Etika vedy a techniky (vybrané problémy)

E-book

Jaroslav Marcin - Viktória Marcinová a kol.

This little book started out in a way that probably many other scholarly publications do: When the five of us met as doctoral students and instructors in the Department of British and American Studies, we soon realized that our research overlapped on a number of points. Most prominent among those was our interest in political or politicallymotivated discourse and the study of myths and manipulation that it employed. 

In the end, we decided to pool the results of our research together in order to create a more complex picture, providing a variety of perspectives and voices. In our endeavor, we were greatly aided by the financial support we received from a grant offered by the Šafárik University. The outcome of these efforts is the five chapters of this brief, but hopefully informative and insightful monograph.

In Chapter 1, Viktória Marcinová deals with the impact of totalitarian ideology on the translation of so-called “capitalist” drama during the first stage of normalization in Slovakia (1948-1968). In Chapter 2, the focus shifts to political discourse and manipulation in a democracy, as Jaroslav Marcin takes a closer look at the wartime rhetoric of American presidents. USA remains the focus also in Chapter 3, but this time the question, addressed by Martina Martausová, will be one of the myth of the American Dream and its presentation in post-9/11 United States. A similar idea, though in a different geographical-cultural context, is dealt with in Chapter 4, where Božena Velebná identifies myths of Scottish identity as portrayed in historic films. Finally, in Chapter 5, Eduard Soták will take a look at the role of the mass media within the topic of politically-motivated discourse and spread of political ideology.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-bool

Peter Fedorčák

When studying the Renaissance, researchers utilize various critical and core terms and concepts which it is necessary to characterize.

However, many such points, notably the following, are problematic: The relationship between the Renaissance and the antiquity; The connection with the Middle Ages; The transformation to Mannerism and Baroque; Realism and Secularism in Renaissance art; The individualism of the Renaissance artist; The reasons for the creation of Renaissance art in Italy, its determinants and stimulators; Distinguishing between the analysis of the genesis of the Renaissance and the analysis of the creation of the period’s art generally; Regional differences in Italy and their impact on the art; Chronological limits of the Renaissance and its milestones; The terms “Medieval Ages” and “Early Modern Period”; The impact, and its extent, of the artistic influences of the Byzantine, Gothic and Romanesque arts on the Renaissance. The term “Renaissance” itself, its content and existence, are also the subject of the discussion with students, alongside learning how such terms and definitions came about and continue to evolve, how they attain their content, how this content morphs in the historical discourse, what academical pluralism and freedom of thinking look like in the discourse led by historians, what the differences are between scientists and schools of thought on the same subject and how it is possible that they are so numerous.

The students will come to recognize the leading scholars in the field, and follow their arguments and methodological approaches. They shall be invited to closely trace and scrutinize the logic which those historians use in building their argumentation. It shall be seen that the freedom to create terms, concepts and new definitions cannot stand on an ignorance of the (historical) facts, as becomes clear with expanding knowledge of those historical facts, the variability of their interpretation growing in tandem. This approach, actually used across the whole range of seminars and lectures, shall drive discussion on the topics covered, students being invited to formulate their own theses and antitheses.

Download the e-book for free  (pdf)

E-book

Jana Bajusová - Dušan Šlosár

The integration of immigrants into society is currently of interest to many professionals and to the general public. Immigration is a consequence of a variety of factors, mainly due to political, social, economic or security conditions in the countries of origin. Immigration is subsequently linked to the process of integrating immigrants into the host country. The integration of immigrants into society or integration, as this process is called in the monograph, is a complex phenomenon that extends to many spheres of everyday life for the citizens of the receiving country, and at the same time is often difficult for immigrants. Many governmental and non-governmental organizations are involved in the process of social integration of immigrants, who develop different strategies and mechanisms to streamline the outcome of this process.

In relation to immigrants, the Slovak Republic is bound to provide social and legal protection and therefore it is necessary to deal with the issue of social services, which could potentially significantly contribute to their social integration into Slovak society. From the legislative point of view, however, these services are unified and do not take into account the differences of immigrants resulting from their culture, religion, social, ethical or other characteristics. That is why the monograph focuses on social integration of immigrants in Slovakia in the context of provided social services.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Lucia Tóthová - Katarína Šiňanská - Eva Žiaková

Here is the translation of the provided text into English: A guide to oncological treatment was created at a time when the importance of health became even more emphasized, becoming a kind of mega-value for the new modern "pandemic" human. The use of the term "pandemic" person arose, of course, in connection with the emergence of the coronavirus pandemic worldwide, but primarily because other dangerous long-term diseases that threaten contemporary humans are somehow being pushed into the background.

The severity of such diseases (including cancer) does not diminish just because attention has shifted to something more acute. It is very important to realize this and not fall under the illusion that if we overcome an acute danger, then automatically improve conditions for chronic diseases as well. We believe it's quite the opposite; prolonged stress and social negative factors constantly affecting us—among which undoubtedly includes pandemic situations—worsen not only psychological but also somatic states.

The guide to oncological treatment aims precisely at highlighting those psychological and social factors that negatively "support" cancer development in any form and can positively influence treatment and coping with illness. The guide offers opportunities for social engagement with groups of people undergoing similar oncological treatments, allowing them to share psychologically as well as professionally similar situations with those facing similar problems in treatment. The authors hope that this guidebook will reach those who will become more self-sufficient in overcoming such a formidable enemy as cancer.

Authors

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Miroslava Köverová - Margita Mesárošová (eds.)

The publication „Helping professions and self-care from the perspective of psychology and social work“ includes research studies focused on self-care, and the positive and negative effects of helping among specific groups of helping professionals – psychologists and social workers.

A number of Slovak as well as foreign authors contributed to the book of proceedings. The contributions are theoretical studies, research studies and case studies. The theoretical and research studies are focused on important issues of professional helping: self-care, compassion satisfaction, compassion fatigue, burnout, perceived stress, secondary traumatic stress, mindfulness, empathy, job satisfaction and turnover among psychologists and social workers.

Research interest in the phenomena is especially important in the context of the mental health of helping professionals and in reducing the negative consequences of helping. 

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

Soňa Lovašová - Katarína Šiňanská - Magdaléna Halachová  - Vladimír Lichner (eds.)

The central theme of the conference is violence in social work. Violence in social work appears in various forms, whether it involves working with clients who are victims of different types of violence or dealing with aggressive clients where the social worker themselves becomes the victim. Violence in society is rapidly increasing, and social work is a science that must necessarily adapt to society; this is its essence. Therefore, managing aggressive situations in any form is an important part of a social worker's personal skill set.

Unfortunately, protecting social workers from violence will gradually become a necessity, and in the future, we may not avoid training in self-defense and reducing aggression as part of professional preparation or lifelong education.

The aim of this collection is to present the issue of violence in social work from various perspectives to both the professional and lay public. We hope that this serious problem will receive increasing attention and that the individual contributions will help readers understand the extent of the problem of violence in social work.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Adriana Jesenková

The ethics of care offers inspiring ways to think about the relationships and connections we are part of. It provides a new and unconventional reading and understanding of human relationships, thereby enabling us to respond in new and appropriate ways to certain empirical challenges (Pettersen 2011, p. 51).

Just twenty-five years ago, thinking about care was associated with women’s decisions in the private sphere concerning their personal dilemmas and problems. Over the last two decades, advocates of the ethics of care have demonstrated that the ideal of care has the potential to regulate not only private behavior but also human interactions in general.

Today, ideas about care have the power to change how we evaluate personal relationships, professional conduct, public policy, international relations, and global issues. The relevance of the ethics of care in such a wide range of areas of life, many of which are characterized by mutual incompatibilities and conflicting interests, is conditioned by several factors. However, one of the most significant is the creativity and fruitfulness of the thinking of the representatives of the ethics of care, who develop ethical concepts, models, and methods capable of grasping and analyzing human relationships in all their diversity (Pettersen 2011, p. 52).

Compared to traditional ethical concepts and theories in moral philosophy, the ethics of care introduces radically different sets of models and normative concepts. Today, it is precisely feminist ethics of care that offers a critical reflection on care within the realm of moral philosophy, ethics, and social philosophy. The aim of this publication is to identify the concept, subject, approach, philosophical foundations and starting points, as well as the possibilities for applying the ethics of care as a specific moral approach and, at the same time, as a specific moral theory in the field of social science and humanities research.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Vladimír Lichner - Dušan Šlosár

Issues of punishment are directly linked to a state’s criminal policy, which is an inseparable part of its social policy. Historically, the state has held a unique dominant position in the realm of punishment. Once the conditions for imposing a penalty are met, the state fulfills its obligation by sentencing through independent courts. However, it does not address questions of satisfaction, which belong to the victim. The victim may be a specific physical person or legal entity that suffered harm due to the criminal act. This harm simultaneously affects civil society as a whole. The state prioritizes its duty to punish and decide on the matter over compensating the harmed individual or civil society.

By mediation in criminal cases, we mean extrajudicial facilitation of resolving disputes between the offender and the harmed party, with the assistance and personal participation of a mediator. The mediator, as an independent and impartial person, helps parties identify their interests and supports them in finding shared, practical, and realistic solutions to the points causing their conflict. Probation refers to monitoring, supervising the accused, defendant, or convicted individual, as well as providing individual assistance to the offender and encouraging them to lead a lawful life. This reduces the risk of recidivism, or repeated criminal behavior.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Lukáš Šutor

Proceedings from the International Scientific Colloquium "The Folk Tale in Contexts" (December 12, 2022, in Košice)

We present the proceedings "The Folk Tale in Contexts" to the professional public as the outcome of the eponymous international scientific colloquium, which took place on December 12, 2022. Our aim was, among other things, to open a discussion on verbal folklore in broader interpretative, transcultural, and ultimately also interdisciplinary contexts—a goal that was achieved especially in the latter respect. Although the contributors primarily work in the fields of folklore studies and literary science, their methodological approaches from other—sometimes even more distant—disciplines expand the current discourse to a remarkable breadth. This is proof that research on the folk tale remains vibrant and open to new challenges.

Download e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Mikuláš Jančura - Alžbeta Śnieżko   

In connection with the 30th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution, which was commemorated in the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 2019, an interactive exhibition titled "First Touch of Freedom" was organized under the auspices of Košice Self-Governing Region in collaboration with Ján Bocatius Public Library in Košice, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, Nation's Memory Institute, and Slovak Radio and Television. The exhibition took place at Ján Bocatius Public Library and aimed to recall November's events from 1989 while emphasizing its cultural-social dimension and impact.

Conceptually, it focused on developing five dimensions of historical consciousness—a concept mainly developed in contemporary subject-specific didactics for history—namely identity, historicity, memory, spatial awareness, and temporal awareness.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Adriana Jesenková

The textbook "Literary Story as a Tool for Moral Education" aims to contribute to the preparation of future teachers of ethical education, as well as students from other fields, particularly in the humanities. It focuses on an area that remains trivialized and marginalized—gender-sensitive education and training. The author operates under the assumption that applying a gender-sensitive approach in education requires an understanding of what a gender perspective entails.

Experience from interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research, along with teaching experiences where ethical questions and themes—such as those related to gender, gender equality, gender justice, and gender relations—are presented, taught, and explored through various media or texts (not only traditional scientific and professional ones but also artistic, especially literary), inspired the author to present such an approach in a relatively coherent form.

This includes summarizing existing knowledge and experiences on the topic so that they can serve as a suitable starting point for enhancing the competencies of future teachers (not only) in ethical education when applying a gender-sensitive approach in education and teaching issues related to gender and gender relations in the context of applied ethics and ethical education.

Autor

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Magdaléna Hovanová

The monograph is devoted to social support, set in the adolescent's environment. Social support can also be described as relational support from the environment in which the individual lives, and thus increases his resistance to stress and the desire to overcome life's failures and crises. It is for this reason that social support was also defined in the context of social-ecological theory. An innovation in the relationship with social support was the "Push-pull" theory, oriented to the individual's motivation.

The defining anchoring of social support was built on its most famous theories. However, the greatest attention was focused on the possibilities of measuring social support, because its multidimensional measurement is necessary to determine the mechanism by which it works. The monograph therefore offered the author's validation processing and verification of psychometric properties of two separate methodologies Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS) - (Zimet, Dahlem, Zimet, Farley 1988) and Social Support Survey (MOS) - (Sherbourne, Stewart 1991).

The monograph results in two validation-verified separate methodologies for measuring types and sources of social support, which are reliable for use in a group of Slovak adolescents (MOS-SK and MSPSS-SK).

Download e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Martina Hurčalová- Lukáš Jakabovič- Jana Kseňák Gregová (eds.)

Proceedings of the XIIth International Scientific Conference of Students and Young Scientists organized on the 19th of May 2023 at the Department of Political Science, Faculty of Arts, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice in cooperation with Institute of Political Science and Public Administration, Faculty of Political Science and Journalism, Marie Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin, Department of Political Science, Faculty of Arts, University of Miskolc, Faculty of Regional Development and International Studies, Mendel University in Brno, Faculty of Political Science and Diplomacy, Vytautas Magnus University in Kaunas and the Res Publica civic association. The aim of the present publication Firewall of Democracy is to highlight the distortions of democracy and its defense mechanisms in the contemporary world, Europe or even Slovakia itself. The collection consists of 13 contributions, mainly in Slovak, but also in English and Czech languages. The authors of the individual contributions dealt with the state of democracy and its problems not only in the domestic but also in the global environment.

Download e-book for free (pdf)

E-journal

Juraj Schenk et al.

The scientific journal Sociálne a politické analýzy (Social and Political Analyses) serves as an interactive electronic platform for communication and the presentation (publication) of experts and their work in the fields of basic and applied research and analyses within sociological, psychological, political, and methodological contexts. It is a medium focused on intensively supporting research activities and analyses within an interdisciplinary framework, facilitating the exchange of experiences, fostering collaboration, and revitalizing the production of scientific work in this area.

The publication section of the journal offers space for works such as:

- Original sociological, psychological, and political studies and analyses in any areas of social life

- Methodological studies

- Research reports

- Studies from qualification theses Research and analysis projects

- Reviews

Download the e-journal for free (pdf)

E-book

Ľubov Vladyková

Reflection of technics  is about as old as philosophy. In the presented monograph the author reflects technology and technology as a medium of everyday life.

Every technical change is reflected in countless levels of our lives: environmental, economic, political, cultural and personal. The moral-philosophical reflection of technics and  technology aims to understand the complex relationships and effects of technology on the environment, society, culture and our existence. Knowledge (whose scientific knowledge is a special type) is part of the social and technical domains. If we perceive social and technical domains as separate, we deny their functioning as an integral part of our existence.

Speaking of 'new ecology of technology and technology'  the term ecology symbolizes the new existing disorder and 'cross-border' in the field of technology and technology reflection as a result of their revolutionary and far-reaching changes, and social change is unpredictable - all the more because technics and technology is the medium of everyday life and determines the future of the human species.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)

E-book

Zuzana Buráková

The English language study materials are intended for students of geography and general ecology at the Faculty of Science of Pavol Jozef Šafárik University. Their aim is to broaden communicative language competencies at an intermediate level of English proficiency, with an emphasis on the students’ field of study.

The individual chapters are based on the need for specialization within the various natural science disciplines and on preparing students to present their academic results not only at home, but also abroad. The study material contains a variety of texts, quizzes, exercises, maps, etc., which further illustrate the issues relevant to the field.

This material is intended to serve as a foundation for the future creation of even more precise materials needed for teaching specialized foreign language courses.

Download the e-book for free (pdf)