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In the United States, the community food movement has been put forward as a potential solution for a global food system that fails to provide just and equitable access to nutritious food. This claim has been subject to the criticism of a variety of scholars and activists, some of whom contend that the alternative food movement is complicit in the re-production of neoliberalism and is therefore implicated in the making of the unjust system. In this dissertation I use theories of Deleuze (and Guatarri) and science and technology scholars to enter the middle of this dichotomy. I argue that both readings of community food work, as just and unjust, rely on realist epistemologies that posit knowledge as representative of an existing reality. I alternatively view knowledge as much more contingent and plural, resulting in a multiplicity of realities that are much less fixed. The idea that reality is a product of knowledge, rather than the inverse, raises the question of how reality might be made differently, or of ontological politics. This is the question I set out to interrogate: how might the realities of community food work be read and made differently, and how this reading might open new possibilities for transformation? To explore this question, I conducted interviews with 18 individuals working for three different non-profit community food organizations in central Appalachia. I used and appreciative inquiry approach to capture stories that affected these individuals' stories about their work captured their visions and hope for food system change. I then used a (non)method, rhizoanalysis, to code the data affectively, reading for the interesting, curious, and remarkable, rather than attempting to trace a strong theory like neoliberalism onto the data. Drawing on Delueze and Guattari, I mapped excerpts from the data into four large narrative cartographies. In each cartography, the narrative excerpts are positioned to vibrate against one another; my hope is that these resonances might open lines of flight within the reader and space for new ontological possibilities. For adult and community educators, I posit this rhizoanalysis as a poststructuralist contribution to Freire's concept of the generative theme and of use to broader project of agonistic pluralism. / Ph. D.

Missing children is one of the horrors that we are confronted with in today's society. The case study method, a feminist co-search methodology, is used to give a missing child's mother the opportunity to tell and re-tell the painful story. During this co-search process the following aspects of doing ethics and pastoral care and counselling with the mother are constantly negotiated. The term "missing child" is defined and the relevance between the distinction of "missing children" and "run-away children" is discussed. Furthermore, this study explores the many diverse practices of narrative pastoral care and counselling with parents of missing children within an economically disadvantaged community. The conceptualisations regarding loss, hope and meaning-making and how these are utilised in the life of a missing child's mother is discussed. / Practical Theology / M.Th.

During the premodern era, images corresponded to the doctrines of ”The Word”, but in contemporary society this relationship is open and does not correspond to the divine Word. Because of our perceived, postmodern inability to respond to ancient Christian symbols, there is a need to revision these symbols and Christian spirituality. The result of such a revisioning would include an ”opening up” of ”The Word” and of traditional, worn symbols which have lost vitality in this milieu. Art produced with this in mind needs to make ”The Word” more currently accessible and relevant. Further, this revisioning would add significance and enhance the possibility of resurrecting language dealing with ”The Word”. In the process of revitalising old Christian imagery and language, I aim to show that the primary role of contemporary Christian art is to function metaphorically. Finally, I argue that Christian images can take on significance as contemporary images. / Art History Visual Arts and Musicology / M.A. (Visual Arts)

This dissertation considers whether photography as a language translates a transient moment into an embodied image. This is considered to be a mimesis of the moment as an aid for memory. By following a dialectic approach I posit a thesis based on the common sense perception of photography which states that photography is an artefactual mimesis aiding memory. After reflecting on Plato’s concept of writing as a pharmakon and Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction theory I establish an antithesis which proclaims that a photograph aids memory but also leads to the illusion of remembering past experiences. The synthesis is then presented which resolves the opposing ideas. This component argues that a photograph is a mimetic device that aids memory by presenting embodied fragmented reflections of time which can be used to create new meanings and memories. The dissertation concludes with a discussion that supports and integrates this argument with visual research. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / M.A. (Visual Arts)

This project forms part of a growing engagement with biology by critical psychology and, more broadly, body studies. The specific focus is on the neurological body whose dogmatic exclusion from critical endeavours is challenged by arguing that neuroscience offers a vital resource for emancipatory agendas. Rather than conversely treating biology as a site for the factual supplementation of social theory the aim is to engage (negotiate) with neuroscience more directly and critically. In this process a discursive reductionism and attempted escape from complicity associated with critical psychology are addressed. Similarly a naïve and apolitical empiricism claimed by neuroscience is disrupted. The primary objective is however to demonstrate the utility of neuroscience in developing critical theory. These objectives are pursued through the ‘method’ of deconstruction, (mis)reading several highly regarded neuroscience texts written by prominent neuroscientists, working within the convolutions of these texts so as develop openings for critical conceptualisations of (neural) corporeality. In this manner the various spectres associated with neurology, including essentialism, determinism, individualism, reductionism and dualism, are displaced. This includes, amongst others, the omnipresent mind/body and body/society binaries. The (mis)readings address a number of prominent themes associated with contemporary neuroscience: Attempts at specifying an identity for (part of) the brain are shown to rely on a necessary relationship with the excluded other (such as the body, the socio-cultural, and the environment). Similarly, attempts at articulating a centre, a point from which agency can proceed, which finds existing identity in the functions of the prefrontal cortices, are also undone by the (multiple, affective, and unconscious) other which decentres the centre by being the essential supplement for any such claims. The causal metaphysic must likewise proceed within the play of différance, a logic of difference and deferral that undermines causal routes, innate origins and autocratic centres. Finally, reductionism must advance as a necessary strategy through which to engage with complexity, its ambitions always impossible as the aneconomic is forever in excess of any economy. The emancipatory viability of such (mis)readings is discussed within a context where the open and malleable body has been co-opted by contemporary neo-liberal geoculture. / Psychology / D.Litt. et Phil. (Psychology)

Beginning with Plato's expulsion of the poets in the Republic, this dissertation ' looks at the often hostile, yet also symbiotic, relationship between·poetry and philosophy. Aristotle's 'response' to Plato is regarded as a significant origin of literary theory. Nietzsche's critique of Western philosophy as being an attempt to suppress its own metaphoricity, leads to a revaluation of truth and consequently of the privileging of philosophy over poetry. Post-structuralism sometimes overemphasizes this constitutive force of metaphoricity, at the expense of conceptual modes. However, Derrida's notion of philosophy as play retains a balance between concept and metaphor: there is no attempt to transcendentally ground philosophy, but neither is it reduced to a merely metaphorical discourse. Finally, Wittgenstein's notion of meaning as determined by use can help us distinguish pragmatically between poetry and philosophy by looking at the contexts in which they function. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / M.A. (Linguistics)

The current vast sociocultural shift from Modernism to PostModernism forms the backdrop to this study. Whenever paradigm shifts occur, the metaphors which depict human experience and identity also change. The mechanistic metaphors of Modernism are giving way to metaphors derived from art and literature, in particular narrative theory. Self, as one of the most pivotal notions in philosophy, literature, and psychology, should not be excluded from this process of reconceptualisation. As the point of intersection between the personal and the cultural, the notion of Self now needs to bereformulated to become more coherent with Post-Modernist ideas. Within this framework the Modernist notion of a Self which is unified, substantial, and stable across all contexts, is deconstructed in this study to reveal the linguistic and ideological codes and conventions which are used in its construction. It is proposed that the Self can be viewed as embedded in relationship with others and as inscribed by the prevailing cultural ideologies regarding personhood. As such the Self can be regarded as held together reflexively by narrative codes and conventions. These ideas are demonstrated in an analysis of two written self-narratives and applied to the conventions and practices in psychotherapy. / Psychology / D.Litt. et Phil. (Psychology)

Unter Queer Politics wird eine spezifische Form des politischen Aktivismus verstanden, bei dem eine kritische Auseinandersetzung mit gesellschaftlichen Konstruktionsprozessen von Geschlecht und Sexualität, die sozialen Folgen solcher Prozesse und ihre Einbindung in Macht- und Herrschaftsverhältnisse fokussiert werden. Queer Politics wurden insbesondere durch die Befreiungskämpfe der lesbischen und schwulen sowie der feministischen Bewegungen des 20. Jahrhunderts geprägt. Die Queer Theory bildet den wichtigsten theoretischen Hintergrund. Kritik wird vor allem hinsichtlich der Unschärfe des Begriffs queer, als auch queerer Identitätspolitiken formuliert.

Dekonstruktion bezeichnet ein durch den poststrukturalistischen Philosophen Jacques Derrida entwickeltes Lektüreverfahren, das sich gegen den tradierten hermeneutischen Ansatz richtet. Es stellt eine letztgültige, im Text enthaltene Bedeutung in Abrede, legt Brüche und Verwerfungen frei und postuliert die Unabschließbarkeit des Interpretationsvorgangs. Statt selbst einen Sinn zu behaupten, erfüllt sich der Zweck der Dekonstruktion in der Prozessualität, das heißt im Akt des Fragens selbst.