Digital Commons Network^™

Controlling And Constraining The Participation Of The Hepatitis C-Affected Community In Australia: A Critical Discourse Analysis Of The First National Hepatitis C Strategy And Selected News Media Texts, Judith D. Pugh

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The construction of texts that place hepatitis C-positive persons at social risk (Candlin, 1989, p. ix), informs this study of the ways in which public health policy makers and journalists in Australia communicate about hepatitis C. The institutions of public health and the news media form part of the cultural context within which persons construct their illness narratives. The privileged perspectives and framing of public health policy and news media discourses; the discursive practices associated with the institutions of public health and the media around hepatitis C and hepatitis C-positive persons, the “objects” of knowledge (Foucault, 1969/2002, p. 81); and …

What Causes An Organisation To Be What It Is And To Become What It Could Be: A Philosophical Expedition, Alan Byrne

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This work represents the evolution of a thesis asking the question what causes an organisation to be what it is and to become what it could be. The author ' s thought development is integral to the project and is highlighted throughout. Conversation and relationship become privileged as the transformative cause of change; of being. This study faithfully reproduces how a thesis actually happens, with all the inherent uncertainty and messiness. The life experiences of the author are brought to bear in this autoethnographic study of the business world.

The Lived Experience Of God And Its Evolution In Children And Adolescents, Anne P. Devenish

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Children's and adolescents' spirituality is important, especially to those entrusted with their education. To effectively nurture children's spirituality, parents, teachers, and ministers would benefit in knowing how young people experience God, what they think about God and how they relate to God: in effect, their lived experience of God. Learning about these phenomena could help greatly in communicating with children and adolescents about God. This study aims to build on the work of those who have investigated elements of the spirituality of children and adolescents in a qualitative way.

Philosophical Justification And The Legal Accommodation Of Indigenous Ritual Objects; An Australian Study, Andrew G. Hunter

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Indigenous cultural possessions constitute a diverse global issue. This issue includes some culturally important, intangible tribal objects. This is evident in the Australian copyright cases viewed in this study, which provide examples of disputes over traditional Indigenous visual art. A proposal for the legal recognition of Indigenous cultural possessions in Australia is also reviewed, in terms of a new category of law. When such cultural objects are in an artistic form they constitute the tribe's self-presentation and its mechanism of cultural continuity. Philosophical arguments for the legal recognition of Indigenous intellectual `property' tend to assume that the value of Indigenous …

The Acquisition Of Japanese As A Second Language And Processability Theory: A Longitudinal Study Of A Naturalistic Child Learner, Junko Iwasaki

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The aim of this study was to investigate longitudinally how a child learner acquired verbal morpho-syntax in Japanese in a naturalistic second language (L2) context. Specifically the points of emergence for three verbal morpho-syntactic structures, namely verbal inflection, the V-te V structure and the passive/causative structure, were investigated within a framework of Processability Theory (PT) (Pienemann, 1998b). The subsequent development of these structures was also examined. Unlike earlier research about morpheme orders and developmental sequences in language acquisition which was criticised because of its apparent lack of theoretical underpinnings, Pienemann’s Processability Theory (PT)(1998b) connects the processability of morpho-syntactic structure to …

The Import Of The Sensation Of The Abyss, David J. Prescott-Steed

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This research argues the significance of the concept of the abyss as a means to understanding key contemporary ideas such as the self, identity, reflexivity, indeterminacy, ideology, radical doubt, lack, and xenophobia. Proposing the analysis of interpretations of the abyss as informative in developing an understanding of ourselves in terms of our cultural, geographical and historical contexts, I draw on a range of visual images, explorations of language use, research into cultural constructs, religious practices and historical events. The reflections on the abyss contained in this thesis contribute to broader research by connecting the developing concept of the abyss to …

Whose Story Is It Anyway?: An Explanation Of How `Academic Literacy' Was Constructed In A University Transition Course For Indigenous Australians During A Period Of Organisational Change, Gregory J. Stratton

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This thesis examines how a group of lecturers who taught in a university preparation course designed for Indigenous Australians thought about what `academic literacy' meant. Lecturers were asked to consider the relationships between the meanings of `academic literacy' , curriculum, and the considerable problems the Course was facing in order to remain viable. My research goal was to better understand what alignment of people, ideas, and other important entities would be required to develop a sustainable program for Indigenous people seeking an alternative pathway into university degrees.

Teacher Education And Critical Inquiry : The Use Of Activity Theory In Exploring Alternative Understandings Of Language And Literature, Brenton Doecke, Alex Kostogriz

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This article explores the challenges of espousing a critical pedagogy within the managerial climate that presently shapes teacher education. Current discourses of professionalism are incommensurate with an understanding of the way that literacy practices are grounded in the social worlds in which both school and university students operate. Such discourses construct graduate teachers as the providers of decontextualised literacy skills to school students whose existing communication networks are ignored. We argue that an alternative understanding of professional practice can be developed by focusing on the textual resources university students use to mediate their learning, and by locating their emerging professional …

Introduction: A New Historicism? Sound, Music And Ruined Pianos., Cat Hope, Jonathan Marshall

Sound Scripts

One of the highlights of every New Music festival which we attend is the banter that goes on between artists and audiences about what we have experienced together. The Inaugural Totally Huge New Music Festival Conference was a way to formalize these discussions for the 7th Totally Huge New Music Festival of 2005, and it was a privilege to have been able to attend a conference about New Music in the midst of it actually happening. The Conference was opened by the Executive Dean of the Faculty of Communications and Creative Industries, Edith Cowan University, Professor Robyn Quin, and it …

Similarity-Aware Web Content Management And Document Pre-Fetching, Jitian Xiao, Michael Collins

Research outputs pre 2011

Web caching is intended to reduce network traffic, server load and user-perceived retrieval latency. Web pre-fetching, which can be considered as "active" caching, builds on regular Web caching, minimizing further a Web user's access delay. To be effective, however, the pre-fetching techniques must be able to predict subsequent Web access with minimum computational overheads. This paper presents a similarity-based mechanism to support similarity-aware Web document pre-fetching between proxy caches and browsing clients. We first define a set of measures to assess similarities between Web documents, and then propose a multi-cache architecture to cache Web documents based on those similarities. A …

Modernist And Postmodernist Arts Of Noise, Part 2: From The Clifton Hill Mob To Chamber Made Opera’S Phobia, Linda Kouvaras

Sound Scripts

This paper will continue to trace negotiations outlined in Part 1 of the music/noise dichotomy as expressed in modernist and postmodernist works.1 Drawing connections with the trajectory of "glitch" in popular music since the 1970s. The paper will examine a number of key ways in which the music/noise dichotomy has been addressed as a borderline dispute between, for example, the embodied and the disembodied, the scored and the unscored, the accidental and the intentional, sense and nonsense, culture and nature. Two key figures from the highly influential group of sound artists who came together at Melbourne's Clifton Hill Community Centre …

Tackling Talk : Teaching And Assessing Oral Language, Rhonda Oliver, Yvonne Haig, Judith Rochecouste

Research outputs pre 2011

Tackling Talk was a collaborative research project sponsored by several bodies: the English Teachers Association (ETA), the Australian Literacy Educators' Association (ALEA) through Quality Teacher Program funding and the Association of Independent Schools of WA (AISWA). A team of researchers from the Centre for Applied Language and Literacy Research (CALLR), Edith Cowan University, guided teachers from the public and independent sectors through an action research program involving online/ electronic materials, professional development sessions and personal mentoring. Some 49 teachers from 28 schools from both metropolitan and regional districts of Western Australia were involved in the project.

The Law And Racism: Some Reflections On The Australian Experience, Laksiri Jayasuriya

Research outputs pre 2011

Racism in Australian society is not something new and surprising. For a variety of historical and socio-political reasons it has existed from the earliest days ·of colonisation, and there have been a variety of strategies tried over the years to deal with racism as a social problem. One strategy most frequently resorted to, especially in recent years, has been to use the law as a means of combating racism. Before considering the questions of law and racism, we need first to clarify what we mean by the term racism...

English Reading Comprehension Of Thai Undergraduates : L1/L2 Usage, Texts, Strategies And Problems, Rapeeporn Sroinam

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

English Ianguage has been taught as a foreign language in Thailand for more than a century and now occupies an important place at all levels of the Thai education system. This study investigates the influence that the Thai language has on intermediate level undergraduate sludents while they are engaged in individual unaided reading of a variety of English texts and determines what aspects of reading texts caused problems. It aims to compare how often and for what purposes students resort to Thai with texts about culturally familiar texts and culturally unfamiliar texts, as well with different genres and question types. …

Investigating Information Management Weaknesses In A Local Government Organisation: A Critical Hermeneutic Ethnographic Case Study Of Internet Documents From Information Warfare And Legal Perspective(S), Edward E. Andre

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

In this thesis I develop an approach to analyse and interpret internet documents belonging to a particular organisation in a State of Australia. My intention in the research is to find ways to protect a local government organisation from litigation and other threats due to weaknesses in information management on the internet. Based on Gadamer's (1985) approach to the interpretation of text discourse, this thesis is a critical hermeneutic ethnographic case study of one local government organisation investigating internet docunents from information warfare and legal perspective(s).

Issues Of English Language Proficiency For International Students, Patricia Dooey

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

In the last 20 years or so, there has been a phenomenal increase in the number of international full-fee paying students applying to study in Australian universities, The revenue provided in this way has helped to address the problems faced by cash-starved universities facing recurring funding cuts over the same period. Furthermore, the presence of such students on any university campus provides immeasurable enrichment to the student body in terms of cultural diversity and research potential, and indeed it is very tempting in an ever,-increasing global market, to be as flexible as possible with prospective international students. However, the process …

The Genetic Heritage Of China: A Genomic Study Of Pr China Based On Nine Representative Ethnic Populations, Michael Black

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

During the course of the last decade, genetic data have increasingly complemented linguistic, archaeological and palaeontological evidence in efforts to reconstruct human history. As technology has developed, studies have utilised genomic techniques in tracing the origins and migratory patterns of modem humans. East Asia is a particular hotspot of human migration, _especially Mainland China where a large number of human fossils have been unearthed and more than 20% of the wor1d's population now resides. There are 56 officially recognised ethnic groups (minzu) within the population of PR China which totals 1,300 million. The majority Han population is distributed throughout the …

Meaning And Emotion In Squaresoft's Final Fantasy X: Re-Theorising Realism And Identification In Video Games, Glen R. Spoors

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This thesis takes the position that traditional theories of "realism" and "identification" misrepresent the relationships between players and videogames, and that a cross·disciplinary approach is needed. It uses Ed Tan's (1997) and Torben Grodal's (1997) analyses of narrative, cognition, and emotion in film as a basis for interrogating existing research on, and providing a working model of, video gameplay. It develops this model through an extended account of Squaresoft's adventure role-playing game Final Fantasy X (FFX) (2001), whose hybrid narrative and game macrostructures foreground many of the problems associated with video games. The chapters respectively address; existing research on video …

Language Learning Strategies Of Botswana Students : An Exploratory Study, Joel M. Magogwe

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The purpose of this research is to explore the learning strategies used by Botswana students acquiring English as a second language. It also examines whether the choice of strategies is affected by the factors of different age/level of education, proficiency and gender. The research also explores whether the students’ self-efficacy beliefs correlated with their use of language learning strategies. Specifically this research examined the types of strategies used by primary, secondary and tertiary students. It also examined the types of strategies used by the students deemed by their teachers to have good, fair or poor levels of English proficiency. The …

Aspects Of Current English Language Teaching Practices With A Special Focus On Task, Valerie Kollmann

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This portfolio is written with the intention to explore current English language teaching practices in global as well as Australian contexts, with emphasis on task-based language teaching. As a result of the forces of globalisation, the number of learners involved in English language instruction has increased throughout the world and with it the necessity of language programs that would facilitate instruction in accordance with the needs of the market. Since the task-based language syllabus is founded on needs generated by the learners, there is potential for this language teaching methodology to become the recommended mode of instruction in the future. …

Boys And Writing: Attentiveness Levels And The Impact Of Single Gender Classes And Teaching Methods, Janet Fellowes

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The study is concerned with boys' literacy learning. It seeks to gauge whether the change to a single-gender class brings about any improvement in the boys' attentiveness levels during writing lessons and also to ascertain whether attentiveness is influenced by other factors associated with the learning tasks, and with the teacher's pedagogical and management practices.

This study involves the scrutiny of writing lessons in three classes in Western Australian metropolitan primary school - a Year 5 co-educational class, a Year 6 allboy's class ( comprising boys from the Year 5 class) in the hands of one teacher and the same …

Teacher Torque: A Research Project Investigating Student Cognitive Engagement Through Observations Of Non-Verbal Responses To Certain Forms Of Classroom Questions, Moya A. Lewis

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This research project investigates student cognitive engagement through observations of nonverbal responses to certain forms of classroom questions. The basic assumption of this thesis is that education is the intentional act of expanding or evolving each individual student's model of the world. This study explores the non-verbal responses that various forms of questions generate in order to assess the level of student thinking that occurs as a direct result of the question. It looks at responses to closed, open and schema accessing questions to discover the role that they play in the expansion of student schema. The expected readership of …

A Study Of Intercultural Discourse Between Mainland Chinese Speakers Of English And Anglo-Australians, Leng Hui

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Intercultural communication between mainland Chinese speakers of English and Anglo-Australians is receiving ever-increasing attention in many fields. These fields include intercultural communication. English language teaching, education and business. This study approached the intercultural communication between mainland Chinese speakers of English and Anglo-Australians from a cognitive perspective by applying the theoretical framework of cultural linguistics. The intercultural discourse produced by mainland Chinese speakers of English in the context of them interacting with Anglo-Australians was analysed. The analysis was made by employing key concepts such as schemas, cultural schemas, discourse scenarios and discourse indexicals. A body of 39 audio-taped conversations between mainland …

Developing The English Oral Competency Of Tourism Industry Students By Means Of A Genre-Based Esp Approach, Taweesak Kunyot

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The purpose of this study is to establish a theory-based process for the improvement of the English oral competency of Thai tourism industry students and determine how far practical needs superseded theoretical demands. It was done firstly, by examining an, blending genre and ESP theories in order to establish a genre-based ESP oral English teaching method, and secondly, identifying the specific features of the most common genres in the target language used by Thai tourist guides by means of genre analysis. Thirdly, the perceptions of the personnel managers of tour agencies and tourists towards the oral competency of Thai tour …

Uncovering The Connections Between The Concepts Of Language, Sexual Difference And The Divine In The Work Of Luce Irigaray, Ajasta Vargas

Theses : Honours

No abstract provided.

Recognising The Screenwriter: Agency And Authorship In Adaptation, Michelle Mcmerrin

Theses : Honours

Throughout the history of film studies, the uniqueness of film as an art form has been acknowledged. It is a multi-sensory experience that continually develops and, in the process, reflects social and cultural progression as well. Notions of authorship have been applied to aspects of film throughout its history and although the auteur theory has maintained a significant and lasting influence within the discipline, the screenwriter as author (or auteur) has consistently been excised from film, and indeed literary, study. Why this is the case when the screenplay is such a necessary component of the majority of mainstream films, and …

Searching For The Semantic Boundaries Of The Japanese Colour Term 'Ao', Francis Conlan

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The Japanese language has a colour term, 'ao' (or 'aoi'), which is usually referred to in bilingual dictionaries as being the equivalent of English 'blue'. Very often, however, it is used to describe things which English speakers would describe as being green. Granny Smith apples are 'ao', so are all Westerners' eyes, regardless of whether they would be described as being 'blue' or 'green' in English. The sky and the sea are prototypically 'ao', but this term is also used to describe lawns, forests, traffic lights and unripe tomatoes. What, then, do Japanese native speakers (henceforth JNS) understand by this …

An Exploratory Cross-Cultural Investigation Of The Organisational Strategies Employed To Prevent And Ameliorate Workplace Bullying In University Settings, Dragana Krestelica

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Workplaces abound in conflict. Individuals within organisations are therefore vulnerable to a wide range of intimidating interactional tactics. These tactics can have an extremely negative impact upon individual workers and upon subsequent organisational performance. Consequentially, the diverse forms of organisational social harassment, and specifically bullying, place a large financial burden upon both organisations and nations. Therefore, the identification of strategies used to prevent and ameliorate workplace bullying and an examination that highlights their comparative success or failure is of great importance for all employers, employees and government. This study focuses upon those strategies used to prevent and ameliorate such workplace …

The Changing Face Of Rural General Practice: An Ethnographic Study Of General Practitioners And Their Spouses, Angela Durey

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Rural general practice is general practice at its best: a comment by one GP interviewed for this study was echoed by colleagues who viewed their work in a rural setting as challenging, diverse, rewarding and satisfying. Despite reported difficulties associated with rural general practice, many GPs argued that the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. Few wanted to leave. Nonetheless, too few Australian trained GPs are willing to move from cities to work in the country. Consequently, overseas trained doctors have been recruited to fill vacancies or nurses provide health services in communities unable to attract a GP.

Learning 'Through' Or Learning 'About'? The Ridiculous And Extravagant Medium Of Opera : Gardner's Multiple Intellegences In Pre-Service Teacher Education, Julie White, Mary Dixon, Lynda Smerdon

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

In recent years, pre-service teacher education has attempted to incorporate into programs an understanding of Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences as it applies to schools. In this paper the tension between ‘learning about’ multiple intelligences and ‘learning through’ multiple intelligences supports Gardner’s (1993) distinction between ‘understanding’ and ‘coverage’. This paper examines the use of the performing arts in the professional studies component of our teacher education program. During 2002 at The University of Melbourne, a group of education students were offered the opportunity to develop an opera in order to learn about assessment and curriculum. Thirty-seven of the students volunteered …