This article explores the possibility of a "homosexual hermeneutic" by which the great literary works of the western canon can be taught. This "interpretative methodology" is based in the author's own individuation process as gay. The author details his personal journey from engulfment in heteronormativity to the first crisis of his homosexual…

This article presents a speech delivered by the author for the Kent M. Christiansen Memorial Lecture series in April 2008 at Arizona State University. The author discusses why he thinks that approaches to academic advising theory and research that arises out of the humanities can be of great value to practitioners in the field of academic…

Professional education has for decades been based on the premise that theory and practice are dichotomous, and that somehow a way must be found to enable professional practitioners to translate theory (the knowledge they acquire) into practice (what they actually do). The article examines the relationship between theory and practice, contending…

Using data from the Monitoring the Future study, this article presents historical trends in U.S. high school seniors' work values across 30 years (1976-2005). Adolescents across three decades highly valued most aspects of work examined. Recent cohorts showed declines in the importance of work, values for job security, and various potential…

Epistemic problems exist when researching painting as adult learning. Painting has non-linear emergent properties. When video-recording and images are used to enable inquiry, and there is a desire to adhere to hermeneutic principles, then painting begins to inform the research output. In this way the emergent content determined the emerging form…

The paper focuses on oral storytelling and transformation through the significance of the liminal zone as thresholding. Involving the reader-listener in an experiential and performative approach, the article draws on all of the senses, using a wide range of data such as dreams, drawing, writing, as well as the act of (sacred) oral storytelling and…

The documented social-subjects curricula for Scottish 5-16 year olds are analysed for representations of "self-in-society". Such representations are important in Scotland because it is expected that the new Education-for-Citizenship framework will in part be delivered through the social subjects. However, citizenship education is also…

In taking its theoretical impetus from hermeneutic phenomenology, the qualitative research reported in this paper aimed to identify characteristics of children's spirituality in Australian Catholic primary schools. The videotaped life expressions of two groups of six children in each of three Australian Catholic primary schools formed the texts of…

The changing nature of engineering problems and new challenges that result from globalization and new ways of doing business have triggered calls for a revolutionary shift in engineering education. To respond to these challenges, the engineering education paradigm has been revised by adding more design and humanities/social sciences components to…

This article explores the process of meaning-making from within the "narrative" mode and in particular considers the difficulty or even impossibility, in certain kinds of organisational and social situations, of constructing viable narratives. This experience is sometimes referred to as "losing the plot", hence the subtitle of…

Use of a focused autobiography to illuminate researcher bias in qualitative study had the unintended effect of identifying additional research questions. Hermeneutic theory suggests that bias or "preunderstanding" is a necessary condition of interpretation. (SK)

Describes hermeneutic approach to counseling research, including basic rationale for use of hermeneutic method in study of values and counseling and description of philosophical and procedural framework of the approach. Illustrates hermeneutic analysis through example of this type of research that focuses on the language of counselors as it…

Shows how Hans-Georg Gadamer's critical hermeneutics can be applied to intercultural communication. Suggests that by incorporating the philosophies of Hans-Georg Gadamer, intercultural communication scholars will be able to bring a fresh perspective to guide their theory, research, and practice. (Author/VWL)

Discussion of virtual communities focuses on Paul Ricoeur's hermeneutic theories which accounts for temporal and spatial distance in the exchange of the community's texts. Topics include virtual communities and computer mediated communication studies; the linguistic aspects of virtual communities; and empirical hermeneutics. (Contains 61…

Attention is brought to the existence of incongruity in the definition of reliability in the literature, and some unnecessary controversies and confusions which result. A conventionalization of the meaning of reliability at a conceptual, model-free level is proposed. Through the exploration of two paradoxes, this article attempts to address some…