International Journal of Case Studies (ISSN Online 2305-509X)

VOLUME 14, ISSUE 11
IMPACT FACTOR 4.428

1) Reflexive Account: Power, Control, and Forced Exit in Academic Supervision — A Fictionalized Teaching Case
Author Details: Dr. Mohammed S. Chowdhury-Touro University, New York
Abstract:
This fictionalized mini teaching case explores the subtle dynamics of power and control within academic supervision. Through the experience of Dr. Zahid Sikdar, a senior faculty member navigating institutional micromanagement, linguistic bias, and coerced retirement, the case highlights how abusive supervision can manifest through routine administrative practices. Designed for use in organizational behavior and leadership courses, it encourages reflection on ethical decision-making, academic integrity, and institutional accountability.Discussion questions and teaching objectives support critical engagement with theories of workplace abuse and organizational justice. Any resemblance to real persons or events is purely coincidental.
Keywords: Abusive supervision, academic leadership, micromanagement, ethics, organizational behavior, higher education
[Download Full Paper] [Page 01-05]
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2) Where is “the biological evolution” of “human beings” component in Goudsblom’s Fire and Civilization?
Author Details:Jeroen Staring
Retired Dr. Jeroen Staring taught mathematics at secondary schools in The Netherlands. His 2005 Medical Sciences dissertation describes the life, work, and technique of F. Matthias Alexander. In 2013 he successfully defended a second dissertation, on the early history of the NYC Bureau of Educational Experiments.
Abstract:
This case study refutes the claim by several figurational sociologists that Dutch sociologist Johan Goudsblom, in his 1992 book, Fire and Civilization, shows how biological evolution and social development of humans are intertwined in the development of using, lighting and controlling of fire. When reading the book, it is noteworthy that its author barely drew on 19th- and early 20th-century German-language literature in his work, despite the fact that numerous articles and books were published in German at the time, increasingly describing important insights into the passive and active use of fire in human history. A selection of these German-language works will be discussed here, using author inscriptions and dedications in the works under discussion, as well as a fair number of illustrations, as a kind of guideline.
German-language works from before 1900 were primarily philosophical in nature. When important paleoanthropological discoveries were made of fossilized human remains by, for example, the Dutchman Eugene Dubois in Java and the Swiss Otto Hauser in France, these philosophical ideas were, as it were, tested against reality.
The German-language books and other texts of four renowned authors from the early 20th century (Wilhelm Bölsche, Adolf Heilborn, Otto Hauser and Carl W. Neumann) discuss a wealth of (paleo)anthropological discoveries and insights. The works also increasingly addressed the technical as well as social aspects of using and controlling fire, but only partially, and still incompletely, the biological-evolutionary changes associated with human furlessness and using tools that made fire use possible. Yet around the mid-1920s Hauser started collaborating with experts on tool use. Sadly, his early death in 1932 prevented the development of a more accurate theory. Bölsche, who had long since stopped writing on paleoanthropological topics, died in 1939.
The importance of the lack of fur was only discussed at length in relation to the use of fire, but not fully explained, by the eugenic anatomist and later Nazi Eugen Fischer. Heilborn, a medical doctor, discussed Fischer’s theory in Klaatsch’s posthumous work, which he edited and published in 1920. Anatomist and anthropologist Klaatsch rejected Fischer’s ideas because he had a different explanation for human ‘nakedness.’ In the second half of the 1930s, Heilborn was banned from publishing. He committed suicide in 1941. After 1932, Neumann no longer concerned himself with the human use and control of fire. He died in 1939.
World War II sowed so much hatred and fear of studying German anthropological theories poisoned by eugenics and racism and distorted ideas of human evolution that all German-language works from before 1945 were not studied anymore by many non-Germans. This most likely led Goudsblom to ignore important German-language works on the development of fire use and control.
Keywords: Wilhelm Bölsche (1861-1939); Norbert Leo Elias (1897-1990); Eugen Franz Leopold Fischer (1874-1967); Hans Wilhelm Carl Friedenthal (1870-1942); Johan Goudsblom (1932-2020); Ernst Heinrich Philipp Haeckel (1834-1919); Rudolf Otto Hauser (1874-1932); Adolf Heilborn (1873-1941); Friedrich Herig (1890-1969); Hermann Klaatsch (1863-1916); Carl Wilhelm Neumann (1871-1939); Carl Johannes Weinert (1887-1967). Control of fire (and smoke); Figurational Sociology.
[Download Full Paper] [Page 06-79]
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