The Evaluation Scale: Exploring Decisions About Societal Impact in Peer Review Panels

Realising the societal gains from publicly funded health and medical research requires a model for a reflexive evaluation precedent for the societal impact of research. This research explores UK Research Excellence Framework evaluators’ values and opinions and assessing societal impact, prior to the assessment taking place. Specifically, we discuss the characteristics of two different impact assessment extremes – the “quality-focused” evaluation and “societal impact-focused” evaluation. We show the wide range of evaluator views about impact, and that these views could be conceptually reflected in a range of different positions along a conceptual evaluation scale. We describe the characteristics of these extremes in detail, and discuss the different beliefs evaluators had which could influence where they positioned themselves along the scale. These decisions, we argue, when considered together, form a dominant definition of societal impact that influences the direction of its evaluation by the panel.     

Peer lending and the subsumption of the informal

The informal financial practices of financially ‘excluded’ groups in the United States are being enrolled in a regulatory project to make new markets and produce financially self-sufficient subjects on the edges of the financial system. Drawing on mixed-methods qualitative research working with nonprofits in the San Francisco Bay Area, this paper explores how informal rotating savings and credit associations (ROSCAs) are being repurposed and formalized to make the risks of financially excluded groups legible, tractable and priceable for ‘mainstream’ financial service providers. In so doing, the paper explores how the credit score orders practices and relations that are ‘outside’ of the ‘financial mainstream’. While others have documented how the efforts of NGOs to marketize and commodify the social networks and cultural practices of the poor result in forms of dispossession, this is not what my research finds. Instead, I show how formalized ROSCAs are redistributing calculative agency, and enabling financially underserved groups to exert strategic control over the calculation of their credit scores.     

Peer effects on youth screen media consumption in Catalonia (Spain)

It is well known that young people are major consumers of screen media and that their peers are one of the principal determinants of youth behavior as regards their patterns of consumption and other activities. On the basis of these premises, the purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of classroom peers on youth screen media consumption. More specifically, it considers the time spent watching TV, playing console games and surfing the Internet. Data are drawn from a single representative survey of secondary school students aged 14–16 in Catalonia (Spain) in 2008. Having accounted for problems of endogeneity, our analysis shows that peer consumption has a positive and statistically significant effect on an individual’s console and Internet use. While the magnitude of this effect is not great in the case of the former use, peer effects are quite marked in that of Internet consumption. Moreover, gender differences are observed when media consumption is examined separately. Thus, peer effects on console use are statistically significant only for boys, while the influence of peers on an individual’s Internet use is higher among boys than it is among girls.     

Review

Roy Strong, National Portrait Gallery Tudor and Jacobean Portraits. vol. 1, Text; vol. 2, Plates. Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1969. £15 15s.     

The Governance of University Knowledge Transfer: A Critical Review of the Literature

Universities have long been involved in knowledge transfer activities. Yet the last 30 years have seen major changes in the governance of university–industry interactions. Knowledge transfer has become a strategic issue: as a source of funding for university research and (rightly or wrongly) as a policy tool for economic development. Universities vary enormously in the extent to which they promote and succeed in commercializing academic research. The identification of clear-cut models of governance for university–industry interactions and knowledge transfer processes is not straightforward. The purpose of this article is to critically discuss university knowledge transfer models and review the recent developments in the literature on research collaborations, intellectual property rights and spin-offs, those forms of knowledge transfer that are more formalized and have been institutionalized in recent years. The article also addresses the role played by university knowledge transfer organizations in promoting commercialization of research results.

荀学研究的新拓展——《荀子与儒家的社会理想》述评

荀子是先秦继孔、孟而起的最后一位儒学大师 ,也是中国哲学研究的焦点人物之一。选择这类前人已有广泛涉猎的课题 ,对研究者的理论创新能力 ,不能不说是一个挑战。近读《荀子与儒家的社会理想》一书 ,感觉无论在切入角度的选择上 ,还是在对现代学术观念的借鉴与运用上 ,抑或材料的择选与阐释方面 ,都有值得关注的拓展。一、儒学研究的视角转换荀子在继承传统儒家思想的同时 ,也广泛吸收了先秦道、法、名、墨等其他诸家的学术资源 ,构建了一个博大的思想体系。相对于孟子代表的偏于理想化的儒学思想 ,荀子呈现出更充分的现实主义品格。在战国…     

非遗热中话非遗

正自2003年初"中国民族民间文化保护工程"启动,中国的非物质文化遗产保护工作开始走入全面、整体性的保护阶段。《中华人民共和国非物质文化遗产法》规定:非物质文化遗产是指各族人民世代相传并视为其文化遗产组成部分的各种传统文化表现形式,以及与传统文化表现形式相关的实物和场所。也就是说,非物质文化遗产既不是物,也不是人,而是指各种以非物质形态存在的与群众生活密切相关、世代传承的传统文化表现形式。由此可见,非物质文化遗产是以人为本的活态文化遗产,它强调的是以人为核心的     

精审·博洽·自得--评李壮鹰先生新著《逸园丛录》

李壮鹰先生新著《逸园丛录》(齐鲁书社2005年9月出版)由六十则学术札记组成,内容涉及中国古代的乐论、诗论、画论和书论,对其中的一些重要概念如滋味、风骨、象、境、势等等,作者作出了独到的阐释,亦让人触摸到了文论背后儒、道、释的思想精义。中国古代文论的深刻内蕴,好像水中盐味、色里胶青一样溶解在看似散漫的具体的文学评论之中,李壮鹰先生的学术札记正是采取了“以散对散”的战术,逐个突破。但各个篇什组合在一起,又展现出了中国古代文论从生成论到创作论,从作品论到鉴赏论的潜体系。《逸园丛录》所记各则文字,看似信手拈来,却不论长…     

外媒聚焦宁波

由宁波市委外宣办、宁波市外办组织的“2014?Focus?on?Ningbo（聚焦宁波）”媒体参访交流活动2014年10月20日至24日举行。来自法国鲁昂,立陶宛阿里图斯,马其顿比托拉,斯洛文尼亚马里博尔,韩国大邱、顺天等宁波国际友好城市的媒体和中国日报、上海日报等中国外文媒体组成的记者团参加了集中参观采访和媒体交流活动。     

搭建金桥三十年——中外文化交流篇

正习近平总书记在召开文艺工作座谈会时指出,中华优秀传统文化是中华民族的精神命脉,是涵养社会主义核心价值观的重要源泉,也是我们在世界文化激荡中站稳脚跟的坚实根基。这让我们不由回想起十年前,在《文化交流》杂志创办20周年之际,时任浙江省委书记的习近平同志曾发来一份热情洋溢的贺信,充分肯定了《文化交流》杂志20年来取得的成就,并对     

新时代浙江书画巡礼

9月29日,“丹心·丹青——庆祝中华人民共和国成立六十周年浙江省第十二届美术作品展览”在浙江美术馆开幕。来自全省的中国画、油画、版画、水彩、粉画、雕塑、壁画、漆画、陶艺、艺术设计、年画、动画、漫画、连环画、插图、综合材料等2163件作品参加展出。到会专家、市民反响热烈,称这些作品彰显了当代美术真善美的审美思想,展现了浙江美术创作的繁荣和兴旺。