Bootlegging: A career caught between fantasy and reality*

This essay considers the seemingly opposing stances of basic knowledge‐building and policy‐driven research. It does so by reviewing the author's involvement in a series of criminological activities on both sides of the issue. He prefers to pose as a knowledge builder, but he admits to seduction by policy concerns.     

Australia

European Journal of Political Research -     

Recidivism and Psychiatric Symptom Outcomes in a Juvenile Mental Health Court

Few researchers have examined outcomes in Juvenile Mental Health Courts. Recidivism rates were assessed among 108 predominantly African American (95.3%) youth. Ages ranged from 12 to 18 (M = 15.85, SD = 1.45). Substantially fewer re‐convictions, along with re‐arrests, were exhibited among the treatment group (n = 54) compared to the control group (n = 54) after one year of participation or probation supervision. Psychiatric symptomatology among 21 youth was assessed pre‐ and post‐ intervention using the Comprehensive Behavior Rating Scales‐Self Report. Cohen's d effect sizes indicated substantial reductions in mental health symptoms (.33 ≥ d ≤ .88). Results are consistent with the previous studies of problem‐solving court efficacy.     

Mukulabhaṭṭa’s Defense of Lakṣaṇā: How We Use Words to Mean Something Else, But Not Everything Else

We frequently use single words or expressions to mean multiple things, depending upon context. I argue that a plausible model of this phenomenon, known as lak?a?ā by Indian philosophers, emerges in the work of ninth-century Kashmiri Mukulabha??a. His model of lak?a?ā is sensitive to the lexical and syntactic requirements for sentence meaning, the interpretive unity guiding a communicative act, and the nuances of creative language use found in poetry. After outlining his model of lak?a?ā, I show how arthāpatti, or presumption, forms the basis of both semantic and pragmatic processes in this approach. I employ a model from contemporary linguist James Pustejovsky as one way of reconstructing Mukulabha??a’s analysis. Finally, I argue that presumption is responsible for the wide range of interpretations in creative uses of language, and that our interpretations are constrained, through defeasible in a way that our decodings of literal meanings typically are not.