The fact-value distinction has structured and still structures ongoing debates in metaethics, and all of the major positions in the field (expressivism, cognitivist realism, and moral error theory) subscribe to it. In contrast, I claim that the fact-value distinction is a contingent product of our intellectual history and a prime object for questioning. The most forceful reason for rejecting the distinction is that it presupposes a problematic understanding of the subject-object divide whereby one tends to view humans as the sole source of normativity in the world. My dissertation aims to disclose the background against which human ethical praxis is widely seen as a unique and special phenomenon among other phenomena. I show that ethical norms, as delimited by utilitarianism, deontology, virtue ethics, etc., derive from an originary proto-ethical normativity at the heart of the real itself. Every object, human and nonhuman, presents itself as a bottomless series of cues or conditions of appropriateness that determine adequate and inadequate ways of relating to it. That is, objects demand something from other objects if they are to be related to; they condition other objects by soliciting a change in disposition, perception, or sense, and for this reason are sources of normativity in and unto themselves. Ethical norms, or values, are the human expression of the adequacy conditions with which all objects show themselves. In the post-Kantian landscape it is widely thought that human finitude constitutes the origin of ethical norms. Consequently, the world is divided up into morally relevant agents (humans) on one side, and everything else on the other. Adopting a deflationary view of agency, I argue that human-human and human-world relations differ from other relations in degree rather than kind. Thus, instead of a fact-value distinction, value is inextricably bound up with the factual itself. The critical upshot of my project is that traditional subject-oriented ethical theories have served to conceal the real demands of non-human objects (such as animals, plants, microorganisms, and artificially intelligent machines) in favor of specifically human interests. Such theories have also been leveraged frequently in exclusionary practices with respect to different groups within the human community (e.g. women and those of non-European descent) based on arbitrary criteria or principles.

The aim of the dissertation is to understand the playing of computer games based on its own conditions, and questions are asked such as what is the meaning constructed around playing and themselves as players, what is the social construction of playing and how can playing computer games be understood from the perspective of youth culture? A basic interest in the thesis is to contribute to the understanding of Bildung in an informal context outside the institutions, activities and genres that traditionally stand for Bildung. The empirical investigation that forms the basis of this thesis i in the form of presence at various LANs and interviews with players. The research perspective includes a hermeneutic point of departure and playing computer games is interpreted and understood from three perspectives: playing computer games as a meaning of Bildung (play and mimesis), as social meaning (friendship and community) and as cultural (style). The results demonstrates that playing computer games is something the player does to relax, to have fun and it makes the time that passes meaningful. For dedicated players, playing computer games is a longing for community. To be a member of a community provides the opportunity to become someone in relation to the others. To participate in the community of players is a way to achieve understanding about how one is expected to behave in a larger community, that is to say society. The players are not much interested in clothes and fashion. Alcohol and other drugs are disapproved. Not stealing from others in the LAN, helping each other and sharing both knowledge and material things are also ways of expressing style. Playing computergames is Bildung and the experiences and insights wich playing can provide should have a place in a vision regarding Bildung in our time. The teachers and the school should make use of the free-time experiences that young people take with them to school.

Aim: The overall aim of the thesis was to explore and describe the concepts of guilt and shame and gain a greater understanding of the next-of-kin’s experiences of guilt and shame in end-of-life care. Methods: Study I was a qualitative secondary analysis of 47 interviews with next-of-kin searching for experiences of guilt and shame. In study II a semantic concept analysis of the two concepts guilt and shame was performed. In studies III and IV a hermeneutic approach inspired by Gadamer was used to analyze next-of-kin’s experiences of guilt (Study III), and shame (Study IV) in end-of-life care. Main findings: The concept of guilt focus on behaviour and the concept of shame on the influence on the self.  The situation of being next-of-kin in end-of-life care involves a commitment to make the remaining time for the loved one as good as possible. When, for some reason, the commitment cannot be accomplished there is a risk that the next-of-kin experience guilt such as not having done enough, not having been together during important events, not having talked enough to each other, or not having done the right things. Aspects such as not having fulfilled a commitment, omission, and being the cause of can be present in these experiences. The guilt experience has a focus on what the next-of-kin has, or has not done. The experiences of shame are also linked to a perception that the remaining time for the loved one should be as good as possible. Shame can occur when the next-of-kin is involved and actually causes harm to the loved one as well as in situations that are beyond their control. Shame that the next-of-kin experience can also emanate from being put in situations by other people. Feelings of inferiority and powerlessness, second order shame, and family conflicts that are brought into the open are experiences of shame found in the studies as well as ignominy, humiliation, and disgrace. The shame experience has a focus on the next-of-kin’s self. Conclusion: The situation of being next-of-kin in end-of-life care is complex and demanding, something that health professionals should be aware of. Acknowledgement of experiences of guilt and shame can help the next-of-kin in their adaptation to the end-of-life situation as a whole and maybe also give useful tools to support next-of-kin during bereavement.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal.

Aim: The overall aim was to generate deepened knowledge and understanding about families’ experiences of living as a family with chronic illness. The four studies aimed to: illuminate the meaning of living as a family in the midst of chronic illness (I), illuminate illness beliefs in those families (II), illuminate the meaning of place for family well-being (III) and describe the experiences of encounters with health care in families living with chronic illness (IV). Methods: All studies had qualitative designs and a Family Systems Nursing perspective. Data was collected through family interviews with families where an adult family member had lived with chronic illness for more than two years. The used analyses were phenomenological hermeneutic (I,III), hermeneutic (II) and content analysis (IV). Results: Living as a family with chronic illness was a continuously ongoing process where families co-created a context for living with illness and alternative ways for everyday life (I). Core and secondary beliefs within and across families about illness, family, and health care were revealed and showed for how families responded to and managed situations due to illness (II). Further, the meaning of place for family well-being was described as “a shared respite”, i.e. a place for relief, reflection and re-creation. It seemed to be important for families to be in secure places to enhance well-being (III). Living with chronic illness also includes frequent encounters with health care professionals and having an accompanying member constituted a great power. It helped families to get opportunities to collaborate, and receiving confirmation in the encounters (IV). Conclusions: Living as a family with chronic illness is a continuously ongoing process where family members constitute support for each other. Families have a common desire to handle challenges and changes due to illness and to co-create new patterns for everyday living. Therefore, if nurses adopt a Family Nursing Perspective and involve families in health care, families’ strengths and resources can be facilitated. Then, family well-being can be strengthened.

Thesis deals with rekontextualization and actualisation of Jesus's parables. The methodological part describes the catechetical methods and possibilities of cooperation with selected sciences such as didactics, pedagogy, psychology and hermeneutics. Moreover there are discussed concepts such as allegory, exegesis, metaphor and metonymy. Particular text dealing with the parables of the New Testament contains a characteristic of parable as a literary form, its origin, significance and its construction order. Parables are selected particularly in the context of Matthew's gospel. The thesis functions on the basis of synchronic methodology as well as diachronic one.

Nous soutenons que l’enseignement de la lecture littéraire, au lycée et au cégep, peut contribuer à former des sujets lecteurs divers, c’est-à-dire des sujets pluriels, changeants et contradictoires, situés dans une historicité, mais capables de s’en distancier de manière réflexive, et ce, grâce à la médiation du texte lu et à celle des autres lecteurs du texte. Premièrement, nous avons élaboré un modèle de compréhension de la diversité des sujets lecteurs, basé sur la critique d’une conception unitaire, homogène et essentialiste du sujet que l’école devrait former et de la culture qu’elle souhaite transmettre. Deuxièmement, nous avons étudié dans quelle mesure la diversité des interprétations effectivement produites par les élèves peut constituer une médiation efficace de la compréhension de soi-même et d’autrui comme sujet lecteur divers. Cette compréhension reposant sur la confrontation entre les interprétations produites successivement par un même lecteur et simultanément par plusieurs lecteurs, elle est nécessairement transitoire, fragmentaire, intersubjective et réflexive. Troisièmement, nous avons décrit et expliqué comment des élèves élaborent plusieurs interprétations d’un texte littéraire, à la fois en mobilisant les diverses ressources de leur subjectivité et en s’appropriant des éléments interprétatifs coconstruits avec leurs pairs et leur enseignant. En cohérence avec ces visées herméneutiques et praxéologiques, nous avons conçu une séquence d’enseignement, axée sur La plage des songes de S. Péan (1998), intégrant des activités individuelles et collaboratives de lecture, d’écriture et d’oral. Ce dispositif a été expérimenté par deux enseignants, dans une classe de seconde en France et dans une classe de cégep au Québec. Notre méthodologie qualitative vise la compréhension approfondie de sept parcours de lecteurs, grâce au croisement de données recueillies par le biais d’observations de cours, de textes d’élèves et d’entretiens. L’étude multicas confirme que les élèves sont capables de mettre en relation diverses ressources subjectives (cognitives, épistémiques, psychoaffectives, socioculturelles, axiologiques), de mettre à distance leurs interprétations et celles de leurs pairs et de réfléchir sur leur expérience lectorale. Les échanges intersubjectifs (en particulier les comités de lecteurs) jouent un rôle significatif dans la compréhension réflexive par les élèves de la singularité et de la diversité de leur parcours interprétatif. / We argue that literary reading education, at secondary school and CEGEP levels, can contribute to the development of diverse subject readers—i.e., plural, changing and contradictory subjects—within a historical perspective but able to distance themselves reflexively, aided by their own interpretation of the text and the interpretations of other readers. Firstly, we developed a model for understanding subject reader diversity, based on the critical analysis of a uniform, homogeneous and essentialist concept of the subject that the school should teach and the culture that it wishes to pass on. Secondly, we examined to what extent the diversity of interpretations actually produced by students can effectively establish the mediation of the understanding of self and others as a diverse subject reader. This understanding is inevitably transitory, fragmented, intersubjective and reflexive, given that it is based on the confrontation between different interpretations produced successively by the same reader and simultaneously by several readers. Thirdly, we described and explained how students develop several interpretations of a literary text by using their various subjectivity resources while at the same time appropriating interpretive elements developed jointly with their peers and teacher. In keeping with these hermeneutic and praxeological objectives, we have designed a teaching sequence, based on La plage des songes by S. Péan (1998). This sequence incorporates individual and collaborative reading, writing and speaking activities. It was tested by two teachers, during the first year of lycée studies in France and as part of a CEGEP-level course in Quebec. Our qualitative methodology is intended to promote thorough understanding of seven reader paths, using data gathered through classroom observation, student texts and interviews. This multi-case study confirms that students are capable of linking different subjective resources (cognitive, epistemic, psycho-emotional, sociocultural, axiological), taking a step back from their interpretations and those of their peers, and reflecting on their reading experience. Intersubjective exchanges (particularly between the reading committees) play a significant role in students’ reflexive understanding of the singularity and diversity of their interpretative paths.

The thesis deals with the question of interpretation of narrative works of fiction in regard to what the text refers to (what is usually termed reference). On the work of three differently focused authors (Frege, Ortega y Gasset, Shklovsky) it studies reference pushed aside as a thing unimportant or even impossible in art. Structuralism, developing mainly in France after 1960, supplants these questions with exploring the literalness of literary works and their inner relations, allowing narratology to arise. Subsequently, Paul Ricoeur aims for the synthesis of structuralism and hermeneutics. Approaching literary work as discourse, he distinguishes the "what" and "what about" of works, following Frege's distinction between sense and reference (meaning), while reference of a work is not descriptive. In Time and Narrative he uses the term refiguration instead of reference and emphasizes the temporal aspect of literary work and its reception. The thesis is closed with a brief interpretation of Budapest, a novel by Chico Buarque (2003).

The goal of this thesis is to explore the possibility of systematization of the literary hermeneutics as a method of interpretation. Three selective studies focused on the hermeneutic the- ory (namely problem of the language, understanding and textuality) should provide a theoretical and philosophical framework for the interpretative part of this thesis, which is focused on interpretation of a literary text, namely Joseph Brodsky's poem Isaac and Abraham. The thesis also explores con- cept of the literary hermeneutics, which stands between phenomenological-ontological hermeneu- tics and methodological-normanative orientated theory of interpretation. Despite the explicit tension between these two attitudes, there is also a space within the literary hermeneutics for their inspira- tional dialog.