The ethics of interpretation: the signifying chain from field to analysis

This paper attempts to describe the relationship between the embodied practice of fieldwork and the written articulation of this experience. Starting from Valerie Hey's conceptualization of ‘rapport’ as form of ‘intersubjective synergy’, a moment of recognition of similarity within difference – similar in structure to Laclau and Moufffe's conceptualization of hegemony – the paper explores how we can understand these moments of recognition as positioned within a complex web of signifying chains that interlink social, psychic and linguistic means of representation. Laclau and Mouffe's logics of equivalence and difference and Lacan's account of the production of meaning through metaphor and metonymy provide a theoretical language through which to explore chains of meaning in two fragments of data drawn from a study comparing disciplines and institutions in higher education. My argument is that an awareness of these processes of production of meaning is necessary to the development of an ethical mode of interpretation.     

“Better Times Are Coming Now”: Wartime Dreams and Disenchantment in <Emphasis Type="Italic">Rufus M.</Emphasis>

Written and published during World War II, Eleanor Estes’s Rufus M. (1943) is set during the time of American involvement in World War I, the war of the author’s own childhood. Despite the fact that the book was named a Newbery Honor title, many critics have found it unsatisfyingly unstructured and episodic. I argue, however, that the book is far more unified in its construction than these critics recognize and deserves study as a revelatory title about how the First World War was presented to young readers during the Second World War. In his dauntless determination to support the war effort, young Rufus shows himself to be an iconic home-front hero of precisely the sort encouraged by the United States propaganda machine. But read carefully, the book has such an air of pervasive melancholy and contains so many scenes of disappointed hopes and disillusioned dreams that it can be read as encoding doubts about the first war’s legacy. Despite Estes’s clearly intended attempt to provide hope for young readers, the reality of World War I’s ultimate failure haunts Rufus M. as a sort of pentimento, a darker set of images revealed beneath the text’s surface optimism.     

Library Study Behaviors in the Age of Ubiquitous Mobile Devices: An Observational Study in Four Academic Libraries

In this study, researchers observed student study behaviors in the libraries of four post-secondary institutions. In all, 2,773 observations were made. This research replicates and expands an earlier study and addresses its limitations. The results of a logistic regression test indicate whether students had a mobile device readily available and where students chose to study in the library best predicted whether they demonstrated a study, as opposed to a non-study, behavior. Specifically, if students were found in quiet study or computer areas, they were more likely to be performing study behaviors. This research has implications for library stakeholders making decisions about the use of library space. Most importantly, this research demonstrates that library spaces are widely used for diverse purposes.     

Critical Information Literacy: A Model for Transdisciplinary Research in Behavioral Sciences

Librarians are instrumental in advancing the education of students and orienting tomorrow's professions toward the world in which they will practice: rich in information, diverse in perspective, and latent with the opportunities for transdisciplinary research. Critical information literacy offers a model for orienting theory and practice to create an integrated learning experience for students in the behavioral health sciences. This paper examines how different disciplines may be included in a shared problem, using psychopathy as an example. The role of the librarian is discussed in terms of critical information literacy, as a means to conducting transdisciplinary research.