Marginalised Groups

In 2016 the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) commissioned the development of guidelines on national disaster risk assessment (NDRA) as part of a series of thematic guidelines under its “Words into Action” initiative to support national implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030.

The present Guidelines are the result of the collaboration between over 100 leading experts from national authorities, international organizations, non-governmental organizations, academia, think tanks and private-sector entities. They focus on Sendai Framework’s first Priority for Action: Understanding Disaster Risk, which is the basis for all measures on disaster risk reduction and is closely linked to the other three Priorities for Action.

This chapter takes the reader on a journey along the circuitous path of the Safai Karamchari Andolan case, filed as a writ petition/ PIL in the Supreme Court of India in 2005, which was treated as a continuing mandamus for almost a decade until it was finally disposed of through a detailed judgment in 2014. The judgment recognised, for the first time, that the practice of manual scavenging was a form of untouchability, and therefore in violation of Article 17 of the Indian Constitution. This was an important milestone for Dalit rights in Indian jurisprudence. The journey to this place was long and hard, which the writer details.

Financial technology (Fintech) is revolutionising the banking and finance sector at an inimitable pace. The concept of market and consumer has shifted dramatically to a new level as technology emerged in financial services industry. However, such service is not familiar among the marginalised people as it involves technology and cost. Scheduled tribes in India have been viewed as the most distraught social group subject to age-old financial and social hardships. Financial literacy on financial services has been shown to be a crucial factor in making effective decisions and choices regarding finance. This paper tries to examine both overall and category wise financial literacy of scheduled tribes in Kerala with special emphasis on gender. It uses primary data of 393 tribal respondents from seven tribal communities across the most three tribally populated districts. It observed that, there are disarrays in the use of fintech services among tribes. The tribal community has not been able to find satisfactory literacy in fintech services. But they have a healthy knowledge on other basic financial and banking services, and women often outperform men in this regard

The cagots were a poorly understood marginalised group found on both sides of the western Pyrenees. They started to become prominent from the thirteenth century before largely disappearing in the twentieth century. This paper describes a curious incident in Biarritz in 1721. To explain what happened, it gallops over 500 years of history to examine the reasons cagots faced discrimination. In doing so it considers the ambiguity of medieval leprosy, the rise of the persecuting society, changing attitudes to poverty, defiled trades, the birth of racism, Jews and violence, Gypsies and assimilation, honour and pollution and conflict between communities and the state.

Although scholars of Somali Studies have engaged themselves in examining the Somali society from several perspectives, colonial and early Somali writers mainly observed the Somali people as homogenous, egalitarian and nomadic pastoral. Themes on multi-ethnicity, multiculturalism, and linguistic diversity were ignored as topics that sully the myth of the selfsame ideology colorfully embroidered in the official historiography. The notion also deluded pioneering Somali scholars from critically studying their people and analyzing colonial writing; at least not beyond the western scholars' knowledge boundary. Accordingly, the Horn of Africa was exemplified as a unique African nation where citizens enjoy equality and share an all-in-one identity: culturally, ethnically, historically, and linguistically. Contrary to that notion, though, the everyday social situation makes the primordial ideology of selfsameness unsustainable. To establish the evidence, this essay discusses about how the Bantu Jareer agrarian community, a section among the different groups of subalterns in the country, views its environment and social space within the boundary of deeply offensive segregation by an extremely suppressive Somali society.

The history of Northeast India is the history of ethnic self-determination whose seeds have been rooted by the crown and the company. The demands for separate geographical space for the native Ethnic community are the outcome of British administrative arrangement which created a exclusive-geographical boundary among the ethnically different communities of northeast India. It was the background on which the entire northeastern states were seen bifurcated in different homelands in post independent period. The demands have created a vicious cycle among almost all the communities who started demanding for a unique geo-political arrangement which is often an outcome of the reference point they made in terms of other. The state however has recognized the inherent differences among the communities to an extent which resultsinto the creation of northeast that one noticed today. It was again a fact that ethnic contestation often led to a mass violence involving two distinctly different communities which completely jeopardize the process of coexistence among the communities. Therefore, the present paper tries to highlight the demands for autonomy among the hill tribes and plain tribes and their trajectory in different forms and ends. The paper adopted a methodology which is analytical and the necessary references to the resources have been made from secondary sources.

Abstract: Dattani is one of the prominent exponents of Indian drama in English (IDE), especially with his contributions in the 90s India when the drama of roots has already made its presence felt and postcolonial studies began a culture study of reclaiming spaces and places, asserting cultural integrity, revising history while questioning the aspects of subversion. This paper is an attempt on how Dattani has responded to the concept of marginality in Indian social construct in the 80s onward when Indian society has made its mark as the largest democracy in the world, yet reeling under several vexing issues, one of them being the problem of social inequality of which marginality forms part of it. He has taken up the taboo subjects like eunuchs, gay/lesbian relations, inter-caste marriages and, gender discriminations. A select drama has been taken up as to show the condition of subaltarnity of the marginalised groups and how the dramatist has struck the conscience of the society by exposing the hypocrisy of the middle class urban Indian society. The deft use of English as a hybrid form of indigenous language has been a powerful tool in showing the conditions of marginality and class identity. Keywords: Marginalization, Postcolonial, Subaltern, Hierarchy, Gender, Sexuality, Hegemony

In an increasingly globalized world, global culture may constitute an alternative cultural resource, especially for members of ethnic minority groups who have often been described as marginalized in acculturation research. In the present study, we investigated the role that global identity may play for the self-concept and the psychological and sociocultural adaptation of ethnic minority members, especially those who score high on marginalization. We explored these relationships in 848 European Muslim minority members. Marginalized participants showed lower ethnic identity but the same or even stronger global identity compared with nonmarginalized participants. No difference in sociocultural adaptation was observed between nonmarginalized participants and marginalized individuals, when the latter expressed strong global identification. Moreover, in terms of ethnic discrimination, increasing one's global identity was related to better psychological adaptation compared with increasing one's ethnic identity, although coefficients remained small. Based on our results, we, in line with other researchers, argue for a reevaluation and differentiation of the concept "marginalization," which has mostly been viewed in negative terms. Additional available cultural resources, such as global identity, may offset the negative relation between marginalization and adaptation and may mediate the effect of ethnic discrimination on psychological adaptation.

Abstract: Dattani is one of the prominent exponents of Indian drama in English (IDE), especially with his contributions in the 90s India when the drama of roots has already made its presence felt and postcolonial studies began a culture study of reclaiming spaces and places, asserting cultural integrity, revising history while questioning the aspects of subversion. This paper is an attempt on how Dattani has responded to the concept of marginality in Indian social construct in the 80s onward when Indian society has made its mark as the largest democracy in the world, yet reeling under several vexing issues, one of them being the problem of social inequality of which marginality forms part of it. He has taken up the taboo subjects like eunuchs, gay/lesbian relations, inter-caste marriages and, gender discriminations. A select drama has been taken up as to show the condition of subaltarnity of the marginalised groups and how the dramatist has struck the conscience of the society by exposing the hypocrisy of the middle class urban Indian society. The deft use of English as a hybrid form of indigenous language has been a powerful tool in showing the conditions of marginality and class identity.
Keywords: Marginalization, Postcolonial, Subaltern, Hierarchy, Gender, Sexuality, Hegemony

The emergence of nomadic education as an important sub-system of the formal educational system in many African countries is the direct consequence of the state's commitment to equalizing educational opportunities for all social groups irrespective of ethnic or geographical origins, gender, or social class. In Nigeria, a special educational program is being implemented for two migrant groups, namely the nomadic pastoralists and the migrant "shermen. The major purposes of this chapter are to:

: Intolerance and discrimination towards sexual minorities are a worldwide phenomenon. India’s transformation from a prejudiced and stigmatized country to a minority friendly society is a worth speculating. People of sexual minorities, and their rights, once recognized in past are more likely to face harassment, threat of violence, moral policing because of the lack of social acceptance and legal recognition. LGBT people, as members of a social minority group, are suffering from various forms of socio-economic and cultural injustices which in turn make them vulnerable to mental health problems. But this highly significant aspect is understudied by the academia and the policy makers. This article is the first attempt to explore the impact of law, society and culture on the mental health of LGBT community in India.

RESUMO
Esta pesquisa analisa o processo de marginalização dos mouros à época de Afonso X, rei de Castela e Leão (1252-1284), quando os movimentos de reconquista e repoblación marcavam fortemente esta sociedade, que consolidava uma identidade fronteiriça, mas acima de tudo cristã. Através de um extenso projeto político-cultural, o rei sábio fundou uma escrita do poder, que incluía uma vasta produção narrativo-historiográfica (Cantigas de Santa Maria, Primera Crónica General e General Estoria) e jurídico-normativa (sobretudo Siete Partidas, Fuero Real e Setenario), entendidas aqui como orientadoras de distintas representações e práticas sociais. Neste corpo social, cujo centro era cristão, os outros eram postos na esfera da subordinação. Interessa aqui o caso dos moros d’España. Estes teriam interrompido a glória do passado visigótico com sua chegada em terras hispânicas, vivenciando ao longo do século XIII uma condição de marginalidade – conceito marcado pelas contribuições de Bronislaw Geremek e Jean-Claude Schmitt. Buscou-se explicar os mecanismos régios utilizados no trato desta coexistência ambígua – durante um reinado muitas vezes dito tolerante, em que os mouros estariam às margens da Cristandade.

ABSTRACT

This research analyzes the process of marginalization of the moors at the time of Alfonso X, king of Castille and Leon (1252-1284), when the movements of reconquista and repoblación deeply marked this society, giving it a frontier identity, but above all a Christian one. Through an extensive political-cultural project, the Wise king founded a writing of power, which included a vast narrative-historiographical production (Cantigas de Santa Maria, Primera Crónica General and General Estoria) and an also broad juridical-normative one (particularly  Siete Partidas, Fuero Real and Setenario). These works are here understood as means of directing social representations and practices. In this social body, whose center was Christian, the others were put into subordination, like the moros d’España. These were accused of having interrupted the glory of the visigothic past, living throughout the XIII century under the sign of marginality – a concept related to the contributions of Bronislaw Geremek and Jean-Claude Schmitt. It is intended, here, to explain the royal mechanisms used in the dealing with this ambigüous coexistence – during a kingdom many times seen as tolerant, in which the moors would be at the margins of Christianity.

RESUMEN
Esta pesquisa analiza el proceso de marginalización de los moros a la época de Alfonso X, rey de Castilla y León (1252-1284), cuando los movimientos de reconquista y repoblación marcaban fuertemente esta sociedad – que consolidaba una identidad fronteriza, pero sobre todo cristiana. A través de un extenso proyecto político-cultural, el rey sabio fundó una escrita del poder, que incluya una vasta producción narrativo-historiográfica (Cantigas de Santa Maria, Primera Crónica General y General Estoria) y jurídico-normativa (particularmente  Siete Partidas, Fuero Real e Setenario), aquí comprendidas como ordenadoras de distintas representaciones y prácticas sociales. En este cuerpo social, cuyo centro era cristiano, los otros eran puestos en la esfera de la subordinación. Interesa, aquí, el caso de los moros d’España. Estos terían  interrumpido la gloria del pasado visigótico con su llegada a tierras hispánicas, sufriendo al largo del siglo XIII una condición de marginalidad – concepto marcado por las contribuciones de Bronislaw Geremek e Jean-Claude Schmitt. Buscóse explicar los mecanismos regios utilizados en el trato de esta coexistencia ambigua – durante un reinado muchas vezes dicho tolerante, en el cual los moros estarían a las márgenes de la Cristiandad.

Without conducting much analysis on the multiethnic texture of the country, colonial ethnographers and ethnohistorians obsessed with the ideology of ‘Somali homogeneity’, and stakeholders of the nationalist sentiments of self-same Somalia successfully demonstrated the Horn of Africa nation as an ‘egalitarian’ society pursuing a cultural mode of ‘pastoral democracy.’1 To break away from that
erroneous diction, this essay aims at problematizing the vagueness of that notion by introducing a counter narrative that unravels not only the existence of other ethnic groups and cultures but also an enormous nature of subjugation, prejudice and discrimination-factors antithetical to the ideals of egalitarianism. For the sake of unlearning that early and enduring misinterpretation, this essay presents an
account of the discrimination against the Bantu/Jareer people and their place in the Somali social and political system. It attempts at offering a realistic situation as compared to the idealistic image of the colonial writers’ and early Somali scholarship’s self-same tutelage. At another level, the revelation in the study challenges the fallacy in
Prof. Lidwien Kapteijns’s recently formed discourse that the Bantu Jareer people benefited significant political and economic consideration in independent Somali, an extremely mendacious concoction which, despite being absent from the available literature, Prof. Kapteijns’s work shied away from producing empirically based,
factual evidence to support her argument (M. Eno, 2013b:21-31). In its general scope, the study intends to contribute to the principle of “understand[ing] Somalia for what it is and not what it ought to be” (Kusow 2004: xii).

Within Indonesia, atheism is highly stigmatised and public expressions of nonbelief can have severe social and legal consequences. For this reason, many nonbelievers have taken to the internet to express their opinions and beliefs in a safe environment and to receive support from others in their situation. This is a common practice among marginalised communities for whom the internet offers a freedom and sense of empowerment which they are otherwise denied. This thesis analyses the online community Indonesian Atheists (IA) as a case study for the use of the internet as a tool for empowerment by marginalised communities. I argue that by providing validation, support and an opportunity to reclaim the dialogue on their experience, virtual communities of marginalised people empower their members and create important counter-discourse which constitutes a meaningful and overlooked form of activism.

This is a poem written on a mother and her daughter's painful journey for collecting the dowry.

Citation:  Morve Roshan K. (January 2018). “Pain in the Body,” English poem Internationa Journal: Kafla Intercontinental, Vol XXIV, No. 1-3 (2017). ISSN-2278-1625. RNI No. CHA-ENG/1994/235. Page: 56.

Abstract In Southeast Asia, archaeological research has recently shown that the earliest centralised polities qualifying as incipient States emerged by the late 5th and early 4th c. BCE (Kim, 2013; Stark, 2015; Bellina, 2017, 2018). Understanding of their hinterland is still very limited. This essay presents the results of a regional study conducted since 2005 in the Isthmus of Kra in the Thai-Malay Peninsula, a narrow piece of land located between the Bay of Bengal and the South China Sea. It argues that in this region, Maritime Silk Road incipient trading states’ emergence went along economic specialisation, cultural differentiation and cooperation between different groups participating in local and long-distance networks. Amongst these so-called “marginal” groups emerge “sea nomads”. Like those described in historical and ethnographic sources some of which are referred to here, these early sea nomads appeared to have already played a crucial economic and political role as part of these maritime trading polities hinterland. Along with an archaeology of sea nomadism, this study opens perspectives on reconstructing a more complete narrative of Southeast Asia and beyond of the Maritime Silk Road, a narrative that integrates marginal groups.

Representation is the language that is used to communicate a meaning, which is subject to change, and hence it is not fixed. ‘Informality’ in this study refers to informal and unplanned spaces such as slums, squatter settlements and favelas. The central focus is to investigate how ‘informality’ is represented and more specifically, to understand how it’s poetics and politics are manifested in these myriad representations. The term ‘poetics’ is defined as an internal articulation of the meaning of a theory or concept by the display of existing practices (of informality). Whereas, ‘politics’, a more commonly used terminology in both theory and practice, is the constructed meaning of a particular concept (in or of theory); the change in power relations through the production of social knowledge. This study uses ‘informal spaces’ as a concept to navigate the various attributes and perplexities of its representation. The poetics and politics of representing informality characterise the contested nature of both representation and informality, especially between those represented (slums) and the ways (media, arts, policies) in which the social forces (state, NGOs, planners) represent them. The research uses the slum narratives of Dharavi, India to exemplify the contested interplay of both the poetics and the politics of representing informality.

This handbook (1,8 MB; PDF) identifies principles and policy mechanisms to advance community-based learning for sustainable development, based on the commitments endorsed by the participants of the Kominkan-CLC International Conference on Education for Sustainable Development, which was held in Okayama City, Japan, in October 2014. To inform policymakers and practitioners new to this field, the handbook clarifies the international vision and goals for sustainable development and Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), and identifies the potential contributions of community-based learning centres and organizations. It documents both policy and practice from different regions and concludes with a summary of principles and policy support mechanisms.

COVID-19 is deepening pre-existing inequalities. Emerging research suggests that people with disabilities across the world have experienced various rights violations and been disproportionality affected by the health, economic and social impacts of the pandemic and responses to it. The aim of this research was to better understand how people with disabilities who are often excluded from research have experienced the evolving COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh and Nepal. In order to better understand how it has affected some of the most marginalised groups of people with disabilities, this study used in-depth qualitative research to focus on people with intellectual, psychosocial, deafblindness and other multiple impairments.

Education is integral to the inclusive, peaceful and sustained development of a society. If education is equitable and of good quality, it can ensure the participation of marginalised groups in the development process more broadly, thereby reducing social inequalities. Without attention paid to equitable access, learning opportunities and quality learning outcomes, education can entrench existing inequalities within societies. To create more inclusive and just societies, it is thus crucial to leave no one behind (LNOB) in education. While the right to education is recognised as a universal human right, an estimated 262 million school-age children, adolescents and youth (between 6 and 17 years) were denied this right in 2017. This means one in every five school-age children, adolescents and youth are out of school. At primary school level, some 64 million 6 to 11-year old children are not in school. Some 61 million adolescents aged 12 to 14 years are not enrolled in lower secondary school. At upper secondary school level, some 139 million youth between the ages of 15 to 17 are out of school. These figures are increasing as the fast growing youth population, particularly in least developed countries, is adding pressure on already weak education systems.

Diversity management has appeared on the global business agenda over the last 20 years – however, some leading-edge companies like SABMiller have been charting the waters in this field since the late 1970s. In the Baltics, though, as well as other emerging economies, this is still a very new concept. For the most part, unfortunately, Western companies have opted to either implement the minimum requirements, normally driven through law and legislation in a company, eg implement demographic targets to be achieved, or focused narrowly on context-relevant multi-culturalism. The fundamental flaw is that too much of the focus has been on how to efficiently box people into typically geographic cultural categories, and then seek to manage then through those lenses – as opposed to fully embracing the uncertainty of diversity.

Using  the  case  of  Sexual  and  Reproductive  Health  Strategy  in  Aotearoa  (New  Zealand),  this  article  interrogates  the dominant  risk  discourse  in  sexual  and  reproductive  health  policy.  It  highlights  the  tensions  between  risk  discourse  and broader  equity  goals,  which  are  increasingly  seen  as  significant  within  sexual  and  reproductive  health.  Working  within  a poststructuralist  perspective,  discursive  methodology  is  used  to  explore  the  positioning  of  youth  in  ten  (10)  policy documents.  The  analysis  shows  how  the  risk  discourse,  along  with  a  developmental  discourse,  creates  three  common youth  subject  positions:  youth  as  at  risk  and  vulnerable,  as  not-yet  citizens,  and  as  especially  vulnerable  relative  to  other young  people.  It  demonstrates  how  these  positions  may  be  associated  with  ‘new’  or  covert  forms  of  morality  and stigmatisation.  Detailing  the  implications  for  ethnic  minorities  in  particular,  it  adds  to  prior  analyses  of  gender-  and class-based  inequities.  The  Sexual  and  Reproductive  Justice  framework,  which  encompasses  notions  of  rights  and justice, is discussed as an alternative to risk-based policy development that can attend to sexual and reproductive health inequities.

Автор рассматривает негативные социально-психологические факторы формирования маргинальных молодых людей в современном российском обществе. Автор приходит к выводам, что развитие социальной деструктивности связано с нехваткой легальных институциональных каналов социальной мобильности.

COVID-19 is deepening pre-existing inequalities. Emerging research suggests that people with disabilities across the world have experienced various rights violations and been disproportionality affected by the health, economic and social impacts of the pandemic and responses to it. The aim of this research was to better understand how people with disabilities who are often excluded from research have experienced the evolving COVID-19 pandemic in Bangladesh and Nepal. In order to better understand how it has affected some of the most marginalised groups of people with disabilities, this study used in-depth qualitative research to focus on people with intellectual, psychosocial, deafblindness and other multiple impairments.

This study examined the presence of dominant literacy and the pedagogical scaffolding in an English Language learning classroom of an alternative school in Malaysia. Focusing on street children, two questions were stipulated to guide the research process: (1) What are the dominant practices vis-a-vis English language literacy present during teaching and learning session? and (2) How does the facilitator provide scaffolding for the students in acquiring the dominant practices of English literacy?. An observation was conducted at the research site and the data gathered was thematically analysed using the operative paradigms of New Literacy Studies and Hegemony. Consequently, it was found that the alternative school’s learning system showed an inclination towards autonomous practices. However, the scaffolding efforts made by the instructor managed to fairly bridge the knowledge gap between the education system and the students. This research therefore advocates that alternative school’...

One of the most dominant educational issues of the past two decades in the Third World has been the widespread concern that despite decades of educational expansion in nearly every country there are significant social groups that have very limited access to education. ...

The Bhopal gas tragedy is one of the most
terrible event in the history of India. This
accident turned the city into a gas chamber.
The shockwaves of the disaster were heard
all over the world. It stunned the whole
humanity on the planet. There are some
documented works which may throw more
light on dark sides of the tragedy. One of
such works on Bhopal accident is 'Surviving
Bhopal: Dancing Bodies, Written Texts and
Oral testimonials of Women in the Wake of
an Industrial Disaster” by Mukherjee S.,
published in 2010. This research paper, is
analytical review of this book.

There have been numerous initiatives to increase access to higher education for those residing in marginalised locales in Wales. However, entrance in itself does not guarantee success and it is important for educators and policy makers to explore issues of retention. Classed and relational positionings often conflict with non-traditional students’ education trajectories and sometimes contribute to their withdrawal from academia. In response to this challenge the current paper focuses on the accounts of non-traditional students in Communities First [1] areas who took an undergraduate social science module with The Open University in Wales. Importantly, rather than reading these barriers to progression as students’ individual difficulties, the paper considers how educational cultures can create and perpetuate disadvantage. Exploring students’ accounts of pedagogy and administration, the paper focuses on online provision in distance learning and offers a range of strategies that could potentially improve the delivery of an Open University module and students’ experiences in future presentations.

This article is a review of On Madness and the Demand for Recognition: A philosophical inquiry into identity and mental health activism by Dr Mohammed Abouelleil Rashed (Oxford University Press, 2019), a psychiatrist-turned-philosopher. It is also a provocation, and how ‘soft and pure’ disciplines must take the lead to enrich our repertoire in how we think about ourselves and others today. The article appeared on the BMJ Medical Humanities blog.

On October 30, 2016, a solidarity meeting was organised by Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Student Union demanding justice for Najeeb Ahmed, a student missing from the campus for the last 23 days. From my social location as a Muslim/ OBC/ male student, I support the protest movement for Najeeb Ahmed in JNU and believe strongly in building alliance with various democratic forces in the campus and outside as well. However, there is a serious violation of democratic representation when the protest movement for Najeeb Ahmed became another sphere of exclusion of Muslims and other marginalised voices. The argument is that there is a resonance between the physical disappearance of Najeeb Ahmed and the symbolic disappearance of Muslim voice – along with other marginalised-from the solidarity movement for Najeeb Ahmed.

Gender Responsive Budgeting is a process of gender mainstreaming, being adopted by the various governments of the world. This report is based on a study of GRB and marginalized women in India, Bangladesh and Nepal. The study attempts to review the GRB processes, looks into the monitoring mechanisms and tries to analyze the GRB process in these three south Asian countries from the perspective of the four groups of marginalized women – dalit women, indigenous or adivasi women, single women and women in the unorganized sector.

The needs and experiences of people with disabilities have largely been ignored during the Covid-19 pandemic, despite Article 11 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) stating that governments must ensure the protection and safety of persons with disabilities. Evidence shows that feelings of destabilisation, disorientation, and uncertainty are linked to loss of income; poverty; food insecurity; lack of access to information, health care, education, livelihoods and support; increased gender-and impairment-related conflict; as well as exacerbated discrimination. Governments and agencies need to develop disability-inclusive policies and actions to be implemented during emergencies, and it is important that people with disabilities are consulted.-Using qualitative research can ensure that the priorities of people with disabilities are foregrounded and that their recommendations for improved disability-inclusive mitigation and support are gathered. The Covid-19 pandemic has affected communities globally, yet the impact has not been equal. People with disabilities were already often living with severe disadvantage and marginalisation and, as predicted by many disability-focused agencies, Covid-19 has exacerbated these inequalities. Emerging evidence from Inclusive Futures, a UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO)-funded programme, highlights the catastrophic emotional and material impacts on people with disabilities in Nepal and Bangladesh. To respond to and plan for future crises, decision makers should consult inclusively with both organisations of people with disabilities (OPDs) and people with disabilities themselves.

Health and social care research seeks to understand patient experiences in a range of situations. It adopts data collection methods that enhance the ability to capture the truthful essence of that experience. Truth is taken to mean the perception of an event as understood by the person involved (Bailey and Tilley 2002) and the researcher aims to capture these truths with methods that enable people to tell their story. Aim During analysis, the aim is to turn what is often cumbersome and prolific data into something that is accessible to the reader but retains the original intent, purpose and passion of the storyteller. The process of analysing narrative data is not straightforward – the more unstructured the data-collection method, the greater the amount of captured data; highly emotive or personal issues can lead to chaotic, disjointed stories that require sensitivity and insight to unpick meaning and demonstrate that meaning in the way the storyteller intended. Stories are usually told with a broad overall sequence of beginning, middle and end (Jefferson 1979, Riessman 1993), but these points and stages are decided by the teller and stories can take unique and varied diversions in that broad structure. Abstract Aim In health and social care research, pure naturalistic enquiry often seeks to understand personal experiences, and adopts data collection methods that can generate vast amounts of rich, thick text. This article demonstrates the way in which the author used a particular approach to analyse the complex narrative data arising from her MPhil research into experiences of lesbian parents in the healthcare system. Background Narrative data is often cumbersome, prolific and chaotic, and it can be difficult to manage such data effectively while remaining sympathetic to the original meaning of the storyteller. Guidance exists on what narrative analysis should achieve, but finding ways of interpreting and demonstrating meaning in different types of stories can be challenging.

The prolonged, two-year reconciliation conference held in Kenya and the resulting interim administration, implemented under the dominant tutelage of Ethiopia, are generally considered to have failed to live up to the expectations of the Somali people. The state structure was built on the foundation of a clan power segregation system known as 4.5
(four-point-five). This means the separation of the Somali people into four clans that are equal and, as such, pure Somali, against an amalgamation of various clans and communities that are unequal to the first group and, hence, considered “impure” or less Somali. The lumping together of all the latter communities is regarded as equivalent only to a half of the share of a clan.