, and group interviews. The three main themes that developed were 360-degree support, the power of knowledge, and expatriate children as future expatriates and expatriate leaders. The results also resulted in the development of an expatriation adaptation process model as well as a list of factors that could contribute to a successful expatriation assignment with the whole expatriate family unit, which would keep all family members together for the expatriation experience.</p>

Bibliography: leaves 381-418. Examines the actions of ordinary people within a city landscape with the major focus on the politics of meaning and culture in cities . Case studies are drawn from Adelaide.

When the author sets out to use anthropology to understand his physical blindness, he discovers a dialectical tension between empirical observation versus heuristics that is held in common by both ethnography and disability. Ensuing discussions synthesize personal experience with the history of anthropology and the philosophy of science in order to construct a critical dialogue in which blindness can be understood anthropologically, while the individuality of the experience of blindness ultimately pushes ethnography past its generic limits. The essays argue that the study of cultural differences cannot apprehend disability processually. Disability is instead properly understood as an unshared individual difference dissociated from communicative practice and learned practices of embodiment, dissociated as well by ethnographic accounts of collective practices. Individual difference is disabling; meanwhile, ideologically, the visible products of disability are driven into the individual body, qualifying it as disabled, without reference to the generative process. This exploration becomes an application of "reflexive anthropology," which departs qualitatively from the conventional project of ethnography by centering critical attention on the interlocutory field that includes the anthropologist as a fully invested participant. It remediates the situated cultural production of one's own knowledge and experience, which opens the possibility to become attentive to the individual differences that constitute the present. The essays historicize three advents in interpretive anthropology: the repulsion of the study of mind by the study of interpretation, the flirtation with and rapid domestication of the self within the representation of the other, and the divorce between the critical study of texts versus the empirical study of language. The approach incorporates discourse pragmatics and practice theory, but also post-objectivist sensibilities. However, the discourse of affirmation associated with poststructuralism is here replaced with one stemming from suffering and disability. Collectively, the essays argue that the ethical practice of "thinking anthropologically" outside ethnography, by students and anthropologists as students, warrants programmatic attention.

Bibliography: leaves 381-418. / x, 418 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Examines the actions of ordinary people within a city landscape with the major focus on the politics of meaning and culture in cities . Case studies are drawn from Adelaide. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of Anthropology, 2000

Thesis (MPhil (Sociology and Social Anthropology))--University of Stellenbosch, 2008. / It has been said that anthropology operates in “liminal spaces” which can be defined as “spaces between disciplines”. This study will explore the space where the fields of art and anthropology meet in order to discover the epistemological and representational challenges that arise from this encounter. The common ground on which art and anthropology engage can be defined in terms of their observational and knowledge producing practices. Both art and anthropology rely on observational skills and varying forms of visual literacy to collect and represent data. Anthropologists represent their data mostly in written form by means of ethnographic accounts, and artists represent their findings by means of imaginative artistic mediums such as painting, sculpture, filmmaking and music. Following the so-called ‘ethnographic turn’, contemporary artists have adopted an ‘anthropological’ gaze, including methodologies, such as fieldwork, in their appropriation of other cultures. Anthropologists, on the other hand, in the wake of the ‘writing culture’ critique of the 1980s, are starting to explore new forms of visual research and representational practices that go beyond written texts.

The Rainbow Family of Living Light is an intentional society devoted to achieving world peace through spiritual healing. A loose association of spiritual seekers that explicitly rejects all forms of leadership and imposed authority, it represents an interesting example of an anarchist and communal society. Rainbow Family events regularly draw thousands of people. These take place all over the world. While some participants may question the label, it can be described as one of the biggest and most geographically diverse New Age groups on the planet. As such, it is a very important factor in shaping the entire present day New Age movement. I conducted fieldwork with the Rainbow Family between the autumns of 1998 and 2002, traveling with the nomadic group throughout the United States. The Rainbow Family rejects any sort of official membership, accepting anyone who attends its events as an equal participant. Spending extended periods of time in the field, I became immersed in this alternative society. The distinction between ethnographic researcher and informants was highly problematic under such circumstances. This made me acutely aware of the issues surrounding fieldwork and anthropological authority. My own work began to seem quite similar to the spiritual seeking of other participants. As such, I began to consider the commonalities between anthropology and the spirituality encountered within the Rainbow Family. The spiritual discourses produced by Rainbow Family participants are uniquely eclectic and ludic in tone. In a setting explicitly championing individual freedom rather than coercion, there is no sense of spiritual orthodoxy. The ways in which spiritual discourses are treated by the Rainbow Family display interesting attitudes towards truth, authority, and reality. These attitudes are reminiscent of epistemological orientations within postmodernist anthropology. Rainbow Family participants find noteworthy solutions to the apparent ontological dilemmas postmodernism presents. It is my hope that looking at the Rainbow Family of Living Light will suggest a viable way for anthropology to productively deal with its current crisis of identity.

TITLE: Faust and the role of myth in the philosophy of Czech thinkers: Bratránek, Masaryk, Patočka AUTHOR: Tereza Čechová DEPARTMENT: General Antropology SUPERVISOR: Mgr. Jakub Marek, Ph.D. ABSTRACT: The thesis Faust and the role of myth in the philosophy of Czech thinkers: Bratránek, Masaryk, Patočka, deals with the theme of Faust and its role in individual works of the mentioned philosophers. The thesis briefly contains the origin and development of the Faust myth, its most famous literary work, and its appearance on the Czech territory. The main chapters of the thesis are those that are focused on such texts of the mentioned thinkers, who are concerned with the Faustian theme. The resulting analyzes and comparations contribute to the depiction and arrangement of the role of the Faustian myth in Czech philosophy, mainly because of the different approaches, goals and methods of research used in their work by F. T. Bratránek, T. G. Masaryk and Jan Patočka. KEYWORDS: Faust, Myth, Contract with the Devil, Goethe, Czech Philosophy, Philosophy of History, Jan Patočka, F. T. Bratránek, T. G. Masaryk