Abstract The present study analyses the role of women in the Roman Catholic Church and the main question addressed is: “How do women construct and maintain an adult Catholic identity in the light of social, political, economic and religious changes?” In order to answer this question I began with grounded theory which enabled me to locate my research in the everyday lives of the study participants. In the course of the research I made a methodological shift to an institutional ethnographic approach in order to better understand the women’s lives as Catholics. One of the major tenets of an institutional ethnographic approach is that in modern bureaucratic organisations the authority and instructions of institutions and organisations are carried via the texts they produce. These texts can be written texts or they can be videos, film, etc. Because they carry the authority of the institution or organisation texts have the power to shape people’s lives and co-ordinate their everyday activities with multiple others, without, however, wholly determining them. In common with other major organisations the Roman Catholic Church is a large, worldwide organisation which relies on the texts it produces to carry its instructions and authority into the homes, churches and personal lives of its members. The greatest production of written texts by the Catholic Church in the modern era took place at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). While many feminist scholars have dismissed the Council proceedings as saying very little about women in particular, I argue that the Councillors’ writings in several major texts have strongly and specifically impacted the lives of contemporary Catholic women. Consequently, while all the texts produced by the bishops at the council can be considered of interest to practising Catholics generally, in this study I have chosen to focus on texts that related to issues that have proved to be of particular interest to the participants of this research study: the role of the laity in the church, Mariology and marriage. In order to carry out the research involved in this study I interviewed thirty women in Australia and thirty women in Ireland between the ages of 55 and 19 years of age. The Australian women immigrated to Australia during the years 1970 and 1997. All of the participants had been baptised into the Roman Catholic Church as babies and they all underwent a similar socialisation process growing up in Ireland.

Abstract The present study analyses the role of women in the Roman Catholic Church and the main question addressed is: “How do women construct and maintain an adult Catholic identity in the light of social, political, economic and religious changes?” In order to answer this question I began with grounded theory which enabled me to locate my research in the everyday lives of the study participants. In the course of the research I made a methodological shift to an institutional ethnographic approach in order to better understand the women’s lives as Catholics. One of the major tenets of an institutional ethnographic approach is that in modern bureaucratic organisations the authority and instructions of institutions and organisations are carried via the texts they produce. These texts can be written texts or they can be videos, film, etc. Because they carry the authority of the institution or organisation texts have the power to shape people’s lives and co-ordinate their everyday activities with multiple others, without, however, wholly determining them. In common with other major organisations the Roman Catholic Church is a large, worldwide organisation which relies on the texts it produces to carry its instructions and authority into the homes, churches and personal lives of its members. The greatest production of written texts by the Catholic Church in the modern era took place at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). While many feminist scholars have dismissed the Council proceedings as saying very little about women in particular, I argue that the Councillors’ writings in several major texts have strongly and specifically impacted the lives of contemporary Catholic women. Consequently, while all the texts produced by the bishops at the council can be considered of interest to practising Catholics generally, in this study I have chosen to focus on texts that related to issues that have proved to be of particular interest to the participants of this research study: the role of the laity in the church, Mariology and marriage. In order to carry out the research involved in this study I interviewed thirty women in Australia and thirty women in Ireland between the ages of 55 and 19 years of age. The Australian women immigrated to Australia during the years 1970 and 1997. All of the participants had been baptised into the Roman Catholic Church as babies and they all underwent a similar socialisation process growing up in Ireland.

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Since 2002, the Canadian state has mandatorily tested applicants for permanent residence for HIV (Human immune deficiency virus). The policy and practices associated with this screening have never been critically scrutinized. Authoritative claims about what happens in the conduct of the immigration medical examination are at odds with the experience of immigrant applicants living with HIV. This is the analytic entry point into this inquiry that is organized within the theoretical and methodological frame offered by institutional ethnography and political activist ethnography. Analysis is connected to broader research literatures and the historical record. The goal of this study is to produce detailed, contextualized understandings of the social and ruling relations that organize the lives of immigrants to Canada living with HIV. These are generated from the material conditions of their lives. An assumption about how organization happens is the social and reflexive production of knowledge in people’s day-to-day lives through which connections between local and extra-local settings are empirically investigable. I investigate the organization of the Canadian immigration process. How is this institutional complex ordered and governed? How is immigration mandatory HIV testing organized, and with what consequences to HIV-positive applicants to Canada? This is a text-mediated organization where all the sites are connected by people’s work and the texts they circulate. The positive result of an immigration HIV test catalyzes the state’s collection of medical data about an applicant. These are entered into state decision-making about the person’s in/admissibility to Canada. I focus on a key component of the immigration process, which is medical examination and HIV testing with this, along with the HIV test counselling practices that happen (or not) there. The reported absence of the latter form of care causes problems and contradictions for people. This investigation adopts the standpoint of these persons to investigate their problems associated with HIV testing. The main empirically supported argument I make is that the Canadian state’s ideological work related to the HIV policy and mandatory screening ushers in a set of institutional practices that are highly problematic for immigrants with HIV. This argument relies on data collected in interviews, focus groups, observations, and analysis of texts organized under Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (S.C., 2001, c. 27) and textually mediated, discursively organized concepts that shape people’s practice. Canadian immigration medical policy makers should make use of these findings, as should civil society activists acting on behalf of immigrants to Canada living with HIV. I make nine specific recommendations for future action on HIV and immigration in Canada.

Elderly patients in the Emergency Department (ED) receive a different level of care than younger patients. The ED disproportionately deploys resources to serve the needs of the younger patient population, a decision that appears to be mediated by the acuity of the patient’s condition as defined by the institution. This study will seek to examine the institutional work processes by which this disparity in care is created. By looking at the needs of the elderly as ED patients and based on what they identify as important to them, this ethnographic study will examine the work organization of the nurses, physicians, and administrators in the ED. The goal of the research is, through the examination of the organization of work and the texts that mediate it, to explain the ruling relations through which elderly patients are subjugated as patients in the ED.

Elderly patients in the Emergency Department (ED) receive a different level of care than younger patients. The ED disproportionately deploys resources to serve the needs of the younger patient population, a decision that appears to be mediated by the acuity of the patient’s condition as defined by the institution. This study will seek to examine the institutional work processes by which this disparity in care is created. By looking at the needs of the elderly as ED patients and based on what they identify as important to them, this ethnographic study will examine the work organization of the nurses, physicians, and administrators in the ED. The goal of the research is, through the examination of the organization of work and the texts that mediate it, to explain the ruling relations through which elderly patients are subjugated as patients in the ED.

Since 2002, the Canadian state has mandatorily tested applicants for permanent residence for HIV (Human immune deficiency virus). The policy and practices associated with this screening have never been critically scrutinized. Authoritative claims about what happens in the conduct of the immigration medical examination are at odds with the experience of immigrant applicants living with HIV. This is the analytic entry point into this inquiry that is organized within the theoretical and methodological frame offered by institutional ethnography and political activist ethnography. Analysis is connected to broader research literatures and the historical record. The goal of this study is to produce detailed, contextualized understandings of the social and ruling relations that organize the lives of immigrants to Canada living with HIV. These are generated from the material conditions of their lives. An assumption about how organization happens is the social and reflexive production of knowledge in people’s day-to-day lives through which connections between local and extra-local settings are empirically investigable. I investigate the organization of the Canadian immigration process. How is this institutional complex ordered and governed? How is immigration mandatory HIV testing organized, and with what consequences to HIV-positive applicants to Canada? This is a text-mediated organization where all the sites are connected by people’s work and the texts they circulate. The positive result of an immigration HIV test catalyzes the state’s collection of medical data about an applicant. These are entered into state decision-making about the person’s in/admissibility to Canada. I focus on a key component of the immigration process, which is medical examination and HIV testing with this, along with the HIV test counselling practices that happen (or not) there. The reported absence of the latter form of care causes problems and contradictions for people. This investigation adopts the standpoint of these persons to investigate their problems associated with HIV testing. The main empirically supported argument I make is that the Canadian state’s ideological work related to the HIV policy and mandatory screening ushers in a set of institutional practices that are highly problematic for immigrants with HIV. This argument relies on data collected in interviews, focus groups, observations, and analysis of texts organized under Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (S.C., 2001, c. 27) and textually mediated, discursively organized concepts that shape people’s practice. Canadian immigration medical policy makers should make use of these findings, as should civil society activists acting on behalf of immigrants to Canada living with HIV. I make nine specific recommendations for future action on HIV and immigration in Canada.

In the late 1990s, many Western governments introduced policy programs to make information and communication technology (ICT) accessible to all. More than a decade later, however, such universal access is far from a reality. Between 2002 and 2005, in response to a request from a group of contingent workers who felt excluded from effective access to ICT training, a university research group on contingency conducted an applied research project in the form of a series of basic ICT courses. This qualitative dissertation both critically examines the training process and treats it as a case study for exploring broader issues of exclusion and resistance in the context of access to ICT. Specifically, it explores: (1) the symptoms of exclusion as they relate to ICT, social capital, and the community; (2) possibilities for resistance that can alleviate the conditions of exclusion; (3) the assumptions, theories, knowledge construction, policy methods, and processes that underlie the symptoms of exclusion; and (4) alternative assumptions, strategies, and activities that offer possibilities for resistive action. The case study provided an environment in which exclusionary and resistive experiences with access to ICT and training were examined from the perspective of excluded contingent workers, as supported by a university research group. A key finding is that generational behaviour in the domestic sphere erects barriers that contribute to the silencing and exclusion of immigrant contingent women; these barriers then reinforce similar patterns of exclusion in institutionalized ICT training. Another major finding is the need for alleviating the barrier that limited English skills create for ICT learning; addressing this issue must be part of any recommendations for curricular change. Guided throughout by a critical approach that focuses on the concept of ruling relations, this dissertation marshals critical knowledge gained from below in support of change by policymakers, educators, and community practitioners.

In the late 1990s, many Western governments introduced policy programs to make information and communication technology (ICT) accessible to all. More than a decade later, however, such universal access is far from a reality. Between 2002 and 2005, in response to a request from a group of contingent workers who felt excluded from effective access to ICT training, a university research group on contingency conducted an applied research project in the form of a series of basic ICT courses. This qualitative dissertation both critically examines the training process and treats it as a case study for exploring broader issues of exclusion and resistance in the context of access to ICT. Specifically, it explores: (1) the symptoms of exclusion as they relate to ICT, social capital, and the community; (2) possibilities for resistance that can alleviate the conditions of exclusion; (3) the assumptions, theories, knowledge construction, policy methods, and processes that underlie the symptoms of exclusion; and (4) alternative assumptions, strategies, and activities that offer possibilities for resistive action. The case study provided an environment in which exclusionary and resistive experiences with access to ICT and training were examined from the perspective of excluded contingent workers, as supported by a university research group. A key finding is that generational behaviour in the domestic sphere erects barriers that contribute to the silencing and exclusion of immigrant contingent women; these barriers then reinforce similar patterns of exclusion in institutionalized ICT training. Another major finding is the need for alleviating the barrier that limited English skills create for ICT learning; addressing this issue must be part of any recommendations for curricular change. Guided throughout by a critical approach that focuses on the concept of ruling relations, this dissertation marshals critical knowledge gained from below in support of change by policymakers, educators, and community practitioners.

Since 2002, the Canadian state has mandatorily tested applicants for permanent residence for HIV (Human immune deficiency virus). The policy and practices associated with this screening have never been critically scrutinized. Authoritative claims about what happens in the conduct of the immigration medical examination are at odds with the experience of immigrant applicants living with HIV. This is the analytic entry point into this inquiry that is organized within the theoretical and methodological frame offered by institutional ethnography and political activist ethnography. Analysis is connected to broader research literatures and the historical record. The goal of this study is to produce detailed, contextualized understandings of the social and ruling relations that organize the lives of immigrants to Canada living with HIV. These are generated from the material conditions of their lives. An assumption about how organization happens is the social and reflexive production of knowledge in people’s day-to-day lives through which connections between local and extra-local settings are empirically investigable. I investigate the organization of the Canadian immigration process. How is this institutional complex ordered and governed? How is immigration mandatory HIV testing organized, and with what consequences to HIV-positive applicants to Canada? This is a text-mediated organization where all the sites are connected by people’s work and the texts they circulate. The positive result of an immigration HIV test catalyzes the state’s collection of medical data about an applicant. These are entered into state decision-making about the person’s in/admissibility to Canada. I focus on a key component of the immigration process, which is medical examination and HIV testing with this, along with the HIV test counselling practices that happen (or not) there. The reported absence of the latter form of care causes problems and contradictions for people. This investigation adopts the standpoint of these persons to investigate their problems associated with HIV testing. The main empirically supported argument I make is that the Canadian state’s ideological work related to the HIV policy and mandatory screening ushers in a set of institutional practices that are highly problematic for immigrants with HIV. This argument relies on data collected in interviews, focus groups, observations, and analysis of texts organized under Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (S.C., 2001, c. 27) and textually mediated, discursively organized concepts that shape people’s practice. Canadian immigration medical policy makers should make use of these findings, as should civil society activists acting on behalf of immigrants to Canada living with HIV. I make nine specific recommendations for future action on HIV and immigration in Canada.