Digital Commons Network^™

Determination Of Presence Within Virtual Space: Implications For Interface Design., Rebecca Bond

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper proposes that measuring and mapping perceptions of ‘presence’ (or, the experience of ‘place’ in ‘space’) may lead to a greater understanding of virtual or ‘cyber’ space experiences, and contribute to the theory of human computer interaction (HCI) and design theory. As the experimental design is focussed on how users perceive and interact in their virtual world in relation to the effect of place and space, an attempt will be made to decipher perceptions of the relatively new frontier of cyberspace, leading to new methods for representing this form of space.

Websites And Values - Genres And Styles As Socio-Cultural Indicators., Ida Engholm, Karen Lisa Goldschmidt Salamon

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Since the appearance of the world wide web during the early 1990s, the interface of the internet has undergone a radical metamorphosis. From being a primitive, text–based medium, it has become an advanced and complex hyper-media representing multiple forms of design. Initially, the web was mainly a playground for private experiments. However, as increasingly culturally sensitive companies and organisations entered the scene, it became more professionalized and a certain degree of standardisation took place. The development of webdesign converged into particular groups and genres based on similarity of content and style and structured according to cultural taxonomies created by professionals …

The Utility Of Design Vision: The Crisis Of The Artificial., Mark Roxburgh

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This research explores the effect on visual communication design of the differences between what is observed (seen), how that is recorded (documented) and what is subsequently projected to viewers (designed).

Designers And Their Clients: An Anthropological View., Alun Price

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper will use examples from research in Australia and the United Kingdom to highlight the relationships between designers and clients. These relationships are sometimes difficult, balancing the needs of both parties can pose challenges for all involved. For example creative freedom can be constrained by financial considerations. For the designer creative freedom can be the most important factor in a job, however for a client, coming in on budget and market effectiveness are more likely to be valued. Salaman mentions sources of intrinsic satisfaction for architects, in a survey of 51 practitioners 63.46% mentioned creativity of work and the …

User-Centred Approach In Visual And Spatial Reasoning: Design Research In Wayfinding Map Design., Christopher Kueh

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Designing effective wayfinding maps to assist people to navigate effectively within a specific environment has always been an issue. According to Wright, ‘[users] have responded negatively to map design in the past ... ’(cited in Wood 1993). The aim of this paper is to address the importance of user-centred approaches in the design of wayfinding maps. In this paper I am proposing that graphic and information designers should emphasize the interaction processes between people and maps, people and the physical environment, and the relationship that people create between the map and the environment. This paper also suggests a speculative wayfinding …

Reading Digital Clones In The Conservation Process., Matthew Cooke

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores notions of ‘the virtual facsimile’, the copy and representation at a practice-oriented level and discusses them with relation to notions of ‘tracking’, ‘recording’ and ‘annotating’ design and design history through digital means. It begins by asking the question: if previsualisation software packages are useful in the representation phase of a construction project, how useful are they as markers and postvisualisation tools for pre-existing structures? Indeed, once modelled, how far departed from the original is the facsimile? Is it possible to extend the usefulness of these tools to include the representation of that which is already built and …

Being, Seeing And Being Seen: Accessing The Social Language Of Clothing Style For Use Within Design Research., Fiona Candy, John Mcaleavy

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper will introduce a new approach to the study of clothing and involves visual ethnographic research methods that can support empirical investigation in to the range of personal and social meanings associated with everyday styles of dress. It has been developed as a result of a multidisciplinary collaboration between fashion, video production, illustration, and animation designers. Research has involved street photography, one to one interviews, group clothing workshops, body language video documentation and post production experimentation with animation and rotoscoping digital imaging techniques. Initial findings are that our approach has a variety of potential applications for practitioners and researchers …

Using Music To Influence Creative And Critical Thinking., Kevin Hilton, Cathy Lockhart, A G Rodell, B Rodell

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper investigates the hypothesis that listening to music may influence responsiveness to creative or critical thinking tasks. It has been acknowledged that a driver’s attitude can change as a result of choice of music played during a journey, but is such an influence observable with cognitive tasks of a creative or critical nature? Certain types of music have been claimed to aid cognitive ability and skill development, though a number of follow-up research programmes have called the reliability of some of these tests into question. The term ‘Mozart Effect’ has been used in reference to a growing claim that …

The Panoramic Narrative And The Production Of Historical Consciousness: This Is Australia., Denise Whitehouse

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper takes a cross-disciplinary approach drawing on developments in Australian historical and cultural studies to investigate the role of design in the production of national cultures and more specifically the construction of colonising histories. It argues that in modern settler nations such as Australia, graphic design has had a significant role in the shaping of the public imagination of nationhood. This paper investigates the historical involvement of the graphic designer in constructing the visual vocabulary and communication strategies of the modern panoramic narrative and its origins in 1930s when business and government turned to modern design to bring aesthetic …

Chance Moves In The Gridded Garden: Experimental Investigations In Chinese Scholar Garden Design., Greg Missingham

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper discusses experiments in rule-governed, though chance-based approaches to the design of contemporary Chinese-styled gardens inspired, in part, by contemporary minimalist landscape architectural design tactics. The results are compared both with other versions of rule-based understandings of the design of traditional Chinese scholar gardens and with such gardens, themselves. While inherent contradictions in the rule-governed approaches are exposed, their utility is demonstrated through discussion of a first and then a later version of the design of the Gridded Garden.

Questioning Understanding: The Cultural Perception Of Visual Communication By Recent Immigrants To The U.S., Patricia Boman

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This research project documents the cultural perceptions and general comprehension of recent U.S. immigrants (immigrated within last 3 years) to visual communication designed to market a product or service. During interviews, participants will share their understanding of a variety of visual communication including: product advertisements, marketing brochures, packaging, and multimedia related to specific products and services ranging in quality and type from ordinary to luxury. Interview questions include but are not limited to the following: What does each example communicate to them? What do they think is the key idea or message of the example? Do they have a positive …

Indigenous Knowledge And Visual Philosophy., Norm Sheehan

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper presents Indigenous Australian knowledge as a visual philosophy founded in a relational patterning ontology that is enmeshed at all levels within the mutual, living knowledge of the world. Visual design methodologies related to Indigenous Philosophy are then applied as an explanative visual ‘text’ that examines the nature of the appearances of things to visual perception. Then the visual artefacts of Aboriginal Australia are positioned as the philosophic texts of these many diverse and individuated yet related cultures. Visual Philosophy is then applied to contemporary understandings of design and human perception as a basis for further possibilities.

Creating A Space For Practicing Designers To Intellectualise; Bringing Theory To Life For Designers., Richelle Harun

DRS Biennial Conference Series

A number of barriers exist to engaging professional designers with discussions of theory, the industry is relatively young and design practice is both time pressured and fast changing, with designers moving rapidly from project to project. This is coupled with a lack of substantive provision of continual professional development which can isolate designers from contemporary debate. Additionally, designers have a preferred learning style that can disconnect them from theory, having a tendency to favour exploratory or trial and error methods rather than seek academic models. The remit of this research has been the integration of theory and practice focusing in …

Innovation Planning Toolkit., Vijay Kumar

DRS Biennial Conference Series

To maintain leadership position, companies need to be continuously proactive in exploring new opportunities for innovation. Focusing on core offerings, customer support, and relationship management is a safe way to sustain business and maintain continued revenue flows. But complacency with the successes of core offerings and eagerness to serve the core customer base frequently leads to inaction in the search for new opportunities. Companies deliberately need to be in an active sensing mode during which new opportunities are continuously sought. An active innovation culture needs to evolve within organizations. This should be predominantly characterized by continuous exploration and search for …

Design As A Device., Sidney Newton

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper will describe the collaborative research project as a case study in how design and other disciplines intersect. Critically, it will argue that what design brings to such a situation may have less to do with design as a particular methodology, and more to do with design as a new device for understanding and engaging with the material content of the project. The paper will argue that significant qualities otherwise (and typically) attributed to ‘the nature of design’, can in fact be accounted for through the phenomenological concept of ‘introducing’. This alternative account has clear implications for the future …

Spartan Daily, November 16, 2004, San Jose State University, School Of Journalism And Mass Communications

Spartan Daily (School of Journalism and Mass Communications)

Volume 123, Issue 55

African American Women With Type 2 Diabetes: Understanding Self-Management, F Bridgett Rahim-Williams

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Prescribed self-management behaviors have been found to be important factors affecting the rates of morbidity and mortality in multiple medical conditions including chronic diseases such as diabetes, a condition that disproportionately affects high health risk populations such as African Americans.

This study focused on understanding health behaviors, beliefs, and associated factors such as support systems and access to care that played a role in diabetes self-management and glucose control. The study also explored diabetes self-management education and its role in diabetes self-management. The research conducted in Pinellas and Hillsborough counties in Florida, included twenty-five African American women between the ages …

Globalization, Ecotourism, And Development In The Monte Verde Zone, Costa Rica, Edgar Allan Amador

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Ecotourism has been promoted globally as a model for sustainable development because it simultaneously benefits the environment and the residents of the given destination. However, many conservationists have questioned the long term sustainability of ecotourism as it is difficult to mitigate the impact of even low levels of tourism on a particular ecosystem. Further, social scientists including anthropologists have similarly questioned whether most residents of a particular destination actually benefit significantly from the alternative tourism economy.

The Globalization Research Center in cooperation with the Monteverde Institue in the Monte Verde Zone, Costa Rica, is undertaking a longitudinal study -- dubbed …

Coulrophobia And The Trickster, Joseph Durwin

Trickster's Way

No abstract provided.

Team-Teaching Africana Studies: Developing A Model For Innovation, Interdisciplinary Pedagogy, And An Inclusive Curriculum, Bryan Carter, Delia C. Gillis, Musa Ilu, Yvonne Johnson, Rev. Albion Mends, C. Dianne Mack, Regina Tenney

Different Perspectives on Majority Rules: 9th Annual Conference (2004)

Africana Studies Faculty from Central Missouri State University will discuss how they developed an innovative team-taught course for Introduction to Africana Studies. The faculty have worked on the course for the past three years and it was recently added to the curriculum as a general education requirement.

The Statesman, V. 48, I. 21, State University Of New York At Stony Brook

Stony Brook Statesman-Sucolian

v. 48, i. 21

Current, November 15, 2004, University Of Missouri-St. Louis

Current (2000s)

No abstract provided.

The Collegian (2004-11-15), Sonia Mejia

UTB/TSC Archives - The Collegian [Newspaper]

Vol. 57, No. 14

Vol. 27, No. 11 (November 15, 2004)

Indiana Law Annotated

No abstract provided.

Rural Elementary Administrators’ Views Of High-Stakes Testing, Robert J. Egley, Brett D. Jones

The Rural Educator

This study examines how rural elementary school administrators perceive the effects of high-stakes testing in comparison to suburban and urban elementary administrators. High-stakes testing had a greater impact, both positively and negatively, on rural administrators than on their counterparts in suburban and urban schools. Specifically, the positive effects were that rural administrators were more motivated by the testing program to do a better job, found the test results more useful in assessing teachers, and found the test results more useful in meeting the academic needs of students. The negative effects were that rural administrators felt more pressure than urban administrators …

The Effects Of Militant Press On Nigeria's Democratic Evolution, Oluwaniran Malaolu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This is an in-depth study of the Nigerian press, the ubiquitous behemoth which called itself the "defender" of Nigeria's national independence and the last "hope" of the common man. It's a bold attempt to critically examine its antecedents, its evolution or development especially the historical, political, technological and socio-economic events that had impacted its growth, its world views and ideologies. It's a thorough assessment of the press' influence on Nigeria's socio-economic and political development, as well as the suitability of its tactics and posturing toward attaining its set goals of economic and political emancipation of Nigerians. Most importantly, this study …

Deafdigest: Blue Edition, November 14, 2004, Barry Strassler

DeafDigest Blue 2004

No abstract provided.

Efforts To Promote Tourism As A Catalyst For Urban Redevelopment In Florida: Insights From The Anthropology Of Tourism And An Annotated Bibliography., John F. Collins

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Tourism is a major contributor to the global economy and is an agent of cultural change. Tourism has been utilized throughout the United States as an engine of economic renewal in the promotion of redevelopment within many of our most celebrated urban centers. Urban tourism as it is found within Florida is explored. A chapter is dedicated to Tampa, Florida. Anthropology has spent little time or effort in attempting to understand the complexities of urban tourism and what it means for the cities of 21st century. The anthropology of tourism is utilized in exploring the political economy of tourism within …

Lawrence University Anthropologist Discusses Human’S Diet Through The Ages, Lawrence University

Press Releases

Lawrence University anthropologist Mark Jenike discusses man’s ever-changing diet, from that of our earliest ancestors to the current low-carb craze, in a Lawrence Mortar Board “First Chance, Last Chance” lecture.

Jenike presents “From Chimips to Cheese Curds: Evolutionary Perspectives on Human Nutrition,” Wednesday, Nov. 17 at 7 p.m. in Lawrence’s Science Hall, Room 102.

Nutrition, or lack thereof, plays a major role in many of the causes of adult mortality today, from heart disease and stroke to cancer and diabetes, spawning an entire industry devoted to dieting, weight loss and fitness. Human ancestry is often cited in promotional materials for …

Spartan Daily, November 12, 2004, San Jose State University, School Of Journalism And Mass Communications

Spartan Daily (School of Journalism and Mass Communications)

Volume 123, Issue 53