Glossary of Terms Used in Papergirls

Globalization

“refers to the current transformation of the world economy the reduction of national barriers to trade and investment, the expansion of telecommunications and information systems, the growth of off-shore financial markets, the increasing role of multinational enterprises, the explosion of mergers and acquisitions, global inter-firm networking arrangements and alliances, regional economic integration and the development of a single unified global market. The phenomenon of globalization is accompanied by increasing international mobility the migration of workers, the growth of tourism and the increasing ease of international travel (Leary 1998:265).” More. For more background reading see The Economist.

HDI (Human Development Index)

is comprised of three equally weighted sub-indices: a life expectancy index (based on life expectancy at birth), an education index (based on adult literacy, school enrollment and university enrollment), and a GDP index (based on GDP per capita in US dollars at purchasing power parity). The authors compare how subjective states such as happiness, satisfaction, with life which depend on qualia (folk psychology) can be used as datasets to decide the ranking of countries in terms of Human Development not just Economic Development. Different studies use different datasets. Eg, World Values Survey (Leigh and Wolfers 2005).

Memory work

is a process of engaging with the past which has both an ethical and historical dimension (Gabriel 2004). The premise for memory work or travail de memoire is that history is not memory. We try to represent the past in the present through memory, history and the archives. As Ricoeur (1955 [1965], 2000) argued, memory alone is fallible. Historical accounts are always partial and potentially misrepresent since historians do not work with bare, uninterpreted facts. Historians construct and use archives that contain traces of the past. However, historians and librarians determine which traces are preserved and stored. This is an interpretive activity. Historians pose questions to which the archives responds leading them to “facts that can be asserted in singular, discrete propositions that usually include dates, places, proper names, and verbs of action or condition” (Ricoeur 2000:226).

Folksonomies to develop

Social Justice,

Leary, Virginia A. 1998. “Globalization and Human Rights.” In Symonides, Janusz (Ed.) Human Rights: New Dimensions and Challenges: Manual on Human Rights. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Dartmouth Publishing Company Ltd. / UNESCO Publishing. pp. 265-276.

2007. “Rich man, poor man.” The Economist. Jan 18th 2007. Accessed January 18, 2007.

Leigh, Andrew, Wolfers, Justin. 2005. “Critique of Blanchflower and Oswald (2005) “Happiness and the Human Development Index”: Australia Is Not a Paradox,” The Australian Economic Review. 39: 2: 176–84.