By Adam J. Pearson (2021) A. Introduction: Demystifying and Clarifying an Essential Term of Contemporary Discourse In the current political climate, both people on the right and people on the left are increasingly referring to each other as Fascists. Ironically, however, despite their well-meaning intentions, many people tend to use the term so loosely that…
Aligning with the Source: Unlocking Hidden Meanings of “Worship” in Ancient Hebrew, Greek, and English
By Adam J. Pearson “Whoever gives reverence, Receives reverence.” ~ Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī in the Masnavi-i Ma’navi (Persian: مثنوی معنوی) (Sidek, 2015). A Brief Introduction to the Idea of Worship in Postmodern Context: Recovering a Key to Wise Living and Right Relationship with Being “Worship” is a fascinating concept that has in some ways become foreign to contemporary…
Towards an Informationist Post-Metaphysic
By Adam J. Pearson I recently came to the conclusion that the universe is not fundamentally composed of ‘matter,’ at its explanatory bottom, but rather of information, indeed a field of infinite potential and informational possibilities that manifest as finite actualities within universes constrained by discrete sets of physical constants and universal principles (“laws of…
Life Beyond the Fall: A Literature Review and Comparative Analysis of Two Qualitative and Quantitative Studies on Risks of Falls in Older Adults
By Adam J. Pearson Introduction: Hazards of the Fall Expressing a perennial sentiment common to many older adults, one 94 year-old participant in Yardley et al.’s (2006) qualitative study reported that “Before my fall, I never thought twice about moving around my home. Since I fell and broke my hip, though, things have changed; I…
“Modernity has Failed Us:” The 1975’s “Love It If We Made It” as a Commentary on Three Contemporary Social Trends with Concrete Policy Implications
By Adam J. Pearson An Introduction to Modern Failures: Social Policy and The 1975’s“Love It If We Made it” The perennial role of the artist is to reach deeply into the ethos of a culture or the zeitgeist of an age and manifest its core essence in creative form. In their 2018 single “Love It…
Eight Forms of Opposition to Making Community Change and How to Tackle Them
By Adam J. Pearson Introduction As I researched the processes by which community groups attempted to make change in community practice, particularly when it comes to doing anti-oppressive practice work, one theme came strongly to the forefront. This is the theme of opposition to change and it directly ties into many of the examples we have…
6 Key Domains of Macro Social Work Practice
By Adam J. Pearson Introduction Social Work was designed from its onset to operate on multiple levels at once. At the greatest extremes of scale, we have micro-level clinical work with individuals, couples, and families and work on the macro-level large structures of cities, provinces, nations, and international coalitions. As I prepared for a project in…
Emotional Labour in Work With Older Adults and Palliative Care
By Adam J. Pearson In “Can Emotional Labour Be Fun?” Arlie Russel Hochschild poses a question as incisive as it is relevant to our own discipline of social work. Hochschild defines emotional labour as “the work of trying to feel the appropriate feeling for a job either by evoking or suppressing feelings — a task…
Cooking Up Empowerment: My Experience Creating, Running, and Teaching a Culinary Training Program for Teenagers with Severe Special Needs
By Adam J. Pearson In 2016, I received a phone call from a Vice Principal at the school at which I had previously worked as a Resource Teacher of Mathematics, English, Ethics and Religious Culture, and History, focusing my educational work on adolescents with severe behavioural needs and emotional, intellectual, and developmental disabilities. At this…
Person-Centered in Letter or Spirit?: A Review of Three Articles on Applications of Person-Centered Care with Older Adults in Long-Term Residential Care Facilities
By Adam J. Pearson Introduction: Person-Centered Care in Residential Settings for Older Adults In recent years, researchers have critiqued medical bureaucracies and institutions’ tendencies to reduce short-term patients and long-term residents alike to numbers, depersonalized medical problems, statistics, chunks of time, waitlist positions, or mere occupiers of beds to be discharged as soon as possible…
