Preface

Abstract

The position of theology in the university and academic life is under discussion, just as its relation to churches and the wider community. In most Western countries the population of students has changed considerably. The essays in this volume deal with these questions: theology between church, university and society.The conference in which drafts of the papers were discussed (in June 2000) has been organized by the department of systematic theology of the Netherlands School for Advanced Studies in Theology and Religion (NOSTER)-in that time coordinated by three of the editors-in cooperation with Conrad Wethmar, who had led a project on theology at his faculty, the Faculty of Theology of the University of Pretoria, in 1996 and who has specialized in this area.The English of the papers has been kindly corrected by Gerrit Brand, while Dr. Henry Jansen was kind enough to make the texts cameraready.The project has been supported by the Board of NOSTER and now published in NOSTER's series.

The Constructed Meaning of Suicide: A Relational Dialectics Theory Analysis of Online Suicide Chats

“…Although a biomedical approach offers valuable insight into suicide relative to biological predispositions, neurological explanations, and pharmaceutical treatment, the bio-medical approach has largely reduced suicide to the psychiatric realm. Brinkman (2009) notes that a biomedical-dominant perspective typically views human behavior as a highly existential issue that can be treated through medication. Other scholars have noted that the biomedical emphasis on suicidality may obscure the relevance of other factors, such as culture, on an individual's suicidal behavior (Baumeister, 1990; Vangelisti, 1994).…”