• Landscape view of a remote house, with water in the foreground and mountains in the background.
Somatechnics

Are academics anxious, stressed & demoralised?

In their article, “Academic Work Cultures: Somatic Crisis in the Enterprise University”, Nikki Sullivan and Jane Simon indicate that research shows large numbers of academics are – “stressed, anxious, depressed, overloaded, and demoralised. Many are suffering from insomnia, feelings of…

Realism and Scepticism

By Gordon Graham For the Scottish philosophers of the 18th and 19th centuries, Hume was the great ‘sceptic’ awaiting an answer, which many of them thought Thomas Reid had provided. Thanks to Norman Kemp Smith’s seminal papers, philosophers in the…

Image from Paragraph 37.2, Catherine Théodose , Rue Mauve

Francophone Communities Past and Present

By Charles Forsdick, Mairéad Hanrahan and Martin Munro New and original work by some of the leading scholars in Francophone and Caribbean Studies is collated in a special issue of Paragraph, A Journal of Modern Critical Theory. Since at least…

Common Sense and Moral Philosophy

By Gordon Graham Scottish philosophy has regularly been identified with the ‘School of Common Sense’ because of the high regard in which Thomas Reid’s Inquiry was held in his lifetime and for many decades thereafter. Nevertheless, some major Scottish philosophers…

Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games

Sports and the Commodification of Scottish Identity

Glasgow 2014 opened with a celebration of Scottish folklore and identity, themes intrinsically associated with Highland Games. Read: Manly Games, Athletic Sports and the Commodification of Scottish Identity: Caledonian Gatherings in New Zealand to 1915, by Tanya Bueltmann, Scottish Historical…

Scotland’s Referendum

By Michael Rosie, Special Editor for Scottish Affairs, Volume 23.3 (2014) Scotland does not stand still. The last 15 years have seen four elections, the death of a First Minister, the transition from a Scottish Executive to a Scottish Government.…

Scottish Philosophy: Mind and Society

By Gordon Graham The tradition of Scottish philosophy had always had twin foci – the working of the human mind, and the social life of human beings. Some philosophical traditions hold these two areas of inquiry largely apart – Rationalism…

Brendan Behan – A bit of a writer

Before his tragic death by self-destructive alcoholism at age 41, Brendan Behan was a celebrated Irish poet, short story writer, novelist, and playwright who wrote in both English and Irish. Fifty years since his death, a special issue of Irish…