Off the Beaten Track: a Postmodern Feminist Analysis of Rural Midwifery and Rural Media Health Discourses

<p>Change was a constant companion for New Zealand midwives during the 1990's. The Nurses Amendment Act 1990, that restored midwifery autonomy was only one of a constellation of changes that saw significant restructuring of the health services in small communities. The purpose of this study was to look at the issues for a group of midwives in rural South Otago who took the opportunity to work independently and offer local women a choice of maternity care during this time. In this study, five rural midwives were interviewed and met subsequently in a focus group. The transcripts were analyzed using discourse analysis informed by a postmodern/feminist theoretical framework. In addition the local newspapers covering the years 1990-1999 were read with a particular focus on the reports of health changes. These texts were also subjected to a discourse analysis using Lyotard's (1997) notion of language games, and bell hook's (1990) ideas around strategic positioning for the marginalised. To practise autonomously, the midwives in this study perform an intricate dance, balancing the contradictions of competing discourses. Their positioning and place of difference is tensioned primarily by a deep sense of community commitment and entanglement, and also by a feeling of physical and perceptual distance from their urban midwifery colleagues. This is underpinned by a staunch belief in women's ability to birth safely in their local area. The findings of this study suggest that the continuation of a comprehensive rural midwifery service is challenged by changes in the arrangement and funding of rural health, plus the increasing use of medical and technological intervention in childbirth. For rural midwifery to survive, this study shows that midwives need to remain flexible and alert while continuing to align themselves with women who are their primary source of support and inspiration. At the same time, they need to forge strategic linkages and alliances, both local and national that will allow them to move and reposition in order to continue their work and provide a realistic childbirth choice for rural women.</p>

Off the Beaten Track: a Postmodern Feminist Analysis of Rural Midwifery and Rural Media Health Discourses

<p>Change was a constant companion for New Zealand midwives during the 1990's. The Nurses Amendment Act 1990, that restored midwifery autonomy was only one of a constellation of changes that saw significant restructuring of the health services in small communities. The purpose of this study was to look at the issues for a group of midwives in rural South Otago who took the opportunity to work independently and offer local women a choice of maternity care during this time. In this study, five rural midwives were interviewed and met subsequently in a focus group. The transcripts were analyzed using discourse analysis informed by a postmodern/feminist theoretical framework. In addition the local newspapers covering the years 1990-1999 were read with a particular focus on the reports of health changes. These texts were also subjected to a discourse analysis using Lyotard's (1997) notion of language games, and bell hook's (1990) ideas around strategic positioning for the marginalised. To practise autonomously, the midwives in this study perform an intricate dance, balancing the contradictions of competing discourses. Their positioning and place of difference is tensioned primarily by a deep sense of community commitment and entanglement, and also by a feeling of physical and perceptual distance from their urban midwifery colleagues. This is underpinned by a staunch belief in women's ability to birth safely in their local area. The findings of this study suggest that the continuation of a comprehensive rural midwifery service is challenged by changes in the arrangement and funding of rural health, plus the increasing use of medical and technological intervention in childbirth. For rural midwifery to survive, this study shows that midwives need to remain flexible and alert while continuing to align themselves with women who are their primary source of support and inspiration. At the same time, they need to forge strategic linkages and alliances, both local and national that will allow them to move and reposition in order to continue their work and provide a realistic childbirth choice for rural women.</p>

The Life of Marpa Lotsawa Chökyi Lodrö

Marpa Lotsawa Chökyi Lodrö (Mar pa chos kyi blo gros, 1000?–1085?) is one of the most famous intrepid translators of the 11th century, who traveled from Tibet to India and brought back to his homeland many of the Buddhist teachings that would decline in India over the following centuries. Marpa is the Tibetan founder of the Kagyü school, one of the main religious orders of Tibetan Buddhism. He was the disciple of some of the greatest luminaries of India such as Nāropa (d. 1040) and Maitrīpa (986–1063), and the master of the yogin and poet Milarepa (1028?–1111?). Marpa lived during the period of the second spread of Buddhism in Tibet, a period of cultural renaissance that followed the collapse of the Tibetan Empire in the 9th and 10th centuries. At that time, many Tibetans traveled south to Nepal and India in order to receive, practice, and translate the various Buddhist traditions, sutra and tantra, that were blossoming in India. Marpa specialized in Highest Yoga tantras (Sanskrit niruttaratantras) and transmitted in Tibet cycles associated with the tantras of Hevajra, Guhyasamāja, Cakrasaṃvara, Mahāmāyā, and Catuṣpīṭha. He is well known for the potency of his key instructions related to the perfection phase of these tantras, known as the Six Doctrines of Nāropa (nā ro chos drug). With the success of his disciples’ practice, the Six Doctrines of Nāropa and Mahāmudrā became central teachings in all subdivisions of the Kagyü lineage. Marpa’s life is mostly known through a long biography composed in the early 16th century by Tsangnyön Heruka (Gtsang smyon he ru ka, 1452–1507), but there are many other biographies written before and after that date. Despite basic inconsistencies in the narratives, it can be concluded that Marpa first left home at twelve. He went to study with Drokmi Lotsawa (’Brog mi lo tsā ba, 992–1074) in Tibet, and then continued on toward Nepal and India, where he spent about twenty years in total, making several journeys in Tibet, Nepal, and India. In India, he mostly traveled off the beaten track and lived the life of an Indian yogin, far from the main institutions of the time. Although he met famous masters such as Nāropa and Maitrīpa, he attended on them in jungles, mountains, and charnel grounds, and mostly traveled alone, sometimes accompanied by his friends, the Tibetan Nyö (gnyos) Lotsawa or the Newari Paiṇḍapa. During his first journey to India (in the 1020s and early 1030s), he received all the transmissions for which he became famous in Tibet, and he deepened his understanding during a second journey in the late 1040s. At that time, he is said to have visited most of his teachers again, and to have had visions of Nāropa, who was then either dead or considered to be engaged in tantric practice. In Tibet, he settled in the southern region of Lhodrak, where he became an important landowner and tantric master. Although he often traveled elsewhere in Tibet in the earlier part of his life in order to accumulate gold and disciples, in the later part he mostly stayed in his estate of Drowolung, where his disciples came to meet him. As a lay practitioner, he had children, but his family lineage did not continue after his death. His religious lineage continued with Milarepa, who transmitted the “lineage of practice” (Tibetan sgrub brgyud), which further flowed through Gampopa and all the Kagyü sub-lineages. Ngok Chödor (Rngog chos rdor) and Tsurtön Wangngé (Mtshur ston dbang nge) were other important disciples who held Marpa’s “lineage of exegesis” (bshad brgyud), especially with regard to the Hevajra and Guhyasamāja traditions, respectively.

The Conceptual Clarifications Of Youth Travel And Tourism In The Case Of Uzbekistan

Youth Tourism has been acknowledged as one of the most perspective sectors of Tourism world, furthermore its trend is showing the high potential possessing for tourism development with the growing rate of student and young people travels. Clearly, in light of a plethora of opportunities and factors youth travellers are willing to spend their free time and weekends by travelling or going to off-beaten track or having trips on new places. As the development of transport, cheap and comfortable hostels, online booking systems together with different kinds of purposes is going to its highest point, travelling has become common for young people. Besides, there are particular factors which have played an indispensable role in urging Youth Tourism to develop significantly. Furthermore, the state and progress of youth tourism largely depends on the state of the methodology and modern practice of learning the theory of youth tourism. The development of Youth Tourism in Uzbekistan is primarily due to the fact that tourism activities are primarily associated with tourism and its legal regulation, as legal and theoretical foundations are considered to be most important to develop any field. This article examines the concepts of youth travel and tourism issued by other scholars and research organization, their approach and methodology and the importance of theoretical aspects of youth tourism. The purpose of this study is to clarify conceptual aspects of Youth travel and tourism in the case of Uzbekistan considering the characteristics and specialties of the country. The approaches were studied to point the main aspects of the travel and tourism activities, as well as, the legal basis of the category.

Religious Tourism in Africa's Global South

International tourist arrivals are projected to surpass 1.8 billion by 2030 on the back of rapid growth in emerging tourism economies. Tourism has emerged as an economic messiah for a plethora of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. It has emerged as a cost-effective means by which countries can diversify their economies, especially countries with low economies that depend on agricultural products to diversify their economies. Religious tourism can contribute to deeper economic benefit for a destination. The synthesis of literature adds to the paucity of academic gaze on religious tourism in Southern Africa. The synthesis takes the reader on a religious tourism journey that includes African spirituality, Pentecostal Christianity, and the interface between Africans spirituality and Christianity. These areas are neglected in the academic gaze and are outside the tourism beaten track, and these forms of religious tourism bring in much needed economic activities for areas on the tourism fringe.

Innovative Digital Guerrilla Marketing

Guerrilla marketing is the selection of atypical and non-dogmatic marketing activities that aim to achieve the greatest possible impact – in the ideal case with a comparable minimum investment. Guerrilla marketing has developed into a basic strategy overarching the marketing mix, a basic marketing policy attitude for market development that goes off the beaten track to consciously seek new, unconventional, previously disregarded, possibly even frown-upon possibilities for the deployment of tools. Digital marketing tools such as social media provide new ways and promising opportunities for innovative guerrilla marketing. This article provides an overview of innovative digital guerrilla marketing. It describes and structures guerrilla marketing in a novel form and shows illustrating examples as well as developmental trends.