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University Of Wollongong Campus News [July/ August] 2000, University Of Wollongong

University of Wollongong Campus News

No abstract provided.

Linear Prediction Incorporating Simultaneous Masking, J Lukasiak, I. S. Burnett, Joe F. Chicharo, M. M. Thomson

Faculty of Informatics - Papers (Archive)

Whilst linear prediction is the cornerstone of most modern speech coders, few of these coders incorporate the perceptual characteristics of hearing into the calculation of the linear predictor coefficients (LPCs). This paper proposes a method of incorporating simultaneous masking into the calculation of the LPCs. This modification requires only a modest increase in computational complexity and results in the linear predictor removing more perceptually important information from the input speech signal. This results in a filter that better models the formants of the input speech spectrum. The net effect is that an improvement in quality is achieved for a given …

The Politics Of Sociotechnical Intervention: An Interactionist View, Karin Garrety, R Badham

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

In this article, we apply concepts from symbolic interactionism - a well-established tradition of interpretivist sociology - to investigate the social and political processes involved in a sociotechnical intervention. The intervention was designed to elicit operator involvement in an experimental trial of an advanced manufacturing system at an industrial site in Australia. The interactionist concepts of social worlds, boundary objects and trajectories are used to explore the interrelationships among the theoretical, practical and contextual elements of intervention. We believe that these concepts are flexible intellectual resources that can extend and enrich our understanding of the politics involved in the shaping …

Outlook University Of Wollongong Alumni Magazine March 2000, University Of Wollongong

Wollongong Outlook: The University Alumni Magazine

No abstract provided.

A State Of Ambivalence: Feminism And A Singaporean Women’S Organisation, Lenore T. Lyons

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

There has been some interest in recent years in identifying the features or characteristics of an ‘Asian’ or ‘Third-World’ feminism (Moraga and Anzaldua 1983; Jayawardena 1986; Grewal et al. 1988; Mohanty 1991; Basu 1995; Alexander and Mohanty 1997). Part of this concern has focused on a costs-benefits analysis of Asian women ‘coming out’ as feminists in overtly hostile political climates. For many women embracing the identity ‘feminist’ continues to be a difficult process. Caught within multiple and shifting discourses that serve to inscribe place, allegiance and behaviour, being a feminist is not only an expression of individual political belief, but …

Disciplining The Body: Power, Knowledge And Subjectivity In A Physical Education Lesson, Jan Wright

Faculty of Education - Papers (Archive)

Extract: In recent years there has been a move in feminist and social theory towards an interest tin the body as a social and cultural site. The dominant discourses in Western society have traditionally, emphasized the body as a physical and biological given, to be understood like other 'natural' phenomena, through empirical investigation. Philosophical, feminist and poststructuralist discussions around the body (Foucault 1979, Foucault 1981, Bartky 1988, Bordo 1990, Grosz 1994) have demonstrated how our knowledge of the body and the body itself is constituted in specific cultural and historical circumstances and in the context of particular relations of power. …

The Truth Games Of Public Relations Politics, Judy M. Motion, Shirley Leitch

Faculty of Business - Papers (Archive)

This article employs thematic analysis to examine the relationships between public relations practitioners, their women politician clients, and the media they seek to influence in order to create and popularise particular truths. The six key themes considered within this article are truth, news values, coterie communication, gatekeepers, media training, and informalization. The article draws upon interviews conducted with women elected to New Zealand's national Parliament in 1994 and women who held mayoral office in 1996. It also draws upon interviews with the public relations practitioners who undertook media relations work for these women politicians.

Porter And Sheppard, A World Of Difference: Society, Nature, Development, Noel Castree

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Book review of: P. W. Porter and E.S. Sheppard, A World of Difference: Society, Nature, Development. New York: Guilford Press, 1998. 602 pp. ISBN 1-57230-324-7 (paperback).

Key Issues In The Provision Of Correctional Services For Women, Mitchell K. Byrne, Kevin Howells

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The time has arrived for a more detailed analysis of the specific needs of female offenders. Even though there is an increasing prevalence, internationally, of women in prison, there is a perception in the literature that governments and correctional systems have failed to deliver reforms and changes in the management of women prisoners. The extent of need identified in the international literature is of relevance to Australia, where the number of female prisoners also appears to be on the increase - in 1983 women comprised 3.9% of the entire prison population, in 1990, 5.4% and in 1998: 6%. Easteal (1992) …

Female Offenders Are Different Form Male Offenders: Anger As An Example, Jennifer Suter, Mitchell K. Byrne

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Anger is a common, universally experienced emotion, which occurs on a continuum from mild annoyance to rage or fury (Daffenbacher et al., 1996). Anger is likely to occur when a person believes their personal rights or codes have been violated. Similarly, anger can occur when a person feels powerless or threatened (Horn and Towl, 1997). Anger consists of interrelated, reciprocal components (Novaco, 1975). Environmental circumstances often trigger anger. Physiological symptoms can serve to alert the individual that they are angry, and can help them provide a label to that anger. Cognitions refer to the individual's style of thinking about, or …

Attempted Suicide: Listening To And Learning From Young People, Susan Gair, Peter J. Camilleri

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Suicide has become a major international health issue. Australia records one of the highest youth suicide rates in the world and Queensland has one of the highest suicide rates in Australia. This study sought insights into the suicide attempts of young men and women who survived. In-depth interviews were conducted in Townsville, Queensland, with a small group of young men and women aged 16-24 to explore the circumstances leading to the attempted suicide, the help sought and their suggestions for more effective intervention. The findings offer insight into the needs of local at-risk youth and provide suggestions for intervention services …

Disrupting The Center: Interrogating An ‘Asian Feminist’ Identity, Lenore T. Lyons

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

The problem of ‘difference’ has emerged as a significant issue in western feminist theory making during the past two decades. In response to claims that mainstream feminism has ignored the lives and voices of third world women and women of colour, attention has increasingly been placed on the ways in which class and ‘race’ intersect in the everyday lived experiences of women. This work has sought to displace the hegemonic control of white, western women in the production of feminist knowledge. Despite a growing body of literature on women’s movements throughout the Asian region, however, common-sense perceptions of Asian ‘submissiveness’ …

Home Invasion: Television, Identity And Belonging In Sydney's Western Suburbs, Tanja Dreher

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

Television occupies a central place in most Australian homes, and 'TV talk' is an important process in negotiations of individual and group identities (Gillespie. 1995). TV is the focus of many private, family interactions. As a 'window on the world', television is also a primary source of information about public life. Thus TV is deeply implicated both in interactions within the home, and in our understandings of the wider 'home' of the nation. This paper draws on discussions with diverse community groups in and around Cabramatta to explore the crucial role of TV in negotiations of 'home' and 'belonging' in …

The Challenge Of Child Labour In Rural India: A Multi-Dimensional Problem In Need Of An Orchestrated Policy Response, D. P. Chaudhri, E. J. Wilson

Faculty of Business - Economics Working Papers

Perceptions about facets of child labour in India, and elsewhere, are strongly conditioned by our knowledge of economic history, socio-cultural view of child welfare, respect, or lack of it, for functioning of the market system and attitudes towards duties of the Sovereign with respect to its citizens and to the international community. The spectrum of views generated by such a complex intellectual prism would naturally be rather large. The coloured vision of vested interests reduces the transpiracy of the spectrum. This is clearly observable in media reporting, legislative processes, national and international posturings on the subject of child labour. The …

(De)Constructing The Interview: A Critique Of The Participatory Method, Lenore T. Lyons, J. Chipperfield

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

Feminist approaches to the use of interviewing emphasise the importance of building rapport with respondents in order to achieve a successful research outcome. This ‘participatory model’ is concerned with addressing power differentials between researcher and researched and thus producing non-hierarchical, non-manipulative research relationships. We argue that the continued centring of rapport as a key interview strategy ignores both the nature of power relationships within the interview, as well as interviewee subjectivity. Drawing on our own experiences of interviewing we examine the ways in which both interviewer and interviewee are placed along intersecting axes of power. An analysis of the complex …

The Environmental Crisis And The Accounting Craft, Jane Andrew

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

If the purpose of environmental accounting research is to develop, suggest ad analyse ways out fo the environmental crisis, then it is fundamental that the ethical positions informing our research are developed and explored fully before we make choices about the path and direction of our own work. This paper reviews two alternative approaches to environmental ethics, namely, radical ecology (of which deep ecology, social ecology and eco-feminism are regarded as sub-divisions) and the emerging area of postmodern environmentalism. The aim is to encourage environmental accounting researchers to consider and explicitly state the ethical position adopted within their work.

Use Of Self-Report To Monitor Overweight And Obesity In Populations: Some Issues For Consideration, Victoria M. Flood, Karen Webb, Ross Lazarus, Glen Pang

Faculty of Health and Behavioural Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Objective: To examine the validity of self reported height and weight data reported over the telephone in the 1997 NSW Health Survey, and to determine its accuracy to monitor overweight and obesity in population surveys. Method: Self-reported and measured heights and weights were collected from 227 people living in Western Sydney, who had participated in the NSW Health Survey 1997. Results: Self-reported (SR) weights and heights led to misclassification of relative weight status. BMI, based on measured weights and heights, classified 62% of males and 47% of females as overweight or obese, compared with 39% and 32%, respectively, from self-report. …

Book Review, Richard Utz And Tom Shippey (Eds), Medievalism And The Modern World: Essays In Honour Of Leslie Workman, Louise D'Arcens

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

As an area of enquiry, the academic study of medievalism has seemed constitutionally, and indeed institutionally, marginal. Neither fish nor fowl, its interdisciplinarity has long consigned it in the eyes of many medievalists to the shadowy realm of para-disciplinarity, seemingly doomed to the task of merely commenting on the work of others. In recent years, however, Anglophone medieval studies has witnessed the growing momentum of what might be called a "medievalist turn". The emergence of numerous studies of the historical and political forces buttressing the emergence of the discipline, along with the biographical studies of Helen Damico and Norman Cantor, …

An Investigation Of The Music Activity Preferences Of Pre-School Children, N. Temmerman

Faculty of Education - Papers (Archive)

Life attitudes to, level of involvement with and success in musical learning are all tied to ®rst musical experiences. Consequently an important objective in the planning of any musical programme for young children is to acknowledge their interests in and attitudes to different musical activities. The purpose of this investigation was to determine young children's attitudes to musical activities included in their pre-school musical programme. In particular it sought to discern if preferences exist for certain activities. What emerged from the investigation is that pre-school children generally appear to respond favourably towards involvement in all musical activities but that preferences …

Odyssey Renewed: Towards A New Aesthetics Of Video Gaming, Jason Wilson

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The first home video-gaming console, the Magnavox Odyssey, was released in 1972. Its limited graphical capacities led Magnavox to ship it with a number of plastic overlays for the user's television that would admit a little variety into the then relatively crude gaming experience, limited to a built-in, Pong-like game. Computer and video games have come a long way since then, but it often seems as if critical approaches to gaming have continued shuffling through these plastic films, taking transformations of the screen, or on-screen events, for the whole of the gaming experience. It seems to me that reflection has …

Learning To Assess School Mathematics: Context, Multimedia And Transfer, Janice Herrington, Anthony Herrington, Len Sparrow

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The study set out to explore the use of a multimedia program on assessment strategies within a preservice teacher mathematics method unit, and to investigate the extent of transfer to classroom practice. A multimedia program was designed to incorporate characteristics of 'situated' learning environments. Preservice teachers used the program in their mathematics method classes, and they and their supervising teachers were interviewed regarding their use of assessment strategies while on professional practice. Results show that all students used a variety of assessment strategies, and according to the beliefs of the students themselves, were influenced in their use of strategies by …

Sharing The Spirit? Sociospatial Polarization And Expressed Enthusiasm For The Olympic Games, Gordon R. Waitt, Philippe Furrer

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

This article seeks to contribute to the literature that assesses the local outcomes of hosting hallmark events by examining the expressed levels of enthusiasm for the year 2000 Olympic Games within Sydney. We report on the results of a telephone survey of 658 Sydney residents conducted in February 1998 designed to measure enthusiasm for the 2000 Olympic Games. As of February 1998, it appeared that enthusiasm for the 2000 Olympics remained strong in Sydney, thereby providing support to the views of those who regard hallmark events as a psychological mechanism to assist residents to feel a sense of pride in …

The Steel Leadership Program: Telling The Stories, Karin H. Garrety, Viviane Morrigan, Richard Badham, Michael Zanko

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

Introduction

• Between October 1999 and June 2000 fifteen interviews were conducted with Springhill employees who had participated in the SLP course.
• The OD Team at Port Kembla intends using these stories to help build a new culture.

An analysis and representation of participants' stories of their experiences arising out of the BHP Steel Leadership Program (SLP) does not lend itself readily to executive summary and bullet points. However, we have been able to discern a number of key themes from the process of gathering these stories and, of course, from the stories themselves.

The Limits Of Feminist Political Intervention In Singapore, Lenore T. Lyons

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

In recent years increasing attention has focused on the Singapore government’s new attitude towards limited public participation in civil society. The women’s rights organisation the Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE) is one example of a nongovernment organisation (NGO) that is directly engaged in this newly emerging ‘civic’ society. AWARE’s activities are constrained, however, by a state demand that its objectives remain overtly ‘non-political’ and reformist in character. This has led some observers to comment that as a state-defined practice, feminism in Singapore is unable to address issues of structural inequality and difference.

Private Desires, Public Pleasures: Community And Identity In A Postmodern World, Anthony Ashbolt

Faculty of Arts - Papers (Archive)

As George Orwell, Herbert Marcuse and, more recently John Ralston Saul have argued, language can be a key mechanism whereby social reality is blurred, camouflaged or distorted (Orwell 1957: 143-57; MarcuseI972: 78-103; Saul 1997: 41-75). Slogans, buzzwords and words blatantly misused permeate contemporary discourse. Just as the advertising industry can take a word like 'freedom' and render it a commodity, so too politicians and journalists can take a word like 'reform; and strip it of meaning. We are told, for example, of the reforms of the Kennett government in Victoria. Closing hospitals and schools and wrecking the industrial relations system …

The Locus Of Decision-Making Authority In Circle Sentencing: The Significance Of Criteria And Guidelines, Luke Mcnamara

Faculty of Law - Papers (Archive)

This article analyses the criteria and guidelines that have been developed for the operation of circle sentencing as a method of First Nation community participation in the Canadian criminal justice system. The objective of this analysis is to determine whether circle sentencing has the potential to transfer decision-making authority over sentencing from judges within the non-Aboriginal justice system to sentencing circle participants and First Nation communities. This article concludes that although it operates under certain judicially imposed constraints, and without a solid legislative foundation, circle sentencing does have the potential to shift the locus of decision-making authority in a manner …

Research Grants: Problems And Options, Brian Martin

Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts - Papers (Archive)

Researchers often complain about research grant schemes, but usually within a narrow frame of reference. Looking more broadly, problems with grant schemes can be classified as bias, waste, discouragement and orientation to interests. There are various ways to allocate research funds, including administrative decision, peer review, performance-based allocation, equality and community-based bids. Each has different sorts of problems and serves different interests. By looking at diverse systems for allocating research funds, some of the assumptions underlying usual discussions become more apparent. Recent changes in Australian government policy on higher education research are examined using the framework provided here.

Management Consultant - Client Relationships: Their Impact On Consultancy Outcomes In Smes, Gary I. Noble

Faculty of Commerce - Papers (Archive)

This paper reports on the findings of an empirical study that examined aspects of the consultant - client relationship (CCR) that affect the adoption of a consultant's recommendations in the context of a small or medium enterprise (SME). In addition, this study found that a SNlE client's judgement of the success of a consultancy project was based on three key factors - the financial change in the business, the gaining of new knowledge on operating an SME learnt through the consultancy and any new perspective on the business gained as a result of the consultancy. These findings are drawn from …