School-based linguistic and cultural revitalization as a local practice: Sakha language education in the city of Yakutsk,Russian Federation

In the 1990s, efforts were launched in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) in the Russian Federation to support the revival of Sakha (Yakut) language education. This interdisciplinary study examines the evolution of school-based Sakha language education in the city of Yakutsk over a 25-year period beginning with the launching of the first reforms in the 1990s. Language education reform in the capital city has been shaped by a dynamic interplay between federal, regional, and local factors. Grassroots social and cultural activism continues to play a key role in school-based language revitalization in Yakutsk, influencing how policies have been received and implemented at the local level. Local community stakeholders are working together to counteract federal education policies, which direct school resources away from minority language education. This case study shows that the Sakha (Yakut) language revival has taken root in the capital city, and it provides important evidence that civic activism continues to develop in urban areas of the republic.     

Addressing the Needs of Survivors of Torture: A Pilot Test of the Psychosocial Well-Being Index

Survivors of torture experience numerous psychosocial stressors that threaten individual well-being in resettlement. This study reports findings from a pilot test that applied the newly developed Survivors of Torture Psychosocial Well-Being Index. The study used a case-level mixed design to assess survivor psychosocial well-being across 16 life domains from intake up to 18 months. Ecological systems theory grounds this study. Participants demonstrated increased well-being as evidenced by statistically significant change on the mean ratings of their total scores. Three case examples illustrate the instrument. Practice applications, lessons learned, study limitations, and future directions are presented.     

A Mixed Methods Exploratory Examination of Victim Injury and Death: Effect of Weapon Type and Victim Resistance During Sexual Assaults by Strangers

Extending prior research regarding victim injury during sexual assault, the current study employed mixed-methods sequential explanatory research design to identify predictors of victim injury and victim death in 361 attempted and completed sexual assaults committed by 72 repeat sex offenders who assaulted strangers. Results from multinomial path analysis indicated that being female and offender coercion increased the likelihood of victim resistance, which in turn elevated the likelihood of victim injury. Divergent from the predictors of victim injury, the risk of victim death increased with victim age, offender alcohol use, and offender weapon possession. Exploratory analyses suggest that certain weapons resulted in higher probability of victim injury or victim death within the context of victim resistance. Exploratory analysis of qualitative data indicated that crime event order was not uniform—in some cases victim resistance preceded victim injury and in some assaults victim injury occurred prior to or was unrelated to victim resistance. The study findings highlight the need for further investigation of victim survival strategies when offenders possess different types of weapons.     

gendering creolisation: creolising affect

Drawing on (auto)ethnographic research—on the process of becoming a marathon swimmer, this paper argues that conventional characterisations of marathon swimming as being ‘80 per cent mental and 20 per cent physical’ reprise a mind–body split that at worst excludes women and at best holds them to a masculine standard. This in turn draws the focus towards sensory deprivation, bodily suffering and overcoming, to the exclusion of the pleasures of swimming, beyond the expected ones such as the challenge of swim completion. By exploring instead the ‘shifted sensorium’ of marathon swimming, and examples of the autotelic pleasures of swimming, this paper argues that training changes the way swimming body feels, and that it is these changes that enable a swimmer to feel ‘at home’ in an environment to which it does not naturally belong. This focus on the sensory aspects of swimming, and its unexpected pleasures, both highlights the ways in which those pleasures do not flow unproblematically to women, and brings to light alternative and politically provocative ways of experiencing the gendered sporting body. This highlights the contingency, however constrained, of even the most entrenched ways of thinking about bodies, both within and outside sport.