This thesis charts the stakeholder communities, physical environment and daily life of two little studied Qādiriyya Sufi shrines associated with Shaikh ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jīlānī (1077 – 1165 AD), a 12th century Ḥanbalī Muslim theologian and the posthumous founder of one of the oldest Sufi orders in Islam. The first shrine is based in Baghdad and houses his burial chamber; and the second shrine, on the outskirts of the city of ‘Aqra in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq, is that of his son Shaikh ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz (died 1206 AD). The latter was also known for lecturing in Ḥanbalī theology in the region, and venerated for this as well as his association with Shaikh ʿAbd al-Qādir. Driven by the research question “What shapes the identity orientations of these two Qādiriyya Sufi shrines in modern times?” the findings presented here are the result of field research carried out between November 2009 and February 2014. This field research revealed a complex context in which the two shrines existed and interacted, influenced by both Sufi and non-Sufi stakeholders who identified with and accessed these shrines to satisfy a variety of spiritual and practical needs, which in turn influenced the way each considered and viewed the two shrines from a number of orientations. These overlapping orientations include the Qādirī Sufi entity and the resting place of its patron saint; the orthodox Sunnī mosque with its muftī-imams, who are employed by the Iraqi government; the local Shīʿa community’s neighbourhood saint’s shrine and its destination for spiritual and practical aid; and the local provider of welfare to the poor of the city (soup kitchen, funeral parlour and electricity-generation amongst other services). The research findings also revealed a continuously changing and adapting Qādirī Sufi scene not immune from the national and regional socio-religio-political environments in which the two shrines exist: a non-Sufi national political class vying to influence and manipulate these shrines for their own purposes; and powerful national sectarian factions jostling to do the same. The mixture of stakeholders using and associating with the two shrines were found to be influential shapers of these entities, both physically and spiritually. Through encountering and interacting with each other, most stakeholders contributed to maintaining and rejuvenating the two shrines, but some also sought to adapt and change them driven by their particular orientation’s perspective.

9/11 changed the face of maritime transport that is responsible for moving 80% of everything we consume. Ports are vital hubs in that maritime transport and any disruption there instantly affects global trade. To protect the global supply chain from crime and terrorism, both must be disrupted locally in the port by port police and security officers that are responsible for port security at operational level. Public and critical criminological attention to these key security actors, however, is virtually non-existent. This thesis therefore explores how their occupational realities and identities are (re)established in two major European ports, by providing an ethnographic account. To do so, the thesis builds on multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork in the ports of Rotterdam and Hamburg between 2011 and 2012, during which everyday policing and security work has been documented, followed by a thematic analysis. The key argument runs thus: the port is a local space for the global trade, which is underappreciated and underestimated by the public, and has its police and security professionals in place both aboard and on shore who protect and defend that vital trade site. The aggressive commercialist governmentality that goes on behind that vital global trade is unwillingly yielded to by these guardians but not without any bottom-up resistance. They condemn the volatile commercialist governmentality that is embodied in management, competitive and careerist colleagues and authoritarian multi-agency partners, as well as in port companies and shipping companies. The State and global market they protect, is simultaneously a threat to them. This contradiction influences their occupational identity, making it inherently conflicted and affecting their performance in the port securityscape to the extent it can create threatening situations that cause the very dangers they are supposed to prevent and eradicate.

This thesis explores how Field-Configuring Events (FCEs) discursively maintain field legitimacy. It particularly addresses how organisations within the field of fertility treatment employ discourses of the female non-reproductive body at one of the field’s FCEs, the Fertility Show. FCEs are temporally and spatially bounded events where organisations belonging to the same field meet and share collective understandings of issues relevant for field-level activities. Despite being acknowledged as important loci for field configuration and legitimacy (Lampel and Meyer, 2008; Wooten and Hoffman, 2016), FCEs are still relatively understudied phenomena. This research particularly addresses the gap of how discourse is generated and employed at FCEs (Hardy and Maguire, 2010), specifically towards legitimacy. It sits within an academic discussion that sees a number of empirical studies concerned with the discursive analysis of legitimacy (Vaara et al., 2006; Alvesson, 1993; Brown, 1998), but a critical perspective to the analysis of discourse is rarely taken (Vaara et al., 2006; Barros, 2014). The thesis contributes to this discussion by adopting a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) approach to unveil discursive strategies of legitimacy employed at the FCE to maintain field legitimacy. As a dynamic and on-going process (Deegan, 2002; Suchman, 1995), legitimacy needs to be maintained (Shocker and Sethi, 1974). Scholars acknowledge that FCEs can work towards field maintenance (Schüssler et al., 2014), however studies that discursively investigate this process and its implications for legitimacy are missing. The importance and peculiarity of FCEs represent a compelling case for analysis, and for empirical and theoretical expansion in this regard. This thesis importantly also focuses on the concept of the body within organisation studies, and zooms in on the female body in particular. With respect to this literature, works so far have mostly analysed the body at work. The study shifts the attention from the body of the worker to the body per se, as a product, tool, and entity in its own right. Finally, this thesis brings to the fore how the female body is constructed within the organisational domain when it is not reproducing. By doing so, it expands our knowledge and balances our discussions as to how the female body is understood when non-reproductive or infertile. The thesis is based on a qualitative study of organisations within the field of fertility treatment in the UK, and entails the critical discourse analysis of organisational texts collected at the Fertility Show, here understood as a FCE. The study critically investigates how organisations discursively construct the female non-reproductive body; which relations they put in place between themselves and the bodies they construct; and how such bodies and relations discursively maintain the field’s legitimacy at the FCE. The analysis shows that organisations at the Fertility Show construct three discourses of the female non-reproductive body, and that each discourse engenders an imbalanced relation between the organisations and the female body. It further shows that each discourse and relation is rooted in past discourses on womanhood and motherhood, which are not explicitly employed by organisations at the FCE. Further, the research illustrates that, in this setting, organisations maintain field legitimacy through the discursive strategies of adaptation to social norms, reiteration of past discourses, and temporary interruption of social norms. At the FCE, legitimacy is thus sustained by adapting to current social norms on motherhood; by reiterating broader historical discourses on the female body; and by temporarily interrupting the current social norm that views infertility as taboo. Building on the term ‘discursive space’ from Hardy and Maguire (2010), the study further contributes to our knowledge of discourse and FCEs by showing that FCEs can be approached as open discursive spaces where imbalanced relations are generated through discourse. It illustrates that FCEs are open spaces because, while they are temporally and spatially bounded, the discourses employed therein are not. The analysis shows that past discourses are employed at the FCE to maintain legitimacy, but not explicitly so. This in turn makes resistance hard to carry out. The study further contributes to how we methodologically approach FCEs by applying a CDA approach to the study of discourse within FCEs. Particularly, a CDA approach explicitly shows that discourse can foster legitimacy through the creation of imbalanced relations between text producers and text consumers. This in turn brings to the fore issues of power, struggle, and resistance within and outside of the FCE. With respect to organisation studies centred on the female body and reproduction, the thesis highlights how fertile bodies and infertile bodies exist in a dualistic system of societal and organisational expectations that cannot be simultaneously satisfied. Consequently, the female body finds itself locked in a lose-lose situation with regards to its reproductive choices, within and outside of organisational life.

Sociable folk dancing in the UK is an organised group activity in which a significant number of people take part, often practising folk styles which have their origins in other countries. These groups are generally not run for profit, operate under the radar of media attention, and consequentially their activities remain largely hidden from view. This thesis addresses the fact that there have been no in-depth studies of these groups. It reports on the findings of a detailed ethnographic research project, to offer in-sights into the practices and motivations of participants in social dance. The thesis answers the key question: ‘What is the meaning and significance of participation in these folk music and social dance styles to those taking part?’. An interdisciplinary and ethnographic research approach was adopted to investigate two such folk styles: Cajun and Zydeco, and Scandinavian. This approach allowed research participants to make a significant contribution to the focus of the research, and to inform the subsidiary questions: ‘What are the concerns and interests of those involved in social folk dance?’, ‘What is it that makes involvement in these dance practices so appealing?’, and ‘What are the overall benefits of being involved?’ The research produced an interpretive account of these practices, through investigating sites of participation in these dance styles in the UK, which were explored by means of immersive involvement in their dance practices. This gave an insight into the way in which participation was organised and managed, and allowed for introductions to be made which were followed up with thirty in-depth interviews. The study revealed that despite the stylistic differences between the two dance styles and how they are practised, both nevertheless benefitted participants in similar ways. That dance events are organised on a not-for-profit basis was particularly important to participants, and encouraged loyalty and cooperation, promoting feelings of empowerment and ownership. An atmosphere of supportive inclusion was also built in to the loose organisation of events and activities, which allowed a consensus to develop where social attitudes and ideas could be negotiated, cultivated, and shared. This created a sense of belonging to an unboundaried, and fluid community or social network, a safe environment in which participants were able to experience dance as a communicative and expressive dialogue between individuals and within the group. This thesis argues that participants found their involvement in these dance styles socially and personally satisfying, and that this made a considerable contribution to their individual wellbeing. The research found that sociable folk dancing served as a vehicle for community, improving participants’ sense of self-worth, supporting creativity, and well-being. These findings complement clinical research that champions dance, and social dance in particular, as a healthy and worthwhile leisure activity. This thesis supports the results of such scientific studies into the benefits of dance by providing supporting evidence from within a social setting. This has implications for further research, and for policy and practice, whether dance activities are pursued formally or informally and whatever their aim.

In this thesis I analyse paradigms for the conceptualisation of male-to-male sexuality as put forward in HIV/AIDS programming in India. This is an especially pertinent project; over the last decade, international and national HIV/AIDS agencies working in India have increasingly identified men who have sex with men as a ‘target population’ for community based intervention. By contrast, within the broader milieu of Indian society the notion of homosexual identity exercises little cognitive grip as a salient category for the constitution of specific persons. This is not withstanding ‘modern’, predominantly urban, middle class popularisations of ‘gay’ identity, nor the specification of various ‘indigenous’ categories of male-to-male sexuality, which have predominantly been outlined in policy oriented research. As a counterpoint to these concerns my research explores the experiences of men who have sex with men in Calcutta for whom categories of homosexual identity are either completely unfamiliar or, where used, inscribed within a far more subtle mesh of conflicting emotions and allegiances than current studies elucidate. Moreover, I argue that in many contemporary Indian contexts homosexuality is most often signified within relational tropes and social spaces made available within heteronormative parameters. Homosexuality therefore has an isomorphic correspondence to identity, meaning that policy and research needs better conceptions of the tacit conditions of sexual subjectivity. My thesis explores what this assertion means for the cross-cultural study of male-to-male sexuality and HIV/AIDS policy and programming.

<p>Aerocapture has been envisioned as a potential orbit insertion technique for planetary destinations with an atmosphere. Despite not being flight proven technique, many studies found in the literature and recent mission proposals have employed aerocapture into their respective mission designs. The potential varying levels of trajectory dispersions experienced during atmospheric flight at each destination drives the need for robust and fuel-efficient guidance and control solutions. Existing guidance algorithms have relied on tracking precomputed reference trajectories, which are computed using significant simplifications to the flight mechanics, are not generally designed to be fuel-efficient, and require tedious performance gain tuning. When simulated with higher levels of uncertainty, the existing algorithms have been shown to produce large orbit insertion errors. Furthermore, existing flight control methodologies have been limited in scope to bank angle modulation. While some studies have introduced new methodologies, such as drag modulation and direct force control, they haven’t been tested at the same level of rigor as the existing methods. Advances in on-board computational power are allowing for modern guidance and control solutions, in the form of numerical predictor-corrector algorithms, to be realized. This dissertation presents an aerocapture guidance architecture based on a numerical predictor-corrector algorithm. Optimal control theory is utilized to formulate and numerically obtain fuel-minimizing flight control laws for lifting and ballistic vehicles. The unified control laws are integrated into a common guidance algorithm. The architecture is utilized to conduct Monte Carlo simulation studies of Discovery-class and SmallSat-class aerocapture missions at various planetary destinations.</p>

Cette recherche porte sur les luttes féministes en Haïti. À partir de nos premières observations sur les relations entre l'évolution de la situation des femmes haïtiennes et les luttes féministes en Haïti, nous cherchions à identifier les principales raisons qui motivent certaines femmes haïtiennes à militer comme féministes, à comprendre les enjeux culturels auxquels sont confrontées les femmes dans la société haïtienne et les stratégies mises en oeuvre pour faire face à ces enjeux. Compte tenu du caractère exploratoire de cette étude et de la nature des données, que nous nous proposions d'analyser et d'interpréter, nous avons choisi une approche qualitative, dans une perspective de recherche féministe. En effet, en analysant les témoignages de 12 militantes féministes, nous avons mis l'accent sur le sens que ces femmes, en tant que sujets engagés dans un processus de transformation sociale, donnaient à leur discours et à leur pratique féministe. Le modèle d'analyse, construit à partir des concepts clés de la problématique et de la méthodologie de notre étude, nous a permis d'entrevoir la dynamique qui sous-tend l'engagement féministe de douze femmes de la région métropolitaine de Port-au-Prince. Cet engagement se comprend sous l'éclairage d'une conception du féminisme comme un mouvement social à trois dimensions: celle d'un discours critique, dénonçant l'idéologie machiste et sexiste qui imprègne la culture dominante de la société haïtienne; celle d'une pratique militante, axée sur l'affirmation de l'identité féministe, la défense, la revendication et la promotion des droits des femmes; et celle d'un projet de transformation sociale, susceptible de rassembler les femmes et de donner à leurs luttes quotidiennes le sens et le dynamisme nécessaires pour produire des résultats tangibles. De ces témoignages, il ressort que les répondantes sont conscientes que leurs luttes ne peuvent être isolées, mais s'inscrivent dans la mouvance des luttes féministes menées en Haïti au cours des vingt dernières années et plus globalement dans le mouvement féministe à travers le monde. Ce mouvement féministe leur offre un espace de vision et d'utopie concrète pour situer leur projet féministe dans une perspective globale de transformation des rapports sociaux entre les sexes et les genres.

Ce mémoire de maîtrise s'intéresse à la question identitaire et à l'adaptation culturelle des Wendats de Wendake (au Québec) et des Wyandottes de l'Oklahoma (aux États-Unis). Étant dispersés depuis plus de 350 ans à partir du territoire ancestral de la baie Géorgienne au nord de Toronto en Ontario, les Wendats et les Wyandottes font l'objet d'une recherche qui tentera de jeter un regard neuf sur les principaux marqueurs identitaires de ces deux groupes et de retracer les principales influences mondialisantes en ce début du vingt-et-unième siècle. Cette étude s'inscrit dans un contexte où, de plus en plus, les conséquences de la mondialisation tendent à fondre les groupes ethniques dans un même melting pot, montrant le besoin de comprendre les mécanismes à l'oeuvre dans la transformation et l'adaptation culturelles de groupes issus originellement d'une même culture.

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La thèse, portant sur la famille et l'école dans la socialisation des filles et des garçons en Haïti, se situe dans la mouvance des études sur les influences de ces institutions dans la socialisation des enfants. Elle poursuit deux objectifs majeurs : comprendre la socialisation dont les filles et les garçons font l'objet dans la famille et à l'école en contexte haïtien : analyser les mécanismes par lesquels ces institutions participent à la construction sociale du sexe des enfants. La thèse, en vue de son opérationnalisation, a recours au cadre d'analyse féministe, porteur d'une nouvelle compréhension de la production institutionnelle et sociale du sexe. Le féminisme, méthodologiquement soutenu par une approche qualitative foncièrement ethnographique, a conduit aux résultats de la recherche. La recherche a relaté que les processus et les mécanismes d'éducation et de socialisation des filles et des garçons dans les familles et à l'école tiennent compte du sexe en référence aux pratiques, représentations et discours qui induisent des différences entre les filles et les garçons. La famille et l'école haïtiennes font un travail de socialisation différenciée des enfants, mais ne le reconnaissent pas ouvertement. Ainsi participent-elles à la production, à la reproduction et à la légitimation des différenciations sociales liées au sexe et assurent-elles la pérennisation des rapports sociaux inégalitaires entre hommes et femmes. Les résultats ont également montré que les adolescent-e-s ne font pas que subir la socialisation familiale et scolaire. Ils sont également acteurs dans le processus de leur socialisation. Nous avons décelé aussi une socialisation à rebours par laquelle ils se révèlent de plus en plus socialisateurs de leurs agents traditionnels de socialisation. Plus que les acteurs traditionnels, les adolescent-e-s témoignent de ce que font ces derniers en matière de socialisation différenciée à leur endroit. Cependant, leurs façons de faire dans les groupes de pairs et les intérêts qui président à la mise en place de tels groupes font voir que les adolescent-e-s sont motivés par des facteurs qui vont au-delà de considérations liées au sexe.