Male sexual dysfunction is considered to be a problematic discursive site due to the diverse ways in which it is constructed and therapeutically conceptualised. Under-researched within the discipline of counselling psychology to date, this diagnostic category needs to be explored to identify ways in which counselling psychologists construct this presenting problem. Therefore the aim of this research was to interrogate how a volunteer group of counselling psychologists understood and worked with male sexual dysfunction in order to make visible some of the masked discursive practices related to its diverse constructions. Ten counselling psychologists were interviewed and a Foucauldian discourse analysis conducted, which interrogated the discursive power games implicated in these participants' accounts. The findings produced firstly identified the wider contextual cultural norms that seemed to regulate male sexuality within gendered masculinity discourses. Secondly, three distinct discursive therapeutic subject positions and their related power games were identified as talked about by these participants. Overall, it is argued that these findings indicate that for these counselling psychologists, male sexual dysfunction is a mutable, diversely power-laden, and thereby problematic, construct. Furthermore this analysis may be understood as a contribution to counselling psychology in raising practitioners' awareness to the power games in their talk about working with male sexual dysfunction.

This thesis offers new insights into physiotherapy practice by asking 'how is physiotherapy discursively constructed?' Physiotherapy is a large, well-established, orthodox health profession. Recent changes in the economy of health care in developed countries, added to an increasing prevalence of chronic illness amongst aging populations, and growing public distrust for the established health professions, are now challenging physiotherapists to consider how best to adapt to the future needs of health care consumers. / Thesis (PhD)--University of South Australia, 2008

This thesis offers new insights into physiotherapy practice by asking 'how is physiotherapy discursively constructed?' Physiotherapy is a large, well-established, orthodox health profession. Recent changes in the economy of health care in developed countries, added to an increasing prevalence of chronic illness amongst aging populations, and growing public distrust for the established health professions, are now challenging physiotherapists to consider how best to adapt to the future needs of health care consumers. / Thesis (PhD)--University of South Australia, 2008

Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD) is understood as a difficult category to work with in various contemporary mental health settings. Additionally, to date, there is a dearth of research on this topic in Counselling Psychology. Therefore, the aim of this study is to explore how Counselling Psychologists (CoPs) and other Psychological Practitioners (PPs) discursively construct ASPD and to investigate any discursive power games that may be implicated in therapeutic practice accounts. Ten semi-structured interviews were conducted and a Foucauldian Discourse Analysis (FDA) was applied to the data. The findings of the analysis produced five distinct therapeutic subject-positions: “Dangerous to Know”, “Damaged Goods”, “The White Collar Psychopath”, “Resisting to Psychiatric Norms” and “Critical Questioning”. Overall this analysis argues that ASPD is a problematic construct as it is produced by these participants as multiple, power laden and opaque. Additionally, these therapeutic subject-positions highlight how ASPD is variously produced in specific therapeutic contexts, such as medium secure units and private practice/ corporate environments. Such findings may contribute to raising awareness among CoPs and other PPs by making visible the power relations and contextual influences implicated in particular ASPD therapeutic accounts. Finally, it is also proposed that this Foucauldian gaze may be applied in other practice areas, to enable critical thinking in relation to potential uses of psychological knowledge, practice and research.

Extensive research into the lives of professional ballet dancers has been conducted by the psychological and medical fields, but much of this research has focused on problems in the environment, sometimes in a way that further pathologizes dancers. Professional ballet is a highly demanding performance area, yet little research into ballet dancers’ performance lives has been conducted, which further shapes perceptions about this population. This study explores how South African professional ballet dancers’ performance lives are shaped by discourse, and how they draw on available discursive resources to construct their subjectivity and create meaning, and to what ends, in relation to performance. Findings suggest that dancers are caught up in several powerful, dominant discourses, some of which may position them in ways that cause subjective harm, but that alternatives do exist. Insights into the complex web of intersecting discourses surrounding ballet are offered, and questions posed to create possibilities, but ultimately, dancers must decide which positions they want to claim or resist, as they continually form their subjectivities. / Mini Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Psychology / MA Counselling Psychology / Unrestricted

Yes / Childbirth has been positioned as a life changing event that has profound long term psychological effects upon women. This paper adopts a community psychology approach to explore the role that the Positive Birth Movement (PBM may have in tackling negative birth experiences by supporting women before and after birth. Six women who all regularly attend UK based Positive Birth Movement meetings and had given birth to at least one child participated in one to one semi-structured interviews designed to explore the support they received before, during and after their birth, as well as their experiences with the positive birth movement. A Foucauldian inspired discourse analysis explores themes relating to the lack of support and information provided by the NHS and the function of the positive birth movement as a transformative community space which offers social support and information. Within these themes a focus on neoliberalism, choice and the woman’s position as an active consumer of health care is critically discussed. It is argued that the PBM has the potential to prepare women for positive birth experiences but more attention needs to be paid to the wider contexts that limit women’s ability to make ‘free’ choice.

This research explores institutional discourse on change in South Korean football. It seeks to understand the construction and legitimisation of change in Korean football as a product of both national and international dynamics. It explores the debates on modernity and modernisation of football in Korean society as a product of Korean colonial and postcolonial histories, including Korea s construction of self and otherness in relation to North Korea, Japan, China, and the West. In doing so, this research s ambition is to contribute to East Asian studies in general and South Korean society (politics, culture, economy, and history) in particular. It emphasises the application of modernity and tradition debates, as well as postcolonial critique and Foucauldian discourse analysis for the study of sport and football in Korea.

This research project falls under the broader Apartheid Archives Project. The aim of the project was to collect the narratives of black and white South Africans, of their earliest quotidian or everyday racist experiences. This project focused particularly on the nature of the experiences of racism of (particularly ‘ordinary’) white South Africans under the old apartheid order and their continuing effects on individual and group functioning in contemporary South Africa, especially on the ways in which white South Africans are positioned by racialised discourses and the reproduction of power relations through these positions. The project utilised narratives that were written by white South Africans and were available on the Apartheid Archive Project’s database. In total, the narratives of twelve white, middle-aged, middle class South Africans were analysed using Parker (1992) and Willig’s (2008) guidelines for analysis of the discourses which converge with Foucault’s ideas. This research report gives prominence to the discourses of race present in the narratives of white South Africans which were examined and it also focuses on how racialised discourses offer the narrators different subject positions to occupy in present day South Africa. Three discursive themes were identified, namely rationalising discursive strategies, race and racism discourses and discourses of redemption. Rationalising discursive strategies were found to utilise discourses of innocence, discourses of denial and discourses that avoid complicity. These discourses enabled the narrators to be positioned as victims. Race and racism discourses included othering discourses, discourses of whiteness and discourses of interracial relationships. Through an appeal to these kinds of discourses narrators were able to occupy opposing positions, such as perpetrator, hero, privileged and non-racial. Finally, discourses of redemption were also found to be prominent in the narratives. These comprised of religious discourses and notions of white liberalism. The utilisation of such discourses enabled constructions of the narrators as moral, virtuous and honest.

Nesta tese problematizo os modos de incorporação da Educação Sexual no currículo de licenciatura em Biologia da Universidade Federal de Sergipe (UFS). Para tanto, busquei articular os campos de estudos de sexualidade e gênero, estudos sobre currículo e os estudos culturais pós-estruturalistas com aporte em teorizações foucaultianas, visando analisar como discursos acerca de sexualidade e gênero atravessam a proposta de Educação Sexual desse currículo. Para produção do material empírico, essa trajetória investigativa envolveu: exame de documentos, como o projeto político pedagógico e a matriz curricular do curso; grupos focais com sete licenciandos/as e/ou recém-licenciados/as em Biologia organizados em três encontros; realização de 14 entrevistas semiestruturadas com os sete participantes do grupo focal e mais sete formandos/as e/ou egressos do curso. A trajetória analítica foi norteada pela análise foucaultiana do discurso, que permitiu descrever os limites e as possibilidades da Educação Sexual incorporada nesse currículo. No primeiro capítulo analítico, questiono ‘o que a biologia tem a enunciar’ sobre sexualidade e gênero. Os ditos dos/as (futuros/as) biólogos/as anunciaram questionamentos, conflitualidades e contradições decorrentes de uma multiplicidade de discursos essencialistas, fundacionalistas e universalistas, que instituem binarismos e normatizações acerca dessas dimensões da vida. Entretanto, um incessante exercício de problematização e desconstrução desses discursos deixou marcas nesse currículo para além do que a Biologia costumava ‘enunciar’, principalmente ao reconhecer sexualidade e gênero como “constructos socioculturais”. Ao argumentar a Educação Sexual como um campo transdisciplinar que engloba discursos sobre sexualidade e gênero, a partir das enunciações dos/as participantes, discuti as (des)conexões entre abordagens biológico-higienistas e sociocultural, bem como problematizei as pedagogias culturais encenadas nesse currículo. Nesse cenário, destaquei os limites e as possibilidades para mudanças e ressignificações, visto que o currículo investigado sugeriu tanto conflitualidades quanto rasuras e deslocamentos decorrentes da problematização de “verdades absolutas” acerca das temáticas da Educação Sexual; principalmente por meio da inclusão das disciplinas Corpo, Gênero e Sexualidade (CGS) e Perspectivas culturais no Ensino de Biologia e Educação, que instigaram acionar um campo discursivo com múltiplas identidades e diferenças ecoantes além da Biologia. Conclusões contingentes e transitórias permitem sintetizar esse processo sociocultural e político ensaiado para uma ressignificação da Educação Sexual “além do biológico”, o que instiga múltiplos questionamentos e (des)aprendizados acerca dos regimes de verdade no campo da Biologia e distintos modos de produção e/ou manutenção de relações de poder que marcam sexualidade e gênero. / In this thesis, I problematize the ways of incorporating Sexual Education in the undergraduate curriculum in Biology of the Federal University of Sergipe (FUS). In order to do so, I sought to articulate the fields of sexuality and gender studies, studies on curriculum and post-structuralist cultural studies with contributions in Foucauldian theorizations, aiming to analyze how discourses about sexuality and gender cross the Sexual Education proposal of this curriculum. For the production of the empirical material, this investigative trajectory involved: examination of documents, such as the pedagogical political project and the curricular matrix of the course; focus groups with seven graduates and/or recent graduates in Biology organized in three meetings; 14 semi-structured interviews with the seven focal group participants and seven other graduates and/or alumnus of the course. The analytical trajectory was guided by the Foucauldian discourse analysis, which allowed us to describe the limits and possibilities of Sexual Education incorporated in this curriculum. In the first analytical chapter, I question ‘what biology has to say’ about sexuality and gender. The sayings of future biologists have raised questions, conflicts and contradictions stemming from a multitude of essentialist, foundational and universalist discourses that institute binarisms and norms about these dimensions of life. However, an incessant exercise in the problematization and deconstruction of these discourses left traces in this curriculum beyond what Biology used to ‘enunciate’, especially when recognizing sexuality and gender as ‘sociocultural constructs’. In arguing Sexual Education as a transdisciplinary field that encompasses discourses on sexuality and gender, from the enunciations of the participants, I discussed the disconnections and connections between biological-hygienist approaches and sociocultural, as well as problematizing the cultural pedagogies staged in this curriculum. In this scenario, I highlighted the limits and possibilities for changes and resignifications, since the curriculum investigated suggested both conflicts and destabilities and displacements resulting from the problematization of “absolute truths” about the themes of Sexual Education; mainly through the inclusion of the disciplines Body, Gender and Sexuality (BGS) and Cultural Perspectives in the teaching of Biology and Education, which instigated a discursive field with multiple identities and echoing differences beyond Biology. Contingent and transient conclusions allow us to synthesize this socio-cultural and political process rehearsed for a re-signification of Sexual Education “beyond the biological”, which instigates multiple questions and learning and/or unlearning about the regimes of truth in the field of Biology and different modes of production and/or maintenance of power relations that mark sexuality and gender.

A presente Dissertação teve por objetivo problematizar a interdisciplinaridade, entendendo que essa tem se constituído em uma das verdades contemporâneas pertencentes ao discurso do campo educacional que teria por objetivo romper, ou minimizar, as fronteiras disciplinares. Neste sentido, as questões que moveram a investigação foram: Quais são as enunciações dos educandos do Curso Licenciatura em Educação do Campo: Ciências da Natureza a respeito da interdisciplinaridade? Que enunciados emergem de tais enunciações? Que efeitos de verdade sugerem? No intuito de responder tais questões entrevistei 32 discentes do curso Licenciatura em Educação do Campo: ciências da natureza – da Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul – campus Litoral Norte UFRGS/CLN. Para análise e produção do material empírico visitei a oficina de Foucault e recolhi algumas ferramentas conceituais tais como: enunciado, enunciação, discurso e verdade. O exercício analítico sobre o material empírico mostrou que: a) a interdisciplinaridade é adotada como perspectiva para o curso Licenciatura em Educação do Campo porque há alinhamentos entre as enunciações dos pesquisadores vinculados a discussões sobre a educação para os povos do campo e os discursos sobre a Interdisciplinaridade. b) os estudantes, mesmo em um curso interdisciplinar, ainda fazem referência aos campos disciplinares e isto talvez ocorra em virtude do baixo grau de remanência das enunciações interdisciplinares e c) o discurso da interdisciplinaridade tem aditividade com os provenientes do campo da sociologia que se propõe a descrever as condições da sociedade atual. Estas articulações entre os enunciados acabam por fortalecer ambos os discursos, forjando-os como verdades contemporâneas. / The purpose of this dissertation was to problematize interdisciplinarity, understanding that this has become one of the contemporary truths belonging to the discourse of the educational field that would aim to break, or minimize, the disciplinary boundaries. In this sense, the questions that moved the research were: What are the enunciations of the students of the Graduation Course in Field Education: Nature Sciences regarding interdisciplinarity? What statements emerge from such enunciations? What effects do they suggest? In order to answer such questions, I interviewed 32 students of the Undergraduate Course in Field Education: Nature Sciences - from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul - North Coast campus UFRGS / CLN. For analysis and production of the empirical material, I visited Foucault's workshop and collected some conceptual tools such as statements , enunciation, speech and truth. The analytical exercise on the empirical material showed that: a) interdisciplinarity is adopted as a perspective for the graduation course in Field Education blecause there are alignments between the enunciations of researchers linked to discussions about education for the rural people and the discourses about the Interdisciplinarity. b) students, even in an interdisciplinary course, still make reference to the disciplinary fields and this may occur because of the low degree of remanence of interdisciplinary utterances and c) the discourse of interdisciplinarity has additivity with those coming from the field of sociology that proposes to describe the conditions of present-day society. These articulations between the statements end up strengthening both discourses, forging them as contemporary truths.