Abstract It is estimated that by 2038 over a million Canadians will be diagnosed with some form of dementia with nearly 443.000 living in long-term care facilities. Non-professional health care workers such as health care aides provide most of the direct care to these residents. The interaction skills of health care aides have a significant impact on the function, communication skills and wellbeing of residents with dementia. The purpose of this study using Strauss and Corbin’s mode of grounded theory was to develop a mid-range theory to describe and explain how health care aides perceive and understand residents with dementia and how this perception impacts the way they interact with these residents. The sample for this study was made up of 24 health care aides who worked with residents with dementia in personal care homes in Winnipeg. Data from audiotaped individual and group interviews were analyzed using grounded theory methodology: open, axial and selective coding. The central category was “The Resident being perceived as a Respected Person”. The resulting theory shows that when health care aides perceive the resident as a respected person with whom they have a relationship and as a care recipient with challenging behaviors, the health care aides use communication enhancement strategies and modify their caregiving to meet the resident’s unique physical and emotional needs and challenging behaviors. The interactions of these health care aides in this study were consistent with the principles of person-centered care and the literature about communication and dementia. The facilitators of this perception of the resident were primarily the personal characteristics of the health care aide and the inhibitors were the time constraints, workload, and lack of support of peers and supervisors. This theory has implications for the training and supervision of health care aides and the organizational structures in which they work. Key words: Health care aides; dementia; communication; long term care; personhood / May 2017

A ritxo(k)o tem sido citada na bibliografia etnográfica desde a primeira expedição que chegou ao Araguaia em 1887. Desde então tem sido traduzida como \"boneca karajá\" e muitas etnografias sugerem seu papel como brinquedo de criança. O presente trabalho tem como objetivo refletir sobre essa tradução, tentando entender quais as redes de relações que a ritxo(k)o engendra e participa. Mostrarei que a ritxo(k)o está inserida nas redes de relações de parentesco, ao mesmo tempo que constitui algumas dessas relações, em especial aquelas entre avós e netas. Também ressaltarei seu lugar de importância nas relações com os tori (os não indígenas). O parentesco é aqui abordado como processo de produção de corposparentes, portanto, além de explorar a produção das relações entre os parentes, também me voltarei para o corpo que se visa construir nesse processo. Irei sugerir que este corpo é produzido através de processos que se assemelham aos utilizados na produção de objetos, como a ritxo(k)o. Por último apresentarei uma reflexão sobre a questão do brinquedo nas sociedades ameríndias. / The bibliography has mentioned the ritxo(k)o since the first expedition which took place in Araguaia in 1887. From this time forward, the researchers chose to translate it as karaja doll and suggest its place as a childrens toy. The present research aim to discuss this translation, based on the relation networks in which ritxo(k)o participates and produce. I will demonstrate that the ritxo(k)o participates in relation networks between kin and at the same time is constitutive of some of this relations, especially those between grandmother and granddaughter. Also, I will remark its important place among the relations with the tori (nonindigenous). I talk about kinship as a process that produces kin-bodies. This approach requires not only an exploration of the production process of kin relations, but of the body that is constituted in this process as well. I will suggest that this body is produced through process that resemble those used to produce objects. In the conclusion, I will present a discussion about the matter of toys among the Amerindians.

The intentional destruction of Bronze Age metalwork prior to deposition is frequently recognised within assemblages, but rarely forms the focus of study. Furthermore, most research focuses on why metalwork was deliberately destroyed without considering how this process was undertaken. This thesis therefore analyses how metalwork might have been intentionally damaged and uses this to better interpret why. The material properties of bronze are considered alongside past research into the use of different implements, before a series of experiments are presented that explore how one might best break a bronze object. A better understanding of the methods by which Bronze Age metalwork might become damaged means one can identify intentional damage over that sustained accidentally, through use or post-deposition. This culminates in a Damage Ranking System, which can be utilised to assess the likelihood that damage observed on archaeological specimens is the result of intent. The Damage Ranking System is applied to Bronze Age metalwork from South West England (i.e. Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset). The catalogue of metalwork from this region was recently updated, highlighting instances of deliberate destruction that would warrant further study (Knight et al. 2015). The present research builds on this catalogue and involved analysis of complete and damaged objects from across the study region and from throughout the Bronze Age. Approximately 1300 objects were handled and studied and set within the Damage Ranking System alongside a contextual analysis of the findspots. This allowed trends in damage and depositional practices to be observed, demonstrating increased intentional destruction throughout the Bronze Age. It is shown that the deliberate destruction of metalwork throughout the Bronze Age related to the construction of personhood and emphasised links with other regions of Bronze Age Europe. This research demonstrates a new approach to the material that has wide-reaching applications in future studies.

The aim of this thesis is to provide an argument that enhancement technologies are a form of enablement more significant than their physical effects; rather, that enhancement might be a fundamental element of humanity. This allows a refutation of the standard bioconservative position, that to increase capacity beyond that of a "normal" Homo sapiens necessarily defeats humanity, or at least nebulous aspects of it. I here argue instead that humanity is affirmed, and furthermore that enhancements are in fact inherently good, valuable, and worthwhile pursuits; on the assumption that it is, as critics of enhancements and transhumanism say, inherently good, valuable, and worthy of preservation to be human. I suggest thus that to enhance is the essence of, and the key to, the continuum of humanity. In the introduction, I set out the reasons why this type of research is increasingly necessary, namely that it is important to rationally consider the effects which new enhancement and related technologies will have on our persons and on our society. Secondly, it presents my rationales for taking liberal stances on questions such as the scope and definition of enhancement, the supposed therapy- enhancement divide, and on access to enhancement technology; in order to provide a reasoned base from which to build the core themes of the thesis. It goes on to address a number of the archetypical critical arguments against enhancement, in support of these core themes. Part II of the thesis contains the papers and delivers the main arguments in sequence- firstly, the need for the application of rationality in policymaking and commentary on bioethical concerns, and secondly the importance of considering motivation when attempting to divine the best course of action to regulate beings and technologies that we have not yet experienced, and the manner of which we cannot entirely predict. This is followed by an argument as to whether it is reasonable to treat enhanced or other purported novel beings that could result from these technologies as different from ourselves, and thus warranting such policy considerations. To accomplish this, the thesis delivers a fresh angle on the relationship between Homo sapiens sapiens, the human, and whatever is posited to supersede it, the posthuman. A central theme is the idea that humanity is a "matter of sufficiency"- an end-state for moral status, not a stepping-stone which one can be 'post'. These arguments culminate in a contention that it is enhancement that acts as the unifying factor in our evolution and existence, and that there is therefore unlikely to be any good reason to see beings that follow the humans of today as being different in any significant way. The thesis concludes with an exploration of the progression of these themes, as well as identifying the place of my work amongst the wider academic literature around enhancement and the nature of the human. Finally, the most promising avenues for future research are explored.

The purpose of this thesis is to provide a brief examination of the historical accounts of philosophical theories of personal identity and show the influence that each has had on the development of contemporary theories. In doing so, the thesis explores the problems associated with these theories, attempting to establish a meta-theory (i.e. a theory about theories) of personal identity. What is demonstrated is that the fundamental problems of personal identity arise from issues related to the use of language, as well as assumptions involving the concept of personhood. By demonstrating that our understanding of personhood is relative to frameworks of understanding based on assumption, the meta-theory states that propositions made about persons are not factual statements, but are, rather, matters of contingency. As such, propositions about persons contain truth-value only within a particular frame of reference that is based on these assumptions. Therefore, the problems that traditionally arise in theories of personal identity -- problems with dualism, the mental criterion, and bodily criterion -- result from a flawed approach to the problem altogether. The conclusion is that it is possible to construct a theory of personal identity (a relative theory), but not the theory of personal identity (one which is definitive and strictly conclusive).

This thesis is an investigation into ways of seeing 12 Step fellowships. The latter provide a popular but controversial means of recovery from various addictive behaviours. The conceptual basis of 12 Step fellowships is the idea that addictions are an illness or disease, and this idea has become the focus of the negative critiques of 12 Step fellowships. Concepts of illness and disease are closely related to concepts of personhood. What 12 Step discourses construct as 'illness' can also be understood as a condition characterised by failure of human capacities for agency, choice, and responsibility. How we understand 12 Step discourses of addiction, illness, and recovery will depend greatly upon the concepts of personhood, illness, and knowledge that inform our view. In order to investigate the concepts that make diverging views of 12 Step fellowships possible, this study develops post-Enlightenment concepts of personhood, illness and knowledge. I use these concepts as a lens with which to examine the negative critiques, and to provide a more positive reading of 12 Step fellowships and illness concepts. In doing so, this thesis aims to show, first, that a positive view that can articulate the value of 12 Step fellowships to 12 Step members is possible, and second, that 12 Step fellowship discourses are philosophically interesting and challenge modern western notions of the self and its capacities. The thesis has six chapters. Chapter One presents an overview of the study, and introduces the basic concepts and practices of 12 Step fellowships. Chapter Two presents an epistemology called perspectivism which provides my research methodology as well as a means of analysing the epistemological assumptions at work in the negative critiques of 12 Step discourses. In order to understand how the capacities of the self may fail, and how such failures might be remedied, Chapter Three presents a post-Enlightenment theorisation of personhood as constituted, embodied, and socially embedded subjectivity. This theorisation enables us to examine how embodied selves may be constituted with diminished capacities for agency, responsibility, and choice, and permits the construction of an account of addiction that explains why addictive disorders are a significant social problem in contemporary western societies. Finally, this theorisation enables us to investigate the concepts of personhood that inform the negative critiques. Chapter Four investigates how concepts of illness inform the negative critiques, and shows that it is possible to understand terms such as 'illness' and 'disease' in a non-medical sense. Arguably, such understandings are better able to illuminate the connection between the notion of illness and recovery practices in 12 Step discourses of addiction. Chapter Five uses the conceptual framework provided by Chapters Two, Three, and Four to present a positive view of 12 Step fellowships and discourses. The three key features of this view are, first, that 12 Step fellowship discourses describe addictions as an illness of the self; second, they provide a phenomenology of the sick self; and third, 12 Step recovery discourses and practices are consistent with the notion that the constituted self is limited, and can be reconstituted or changed through practice of the 12 Step recovery program. Together, these three key features show us that 12 Step fellowships provide a valuable social resource for people with limited capacities for self-regulation to help themselves and each other. Chapter Six considers the implications of this more positive view of 12 Step fellowships in terms of the primary and secondary aims of this thesis.

This thesis examines whether the interrelationship of family and gay identity in South Korea is best understood as one of conflict, pitting a traditional, national, and filial constraint against a presumed global, progressive, and individualistic freedom, or whether it requires (or perhaps, in the narratives themselves, already provides) a different, more recursive understanding. This thesis explores the recursivity between gay identity and filial piety among college students in contemporary Korea while also providing a critique of a global gay paradigm that others may argue infiltrates Korean gay discourse. The aim of this ethnography is not just to collect the stories that these young South Korean college men tell about their experiences of being gay and a son, but to trace how my position as a researcher and a friend are shaped by my experiences with other gay Korean men and how those positions are intimately tied to this ethnography as a whole.

My research centers on changes in personhood, identity and funerary rituals from the Early Agricultural Period to the Classic Period in the Tucson Basin. The three core papers of my dissertation represent submissions to peer-review journals or book chapters, all of which are connected by similar research themes. The first paper examines changes in funerary rituals from the Early Agricultural Period (2100 B.C.-A.D. 50 ) to the Early Preclassic Period (A.D. 475-750) and how these changes modified social relationships between the dead, their families and the community. A total of 21 archaeological sites and 436 burials were analyzed. The predominant mortuary rituals in the Early Agricultural Period were inhumations characterized by variations in body position and location, possibly emphasizing individuality. These rituals changed in the Preclassic Period as cremation became the dominant practice. Cremations during this period were mainly secondary deposits with low quantities of bone located in cemeteries within habitation courtyard groups. Social group membership was emphasized through these cremations. Results suggest that triggers for changes in funerary rituals through time were multicausal, but these changes are reflective of emerging group identities with strong social cohesion, consistent with patterns observed in other archaeological evidence from the area. The second paper explores how the Preclassic Hohokam (A.D. 475-1150) of the Tucson Basin created different pathways to personhood for the dead. This consisted of examining how bodies were treated within cremation practices at four recently excavated Tucson Basin Hohokam archaeological sites and through consideration of different ethnographic accounts of cremation practices among Native American groups from the Southwestern United States. Historical accounts of cremation practices utilized in this work originate from the Pima (Akimel O'odham), Tohono O'odham, and several Yuman-speaking groups. Based on archaeological and linguistic evidence, the ancestors of these historic groups had ancestral connections with the Hohokam. Results of my research suggest dynamic transitions of personhood occurred at death while these transitions occurred both with the dead as well as the living. Subsequent to the cremation pyre bodies were transformed into "body-objects" and continued to evoke memories of the deceased person's life. Furthermore, at these events mutually-identifying relationships were created, transformed or destroyed through interactions of the community, family and deceased. The third paper examines the identification of and changes in aspects of personhood among the Tucson Basin Hohokam from the Preclassic (A.D. 475-1150) to Classic periods (A.D. 1150-1450/1500). This is done by examining the biological profile, posthumous treatment of the body and mortuary practices of remains of 764 individuals from seven sites. Cremation was the predominant mortuary practice in the Tucson Basin during the Preclassic and Classic periods. However, inhumation also co-occurred at lower frequencies, particularly for fetus and infants, possibly due to the undeveloped form of self that these individuals had within the society. Through time cremation rituals changed particularly for individuals older than 15 years at death and adults. In the Preclassic Period, after the body was burned, the remains were fragmented, divided and distributed as inalienable possessions among families and within specific networks. This suggests a social construction of self that was more relational, part-person and part-object. In the Classic Period, these practices decreased and the remains were not divided but left in place or transferred almost wholly to a single secondary deposit. The perceptions of personhood in the Classic Period changed to a self that was considered as bounded units and more-whole even after its transformation during the cremation fire. It is possible that this transition through time occurred as a result of more centralized and private rituals, and by a general decrease in emotive networks. The changes in mortuary rituals are similar to broader sociopolitical changes observed in the Classic Period where an increase in social differentiation and complexity has been postulated.

Notwithstanding the prominent focus on inclusion in the discourse of special education, students with significant intellectual disabilities in North America continue to receive a part of their education in segregated contexts (G. L. Porter, 2008; Schwartz, Mactavish & Lutfiyya, 2006; P. Smith, 2010). This situation creates an interesting and perplexing anomaly that I attempt to reconcile through an examination of the discursive conceptualizations of these students in Canadian introductory special education textbooks. My study is framed within (a) the academic field of disability studies, which re-imagines disability using new perspectives (Linton, 1998; Oliver, 1996), and (b) new philosophical concepts of “personhood”, which critique traditional definitions of personhood based on intellectual ability (Carlson, 2010; Carlson & Kittay, 2009; Nussbaum, 2006). Situated within social constructionism and discourse theory (Laclau & Mouffe, 2001), this analysis examines how students with significant intellectual disabilities are depicted in these textbooks. The language used in portraying these students suggests a discourse of individual pathology, medicalization and professionalization, distancing students with significant intellectual disabilities from other students because of their perceived lack of abilities, needs and behaviours. This discourse relies heavily on traditional understandings of people with significant intellectual disabilities as lacking in value. There is little discursive evidence to suggest that these students are presented in ways that challenge either historical or modern conceptualizations.

Notwithstanding the prominent focus on inclusion in the discourse of special education, students with significant intellectual disabilities in North America continue to receive a part of their education in segregated contexts (G. L. Porter, 2008; Schwartz, Mactavish & Lutfiyya, 2006; P. Smith, 2010). This situation creates an interesting and perplexing anomaly that I attempt to reconcile through an examination of the discursive conceptualizations of these students in Canadian introductory special education textbooks. My study is framed within (a) the academic field of disability studies, which re-imagines disability using new perspectives (Linton, 1998; Oliver, 1996), and (b) new philosophical concepts of “personhood”, which critique traditional definitions of personhood based on intellectual ability (Carlson, 2010; Carlson & Kittay, 2009; Nussbaum, 2006). Situated within social constructionism and discourse theory (Laclau & Mouffe, 2001), this analysis examines how students with significant intellectual disabilities are depicted in these textbooks. The language used in portraying these students suggests a discourse of individual pathology, medicalization and professionalization, distancing students with significant intellectual disabilities from other students because of their perceived lack of abilities, needs and behaviours. This discourse relies heavily on traditional understandings of people with significant intellectual disabilities as lacking in value. There is little discursive evidence to suggest that these students are presented in ways that challenge either historical or modern conceptualizations.