Browsing by Subject "agency"

More than a half of the population in Southern Africa is young. In Mozambique, majority of the population lives in the rural area, gaining their livelihoods in subsistence farming. The growing urban population in the region is mainly occupied in the informal sector, where rights of the workers are not considered. This work is about young people and their opportunities to find employment and get settled in normal life. This work is based on interviews of young people from the poor neighborhood of Chamanculo in Maputo, Mozambique, and young people living in the streets in Nairobi, Kenya. Despite of differences between these two groups, they face similar challenges and prejudices. Also their dreams and strategies to reach these dreams do not differ much. The material is collected over a time span of over two years during monitoring trips to NGOs working for empowerment os marginalized youth. In addition to young people, material includes interviews with staff of NGOs working with marginalized youth, and representatives of respective government officers and school staff. Different from Western societies, being young is not considered a privilege in Southern Africa. Instead it’s a period in a life when possibilities for influencing and participating in social life are limited. Status of an adult is gained after establishing a family, and securing income that is enough to sustain oneself and his family. Especially young men are expected to be able to provide for their wife and the family. In a situation when access to decent jobs and income is limited, young people from difficult circumstances are easily stuck in a situation in which they do not have the option of becoming fully recognized adults. Weak educational background and connections to formal economy create obstacles for poor young people to integrate into formal society and labor force. In this work, the challenge of becoming adult is studied using concepts of child agency, agency, social navigation and capability. Agency of children and youth is a relatively new topic of studies, because decision-making has until recently been considered the responsibility of adults. However, recent studies show that children already in young age make decisions concerning their education, selection of future profession and entrance into vocational training. Young people make their decisions based on the information available for them about their societies, in this case especially about labor markets and income earning possibilities. Navigating in insecure environment requires continuous monitoring and keeping eyes open for any opportunity. Often youth in difficult situation have to consider both immediate survival and long term plans in the same time. Chances of young people from poor background are limited not only due to economic hardship, but also because of lacking social capital and networks. Possibility to choose between different options is often limited, and in many cases it’s necessary to accept any opportunity that turns up. Made choices are evaluated continuously; and corrective actions taken if a decision does not lead to a desirable outcome. Youth from poor neighborhood of Chamanaculo in Maputo tell that they search their models somewhere else, because the environment does not support education, and abuse of alcohol and drugs is common. In the same time, young people who have little formal education are in difficult position on the labor market, and those with less formal education end up in informal jobs. While informal sector is widespread. Even the poorest youth are usually aware of this, and employment in the formal sector is the ideal for most. Young people also dream of continuing their studies, and continuing to higher education after completing vocational training and earning some money. Costs related to formal education and lacking social capital prevent young people from poor families to pursue this dream. Especially young men who have grown up as street children face fear and discrimination. For youth from the margins of the society, placement on a training course is not enough, but they also need moral support and counseling to prepare them for the social life at workplace. When this support is available, they have all the possibilities to succeed, and most youth are employed after traineeship. Usually girls are more vulnerable than boys, and their opportunities in earning income are more limited than for young men. While young men from poor neighborhoods are easily labeled criminals, girls with the same background are often considered prone to prostitution. Selection of trades in vocational training is strongly gendered, and young women end up in professions that are less paid than male dominated ones.

In my Master’s thesis, I offer a novel interpretation of Gilles Deleuze’s (1925-1995) conception of transcendent thinking. As a first approximation, transcendent thinking is an unconscious disruption of quotidian thinking (i.e. empirical thinking). Deleuze’s conception is an important attempt at explaining the emergence of thought from material reality. Additionally, it offers insights into the conditions of creating something new in thinking. In Deleuze’s account, these two are closely connected. My interpretation is mainly based on Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition (1968), but I also draw from Deleuze’s other works and philosophers he discusses. Deleuze’s reading of Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) is important for my interpretation. I proceed by close readings of Deleuze and compare my interpretations to others from secondary literature. My thesis is divided into five chapters and I begin by introducing my reading of the relevant features of Deleuze’s overall project in Difference and Repetition. In chapter one, I introduce Deleuze’s novel philosophy of difference. According to Deleuze, all continuity we experience is constituted by the interplay of internal difference and hidden repetition. In chapter two, I introduce the relevant features of Deleuze’s ontological scheme in Difference and Repetition. According to it, actual objects are constituted through the process of different/ciation; two figures of internal difference, the differential relations of virtual Ideas and intensive differences, produce the actual objects we perceive in our experience. Situating Deleuze’s transcendent thinking into his overall project is necessary to interpret it correctly and to grasp its significance. Next, I interpret what Deleuze means by thinking. In chapter three, I read Immanuel Kant’s (1724–1804) determining judgment (e.g. “This is a dog”) as providing a case of Deleuze’s empirical thinking. This kind of thinking is what human subjects experience in the quotidian. However, transcendent thinking goes beyond empirical thinking. In chapter four, I show how transcendent thinking is comprised of a series of encounters where the different faculties (i.e. cognitive capabilities) of the thinker are elevated to their transcendent exercise. This series starts as sensibility encounters sensible intensity and it continues as subsequent faculties are traversed by a virtual Idea. In these encounters, the faculties confront their internal differences, which reveal their limits and what is most singular to them. However, intermediary encounters do not correspond to any conscious empirical experiences, nor does the whole of transcendent thinking either. In the final chapter of my Master’s thesis, I begin by arguing that my interpretation ameliorates on previous readings. First, it reveals that transcendent thinking is a case of different/ciation unravelling through the faculties of a psychic system. Second, my reading distinguishes between empirical thinking and transcendent thinking—both being kinds of thinking, for Deleuze. Third, it clarifies that learning is an instance of transcendent thinking (not vaguely thinking in general). Next, I discuss how transcendent thinking reveals the possibility of creation in thinking. Empirical thinking is incapable of change because in it, the faculties function according to the model of recognition: the thinker only recognizes what is already known using pregiven concepts. Transcendent thinking, as a case of different/ciation progressing through the faculties, changes the faculties and, in doing so, transforms the composition of the psychic system. This process is carried out on the level of being and results in something new emerging in thinking. However, transcendent thinking is involuntary and unconscious, leaving the conception of creative agency in Difference and Repetition restricted.

Goals: This study examines different meanings of preschool environment through pictures children have taken, and by children's stories associated to these pictures. The study committed to multidisciplinary childhood study approach which sees children as competent active actor in their own right and as a constructor of their own childhood. Theoretically the study focuses on studies of child perspective, children's geographies, and meanings. The study assumes that preschool environment appears differently to children that it does to adults, and that adults should pay more attention to how the preschool environment appears to children. Methods: The study is a part of Academy of Finland research project "Children tell of their well-being - who listens? Listening to children's voices and receiving their stories" (TelLis project number 1134911) The project is led by Adjunct professor Liisa Karlsson in University of Helsinki. Material for the study is collected from a Kouvola-area child safety project. The project focused on children's point of view. As part of the project children photographed places they considered nice or boring in their preschool environment. The children were then asked to tell about the pictures using a method called Storycrafting. The pictures and stories were used as information source by the experts from different fields who participated in this project. Pictures and narration materials produced by 28 preschoolers are analysed in this study. The material consisted of 40 picture and story combinations. Method of the study was a qualitative study and the material was analysed using content analysis. Results and conclusions: Four significant dimensions were found from the material: operation, social interaction, play, and aesthetic character. The study found that meaningful environment for children is cosy, and offers different activities, social interactions, and also possibility to play. The pictures taken by the children and the stories they relate to them contain information which helps to understand how children react to their environment and how they take advantage of affordances environment produce. The results of this study can be utilized by the experts who are working among children and design environments for children.

This study/research is an explorative work examining the effects of the use of talk audio digital products on agency. Visual products are most often the focus in discussions on human-computer interaction (HCI) and Science Technology Studies). Therefore, an examination of agency in the context of voice-based talk-audio products has remained a minority but is necessary in the era of digital services. The thesis explores the use of products in two environments with different cultures; urban Bangalore in India and urban Stockholm in Sweden where semi-structured interviews with undergraduate students were conducted. The concept of agency builds on Anthony Giddens’ classical approach. The concept of talk audio was created in the context of data collection and refers to talk-based auditory products. Inspired by studies of personal stereo use by Michael Bull and music sociology by Tia DeNora, the thesis explores how individuals construct their agency both consciously and less consciously when using talk audio products. Young people use talk audio products when constructing their agency consciously to manage it in relation to their environment (e.g. to avoid noises of the city, or to escape the repetitive elements of urban life), and to manage their inner reality inside their heads (e.g. manage their thoughts and feelings, avoiding feelings of loneliness, escaping to an imaginary place). Young people also constructed their agency less-consciously in order to manage their mood but they, in part, struggled to express how. By comparing talk audio use to music listening, the students described to attain a “normal” level of mood and thoughts instead of strong emotional states they get when listening to music. When choosing between music and talk audio products, the students aimed to attain a mood that was, in their minds, suitable for the current or future social situation. With talk audio, the interviewees describe getting a chance for a change of thoughts to feel less stressful or to gain perspective on their daily issues through the talk audio content and voice of the talk audio host. The young people also describe finding perspective e.g. on political topics from talk audio, while they also simultaneously learn, are entertained, get information and develop their social skills. The perspectives and information the students described to receive through talk audio were always curated by the talk audio host(s). All of the young people also said to have experienced talk audio products as distinctively personal and intimate. In contrast to music use, they described it to “feel strange” to listen together, and they only listened to talk audio alone or with a significant other. According to previous literature on radio and podcasts, the sense of ‘being there’ in a talk audio product can create a sense of a two-way communication for the audience. The relationship my informants described with talk audio hosts was perceived as distinctively personal; many would describe how they would feel being addressed exclusively or that they would take part in the discussions themselves. They also described talk audio to be more “authentic” than other mediums (e.g. in comparison to social media). With these findings I argue that the primary material for constructing agency through talk audio use builds from, in light of this data, the perceived relationship the listeners have with the talk audio host. The young people would describe talk audio hosts of something similar as talking or hanging out with friends or having a mentor. The phenomenon of an always-available human-presence decreased the level of loneliness for some participants and thus extended their sociality with technologically mediated content. Nevertheless, since the talk audio hosts are mostly unaware of the listeners’ reactions to their content, the social encounter is controlled solely by the listeners, unlike in a traditional interpersonal encounter. This creates one form of agency the students build with talk audio; a form of parasocial agency.

Algorithms are effective data processing programs, which are being applied in an increasing amount of contexts and areas of our lives. One such context is that of our working lives, where algorithms are being adapted to take over tasks previously performed by human workers. This has sparked the discussion about capabilities and agency of algorithmic technology, and also whether or not technology will be replacing the human workforce. Public discussion has actively taken part in constructing both opportunities and fears related to algorithmic technology, but very little research exists about the impact of algorithmic technology at work. A lot of discussion has also centered around the agency of algorithms, as due to the advances in technology, agency is no longer something only only assigned to, or possessed by human actors. While some research has been done on the construction of algorithm agency, very little research has been conducted to explore the phenomena in the context of work. Research about adapting algorithms in companies is very scarce, and the gap in this research is especially crucial due to its lack of research from a social scientific perspective. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how algorithmic agency (or lack thereof) is constructed in the discourse of five employees of an IT company that has applied an algorithm in their operations. I further want to investigate what consequences these constructs have on the work of the employees and the flow of agency in the company. The theoretical and methodological framework is rooted in social constructionism and discursive psychology and the analysis focuses on the construction of accounts of agency in the context. In order to answer the research questions I have conducted a semi-structured focused interview with each of the recruited employees. The results show that algorithmic agency is constructed in multifaceted ways and several constructs of agency coexist in the discourse of the employees. The agency is constructed as an independent actor with agency, but that this agency is also restricted by its human developers and operational staff intervening in its decisions. While accounts for algorithmicx agency exist, agency is also constructed as something possessed by the developers and company, who develop the algorithm in order to reach certain goals. The results also show that the algorithm is constructed as an enabler and restrictor to human agency, but that the adaptation of the algorithm has also created new flows of agency, where agency flows from human to algorithm and vice versa. This thesis contributes to previous research on agency, algorithms and work by taking a contemporary, employee-centric perspective on agency, not yet taken by previous research. In order to take into account the dynamic processes of agency when adapting algorithmic technology in companies, an extensive social scientific perspective is needed to inform organizational change. In order to achieve this, more qualitative research is needed to further understand the impact of automation on agency and other interpersonal dynamics.