Connection, desperation and disillusionment: Exploring student wellbeing at a university in South Africa during the COVID-19 pandemic

University students' mental health and wellbeing has been a global public health issue of increasing concern in recent years, with a growing body of empirical evidence suggesting university students are a 'very high-risk population' for mental disorders and psychological distress. Pre-existing mental health challenges among university students have consequently been compounded by the global COVID-19 pandemic. A sample of 20 students registered in the education faculty at a large urban university in South Africa participated in a Photovoice study. The research required them to capture three photos or images of their experiences of wellbeing during the pandemic. The findings showed that students experienced mental health concerns and disillusionment with higher education. Their wellbeing was associated with a sense of connection with themselves, their peers and the campus space, and the cultivation of resilience.

How Do Arab and Moslem Countries and Communities Act in Dealing with the Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic?

The global spread of COVID-19 and the uncertainty of finding an immediate cure for such an invisible and ubiquitous pandemic have triggered many believers of the Islamic faith and their respective Arab and Moslem governments and religious institutions to act quickly to initiate hands-on efforts to deal with the crisis. They have grounded their work on several centuries of medical tradition and body-health wisdom emanating from the Quran and the Prophet Mohammad's Peace upon Him sayings and deeds in respect to how to grapple with such unexpected human crises. This paper seeks to highlight the intertwining between traditional norms and religious belief on one hand, and modern-day practices and strategies for dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic on the other. The focus is centered on Arab and Moslem countries. Although Islamic and Arab areas are considered among the most culturally and territorially cohesive places on earth, they have not necessarily pursued a unified strategy in confronting the pandemic. Furthermore, Moslem/Arab communities have extended far beyond the core Arab/Moslem localities. They have migrated over centuries to all continents, making their homes in new places, while still adhering to their ancestral traditions and faith in developing effective practices for confronting a health crisis like the viral pandemic. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.

Questioning global health in the times of COVID-19: Re-imagining primary health care through the lens of politics of knowledge

The advent of the COVID-19 pandemic and the inequitable response to it has created a space for rethinking the knowledge translation that informs current health policy formulation and planning. Wide recognition of the failure of global health governance and national health systems has led to calls for reviving the Primary Health Care (PHC) agenda for post-COVID health systems development. Despite the joint international declaration on PHC made four decades ago, it has had limited application. This paper argues that the recent attempts to rethink PHC will prove inadequate without analysing and learning from the politics of knowledge (PoK) underlying global health policy and planning. Even with the growing relevance of the spirit of the Alma-Ata Declaration (1978) and its operationalisation as detailed in the report of conference proceedings, reassessment of reasons for its limited implementation continues to be located largely in the political economy of the medical establishment, the international economic order or in national governance flaws. Failure to address the dominant knowledge paradigm in the Alma Ata articulation of PHC has contributed to its limited application. This calls for expansion in the analysis from knowledge translation to generation and hierarchisation of knowledge. The paper discusses how the application of PoK as an analytical lens helps understand the power equations underlying the process of knowledge generation and its translation into policy and practice. Beneath the techno-centric and commodified health system is the dominant ‘knowledge' system whose foundations and assumptions ought to be interrogated. By following a PoK approach, a reorientation of thinking about the relationship between various forms of knowledge and knowledge holders is anticipated. A new health service system design is outlined—translating the spirit of PHC of 1978 into a ‘PHC Version 2.0'—that addresses the PoK gap in operational terms, with an approach to guide all levels of healthcare. It suggests how the world can be empowered to respond better by engaging with diverse ontologies and epistemologies to conceptualise knowledge and frame policies. Further, in the contexts of Asia, Africa and Latin America, it can contribute to the development of self-reliance to democratise general health policy and planning in the post-pandemic period.

Desire, Darkness and Hope: Theology in a Time of Impasse. Engaging the Thought of Constance Fitzgerald, OCD ed. by Laurie Cassidy and M. Shawn Copeland (review)

Ever since the publication of her 1984 article, "Impasse and Dark Night" in the volume Living with Apocalypse that brought the contemplative vision of the Carmelite tradition to bear upon intractable contemporary societal issues (the dark night not only of the soul but of the world), the writings of Sr. John of the Cross's delineation of this dark night involves a purifying movement from a selfhood in which love is entangled, complex and unfree through a joyless darkness in which the self is stripped of its former identity and becomes transformed in union with God and others. In the spirit of M. Shawn Copeland's apt and memorable introductory characterization of the work of theology as "rowing toward God in an anguished world," these writers tackle the impasses that paralyze our society today: white supremacy (Laurie Cassidy);the Covid 19 pandemic (Maria Teresa Morgan and Susie Paulik Babka);the preferential option for the poor (Roberto Goizueta);the global climate crisis (Margaret R. Pfeil);the de-colonializing of faith and society (Alex Mikulich);racial [in]justice (Brain Massingale);grace in a violent world (Andrew Prevot);and preaching the wisdom of the Cross (Mary Catherine Hilkert).

Is Real Hell Preferable to Imaginary Paradise?

Each chapter takes as its object of analysis either a pair (for example, Bayle and Malebranche, Leibniz and King, Voltaire and the Deists) or an individual (Hume, Rousseau, Kant, Schopenhauer) who participated in the tradition of theodicean thinking or its critique. Taking the present conditions of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the Black Lives Matter Uprisings in the spring and summer of 2020, and the conceptual framings of tracking-capitalism, ecological collapse, and civil war as his subject matter, he paints a pessimistic picture of the futureless futures and impersonal dominations of the contemporary globalized world. [...]to what extent was it even conceived as a real problem?" (29) Whereas optimists are only interested in the problem of evil in its relationship with good (or God), van der Lugt's value-oriented pessimists reject the necessity of alignment, instead taking reality as it is, discontent, dread, and all. Through King and Liebniz the reader is provided a foundation for Enlightenment optimism that adjusts the Augustinian thesis of responsibility. While King's contribution is given its due, van der Lugt defines optimism by Leibniz's foundation of modern theodicy in his assertion that "we live in 'the best of all possible worlds'" (69): that there is, at the very least, a justification of evil in the world in relation to the good—either through theodicy in that the evil serves the good, or through alignment in that the good outweighs the evil. [...]with the question of whether life is worth living, van der Lugt explains that "the deeper point [schopenhauer] is trying to make […] is that even if the goods of life vastly outweigh the evils, even so, this does nothing to justify existence" (348).

The Death of Law

This is a talk about the decline and fall of constitutional law, an overarching characteristic of the new millennium. I focus on the period from the end of the Cold War—once described as the end of history—to what I call the "Second Cold War” beginning in the second decade of this century and having escalated in the proxy war in Ukraine. The Second Cold War is also characterized by an aborted cooptation of China through the World Trade Organization (to tame China's seemingly unstoppable ascension to global supremacy) as well as a state of permanent emergency.

Global Classics

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO SPEAK of "global Classics” in the "post-COVID era?” Reaching the post-COVID period may have eluded us, but the notion of a global Classics—Classics as it is received outside the West—has been a topic of serious interest in the field over the past decade, even in advance of the new opportunities for conferences and conversations across time zones made possible by Zoom and the virtual office.1 Paradoxically enough, the question of how to read—and interpret—the texts of the Classical tradition in a globalized world arises just as the field is facing critique from within, as texts once standard in university curricula are condemned for their historical use in the service of empire, expansion, ideology, and propping up hierarchies of class, race, and gender. At a 2019 conference on "Classics and Global Humanities” at the University of Ghana,2 (non-globalized) Classics' involvement in the ideologies of colonialism was openly acknowledged, but new frameworks were also suggested within which these texts could speak to topics relevant to the present, spurring readers to discuss such subjects as academic freedom and politics, race in the canon, citizenship and migration, globalization and education, and more.3 As Erin Mee (2010: 314) puts it in her review essay of Classics in Post-colonial Worlds and Crossroads in the Black Aegean: Oedipus, Antigone, and Dramas of the African Diaspora, "What better way to challenge colonialism (either before, during, or after the ‘official' period of colonization) than by using the very tools that colonial powers used to justify their cultural superiority and therefore their dominance?”4 Other voices agree: Here, then, "global Classics” strives to be truly global by cutting across social and economic status in its search for representative texts—representative, perhaps, of "the human condition,” to the extent that is possible. Unfortunately, the Yale-NUS liberal arts college (and its vibrant international student body with it) has just been shut down by policy makers at NUS: the challenges of teaching a broad-ranging core in a country without complete freedom of speech apparently proved to be too much.11 Here politics confronts the habits of mind of the liberal self, which is often prompted by the classical texts of any culture to ask questions about human beings' relationship to themselves and their society that do not mesh well with nationalism, autocracy, or the control of propaganda.

COVID-19 and the Urgency of the Interdisciplines in the Corporate University

As US universities and colleges increasingly identify with neoliberal discourses of students as human capital and higher education as a direct investment in earning potential, the liberal arts and humanistic fields of study are valued only for their capacity to train students in "multicultural communication." The minimization of their intellectual project marks these fields as susceptible to terminal budget cuts, a long-standing trend intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic. Some humanists have responded to this devaluation by defending the humanities as sites that produce knowledge for knowledge's sake. Such reflections defend the older venerable humanistic traditions often at the expense of newer and lesser humanities, namely, Black studies and feminist studies. In a recent Forbes article, the president of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni argues that core language and humanities courses (e.g. writing, US history) should be protected, but "expensive fluff" courses should be eliminated as a cost-cutting measure. This "fluff" in fact represents the only significant epistemic challenge to the unreflective valuation of the Enlightenment project that birthed both scientific and humanistic traditions of study. This article analyzes recent COVID-related medical research to demonstrate how Black and feminist studies reject the assumptions of the Western canon in both humanities and STEM courses. Investing in these fields does not merely invest in students' communication skills, but in their ability to critically engage their home disciplines, fields of work, and political systems. Rather than defunding the interdisciplines, we urge institutions to model undergraduate studies more broadly in line with these fields.

The Construction of Legitimation in Romanian Public Authorities' Discourses During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The global spread of COVID-19 in 2020 has created a wide range of responses from governments, like lockdowns, event prohibitions, social distancing rules, etc. Authorities tried to legitimize these restrictions (including limitations of individual rights) through different strategies in order to obtain people compliance. This paper aims to analyze the discourses of two most trusted Romanian public figures, according to IRES (April 2020), Klaus Iohannis, Romanian President, and Raed Arafat, Romanian State Secretary in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, both of whom played key roles in the communication around the COVID-19 health emergency state in our country in March-April 2020. Our goal is to identify how they legitimize their actions by exploring the power relationships between these two Romanian authorities, citizens and other social actors as reflected in their discourses. Our analysis combines van Leuween's (2007) legitimation strategies with Brown's (2020) risk features to understand how Romanian authorities managed to respond to COVID-19 crisis. Research showed the two public figures legitimize their actions by using personal authority and that warnings are the most addressed constructions in their discourses. Differences also showed that Arafat was more focused on battling fake news and its effects, while Iohannis was often using good hero's narratives to explain the decisions implemented to combat the pandemic.

Fostering the Global Common Good: The Relevance of Catholic Social Teaching to Public Health Debates

Given the scope and intensity of its impact, the COVID-19 pandemic proves instructive as an example of the shortfall in regnant legal and policy approaches to global health issues. Secular discussions of such issues tend to rely on a perspective best described as "policy realism”, with current international arrangements and institutions viewed as the acceptable context for future reform. Much of recent Catholic social teaching (hereinafter, CST) has challenged such realism in fundamental ways. While CST is often dismissed as merely prophetic in its tone, I defend its salience by assessing several aspects of its distinctive perspective: (1) the broad theological and anthropological vision reflected in the Catholic framework of basic norms, especially the norm of solidarity;(2) issues that arise in identifying different modes of moral discourse in modern CST;and (3) an effort to resolve such apparent tensions that unifies a distinctively Catholic approach to global health even as it suggests a series of "talking points” between the Catholic theological vision and various secular philosophical and political perspectives.

Enhancing communicative competence in English second language classrooms through traditional storytelling

This paper aimed to explore the use of traditional stories as a tool to facilitate and enhance communicative competence in English Second Language (ESL) classrooms. The sudden switch from in-person to online instruction during COVID-19 caused a decline in communicative activities, including traditional storytelling. Any language program should aim to generate learners who are proficient in communication. According to research, even learners with low motivation and poor academic skills are more inclined to listen and put much effort into the narrative setting. This paper is grounded on Gardener's Multiple Intelligences Theory, which challenges the traditional view of the Intelligent Quotient Theory and enables teachers to take a renewed look at other views about learning development. This study adopted an interpretive paradigm entrenched in a qualitative approach using a case study design. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from 5 conveniently selected Grade 6 teachers. Content analysis was used to analyse data. Findings revealed that (i) learners are not engaged in traditional storytelling in schools and (ii) a lack of recordings of traditional stories. The lack of traditional storytelling in schools denies learners opportunities to share their cultural knowledge and values. This paper recommends that traditional stories be included in the school curriculum to improve learners ' communication skills. Furthermore, traditional storytelling can act as a vehicle for restoring the learners' culture.

Introduction: In Search of Hope amid Despair in Folklore of Epidemics

Facing the outbreak of an unprecedented pandemic, along with a disturbing sociopolitical environment, folklorists should and can reflect upon what we have done within our discipline and what we can contribute to the discourse and public understanding of such realities with folkloristic perspectives. This introduction intends to define the study of folklore of epidemics as a new research area, building upon the studies of disaster folklore and ethnic minority folklore. It also discusses issues of marginalization, minoritization, and invisibility in folklore studies as a reflection of systemic racism in folkloristics as well as in broader society where the victimization of minorities and low-income class during the COVID-19 pandemic has been ultimately exposed.

'My memories of the time we had together are more important': Direct cremation and the privatisation of UK funerals

Funerals have long been of interest to social scientists. Previous sociological work has examined the relationship between individuality, belief and tradition within funeral services, founded on the assumption that public rituals have psycho-social benefit for organisers and attendees. With the introduction of direct cremation to the UK, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on funeral service attendance in 2020 and 2021, critique of this assumption is now needed. Drawing on interviews with recently bereaved people who organised a direct cremation in late 2017, this article illustrates how compromise, control and consistency are key drivers for not having a funeral service. The article argues that a declining importance in the fate of the body and a move towards 'invite-only' commemorative events represents a waning need for social support offered by a public, communal funeral service. In turn, this indicates a sequestration, or privatisation, of the contemporary funeral. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

THE DEVELOPMENT OF ACCOMMODATION BUSINESS TO PROMOTE TOURISM IN THE NEW NORMAL ERA FOR PHU KRADUENG DISTRICT, LOEI PROVINCE

This study aims to 1) study the potential of the accommodation business in Phu Kradueng district, Loei province, and 2) to propose guidelines for the development of the accommodation business to promote tourism in the New Normal era for Phu Kradueng district, Loei province. The research methodology used mixed-methods research consisting of;quantitative data collected by questionnaires from 400 guests/tourists who stayed in Phu Kradueng district, Loei province, and qualitative data collected through interviews from the government sectors, private sectors, and people in Phu Kradueng district, Loei province. The results of the study found that 1) the current situation of the potential of the accommodation business in Phu Kradueng district, Loei province consists of;a lack of public relations, reservations and online payments, lack of application of computer systems to manage the accommodation business, lack of coordination with nearby attractions, and lack of tour guides and information on current interesting tourist activities. There is local waste and environmental management system, the quality of life is improved and the distribution of income to the local people by promoting and supporting the employment of local people, local enterprises are promoted and supported to use existing resources for sustainability, and arts, traditions, culture and local sports are preserved. 2) Guidelines for the development of accommodation business to promote tourism in the New Normal era for Phu Kradueng district, Loei province consisting of;the project's development of facilities, technology, digital marketing, safety, cleanliness, adoption of local identity, and Activities to connect the local way of life.

CONFLICT OF TRADITIONS AND INNOVATIONS AS A SOURCE OF GLOBAL TECHNOLOGICAL INEQUALITY: SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF THE INNOVATIVE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ECONOMY AND THE BASICS OF CONFLICT MANAGEMENT

Purpose: The purpose of this chapter is to scientifically verify the credibility (prove or disprove) the existing argument for the global technological inequality within the conflict of traditions and innovations, as well as from the perspective of social consequences of the innovative development of the economy and the basics of conflict management. Design/methodology/approach: A review of existing sources of research literature has shown that they formed an insufficient scientific basis for determining the essence and scope of social consequences of the innovative development of the economy and the basics of conflict management in terms of global technological inequality. The method of comparative analysis of statistical data over time is used to fill the identified gap in the scientific knowledge system in this chapter. The top 10 countries of the world, which are characterized by the highest level of the innovative development of the economy, were chosen as the objects of study. Findings: This chapter presents a review of facts determining that there are arguments for the conflict of traditions and innovations against the backdrop of global technological progress from a scientific perspective, a conflict that has social consequences for the innovative development of the economy and the basics of conflict management. Today, the protection and promotion of national interests are being increasingly determined by digitalization as the primary function of diplomatic services. For example, cybersecurity affects national security;web platforms support the economic well-being of citizens and companies;the Internet contributes to the development of healthcare, education and other essential social services, especially during the crisis caused by the COVID-19. Originality/value: It is expected that wide introduction of high technologies in developed countries will reduce the competitive ability of currently less indus-trialized economies of Asia and Africa in terms of cost of labour, will increase the technological gap between them and developed countries that will diversify their economies and create more jobs. In the past, countries such as China, Mexico, Brazil and several Asian countries were climbing the income ladder, transferring labour force and capital from the relatively inefficient agricultural economy to the more efficient products and services. Today, there are fears that high technologies and Industry 4.0 will revolutionize these conventional development processes, making a thorny path even more thorny, and will lead to conflicts of traditions and innovations as a source of global technological inequality. © 2022 by Alexey V. Tolmachev, Olesya A. Meteleva, Evgeniy B. Luparev and Elena V. Epifanova.

Sustaining Traditionalism: an investigation into the vernacular transformation of the Khasi tribal houses of Sylhet

PurposeThis study aims at understanding the reasons causing the decline in the practice of traditional, regional architectural methods of creating house forms in the Khasia Punji at Jaflong, Sylhet area.Design/methodology/approachTwo main types of traditional and modern house forms were identified and studied in order to document and analyze the aspects of changes in the construction method and material uses, while the interviews together with observational, qualitative and descriptive study formed an insight into the changing socio-cultural dynamics and evolving lifestyle of the tribe. Apart from physical surveys, the primary data on settlement patterns over twenty years' time were reviewed through satellite imaging while the characteristics of local house forms were also collected from tourist photographs through time recorded in Google database.FindingsThe findings of this research have pointed out that in the case of the Khasi tribe, the shift in temporal context, accompanied by a shift in technological, socio-cultural and economic aspects, is fueling the transformation in the formal expression, material and methods of the house building.Research limitations/implicationsLimitations were posed in setting up more constructive and informative interview sessions with the Khasi people due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) situation which limited the survey outcomes in general.Practical implicationsThe scope of this study is to understand the changes and advances in socio-cultural, technological aspects of a society and their impact on the intricate patterns of life and customs that are evidently reflected in the transformation of built environments.Originality/valueThis research attempts to understand the causes behind the transformation of vernacular house forms, taking place in the Khasi village of Jaflong, Sylhet.

Towards a digital football studies: Current trends and future directions for football cultures research in the post-COVID-19 moment

As the digital revolution continues apace, emergent technologies and means of communication have presented new challenges and opportunities for the field of football studies. In turn, researchers active across the social sciences and beyond have responded and are beginning to carve out a new field of study-digital football studies. In the absence of any concentrated review of this field, the purpose of this paper is threefold: (1) to critically revisit previous 'waves' of football studies scholarship;(2) to identify themes in current digital football studies scholarship and identify areas for future study;and (3) to begin to map out some theoretical and conceptual traditions that might better equip scholarly enterprises for the study of football, and by association leisure and sport, in the (hyper)digital moment. We also postulate the establishment of digital football studies as a collective enterprise will be especially important for a post-Covid-19 globe given the rapid acceleration towards digital during the pandemic. To this end, we argue that leisure and football studies must develop empirically, methodologically, and theoretically to better capture the nature of (hyper)digitalised societies and the ways audiences are playing with, and shifting, the boundaries and possibilities for football and leisure. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Environmental education in Portuguese Speaking Nations: a survey of current practices and priorities

Since the Community of Portuguese Speaking Nations (CPLP) was created in 1996, environmental education (EE) has gained recognition for enhancing multilateral cooperation on environmental protection and sustainability promotion. Conducted online in 2020 in all member states during the COVID-19 pandemic, this second Environmental Education Survey of CPLP explores the conditions and approaches of EE within the overall setting of the 2030 UN Agenda, taking the concepts of Canaparo's geo-epistemology and Öhman and Östman's selective traditions as the underlying framework of analysis. The survey received 196 valid responses from EE Experts and Promoters who hold positions in various institutional backgrounds. Addressing the current state of EE in all nine countries, a picture emerges of significant and ecologically prudent human intervention based on fact-based, normative, and pluralist EE approaches. Most encouraging is the overall finding that EE is vibrant, relevant for sustainable transformation, young people focussed, and in good heart.

From certain to uncertain knowledge: Changes in the psychoanalytic discourse

The changes in thinking and working in the history of psychoanalysis are described as evolutions from the search for certain knowledge to a growing tolerance in dealing with the uncertainty inherent in psychoanalytic work. The corona pandemic as an external reality has created additional uncertainty. Its effects on clinical work and the setting are discussed. Another external reality, the new Psychotherapists Act, not only challenges the tradition of psychoanalytic training both in terms of organization and content but currently leaves both institutes and the professional society in uncertainty about their future. The implications and organizational risks of this situation for boards and members of training institutes are described. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved) (German) Die Entwicklungen des Denkens und Arbeitens in der Geschichte der Psychoanalyse werden beschrieben als Entwicklungen von der Suche nach sicherem Wissen zu einer wachsenden Toleranz im Umgang mit dem Ungewissen, das der psychoanalytischen Arbeit inharent ist. Anhand der Coronapandemie wird die Bedeutung der Ungewissheit reflektiert, die durch die ausere Realitat auf die klinische Arbeit und ihr Setting einwirkt. Am Beispiel des neuen Psychotherapeutengesetzes werden die Chancen und Risiken diskutiert, die die Ungewissheit uber Organisation und Inhalt der kunftigen Weiterbildung fur Institute und die Fachgesellschaft darstellen. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved)

Guest editorial: Global branding management in a rapidly changing environment

[...]the renascence of consumer ethnocentrism, patriotism, local identity and global company animosity has shadowed the prospect of global brands (He and Wang, 2015). [...]in an age of emerging and growing antipathy towards globalization, perhaps fueled by global crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic, a relevant issue within the global branding literature needs to be answered. Lang, Behl, Guzman, Pereira and Del Giudice (The role of advertising, distribution intensity and store image in achieving global brand loyalty in an emerging market) investigate the simultaneous impact of advertising efforts, distribution intensity, and store image on global brand loyalty of fast-moving consumer goods in emerging markets. The study reveals variations among the selected marketing mix elements and brand loyalty, contributing to the understanding of global consumer culture, marketing mix, brand equity and global brand loyalty.