The 20th century saw an unprecedented increase in average human lifespan as well as a rapid decline in human fertility in many countries of the world. The accompanying worldwide change in demographics of human populations is linked to unanticipated and unprecedented economic, cultural, medical, social, public health and public policy challenges, whose full implications on a societal level are only just beginning to be fully appreciated. Some of these implications are discussed in this commentary, an outcome of Cultures of Health and Ageing, a conference co-sponsored by the University of Copenhagen (UCPH) and the Center for Healthy Ageing at UCPH, which took place on 20–21 June 2014 in Copenhagen, Denmark. Questions discussed here include the following: what is driving age-structural change in human populations? how can we create ‘age-friendly’ societies and promote ‘ageing-in-community’? what tools will effectively promote social engagement and prevent social detachment among older individuals? is there a risk that further extension of human lifespan would be a greater burden to the individual and to society than is warranted by the potential benefit of longer life?
Research across disciplines is often described as beset with problems of epistemological hierarchies and incommensurable categories. We recognize these problems working in two large interdisciplinary research projects on obesity and cholesterol lowering medicine in Denmark. We explore the affective tensions that arise in concrete situations when we meet other researchers around a shared research object. We propose that sensitivity towards such differences, and exploration of the affects they foster, can generate new epistemological and political openings. Analysing four interdisciplinary situations we suggest that embodied experiences of amusement, awkwardness, boredom and doubts are signposts of both differences and connections between people and concerns. Inspired by Haraway’s notion of “response-ability” (1997) and Verran’s concept of “generative critique” (2001) we propose that attention to affective tensions in interdisciplinary research collaboration can be generative of effects not only on modes of collaboration, but also on the ways we engage the world as researchers.
Responding to university reform in South Africa: student activism at the University of Limpopo Fifteen years ago South Africa's first democratic government inherited a tertiary sector marred by racial segregation. Since then higher education policies have been implemented with the aim of turning the sector around. Using the historically black University of Limpopo as a case, this article examines the impact of these policies from the perspective of students. It does so by combining a situational analysis of the student protests that erupted in 2007 at the University's main campus with a critical review of the impact that the new policies have had on university funding and autonomy.
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