Critical Analysis of Problems Encountered in Incorporating Indigenous Knowledge in Science Teaching by Primary School Teachers in Zimbabwe

In Zimbabwe the need to incorporate indigenous knowledge in science education to reflect local cultural settings cannot be overemphasized. Current policies on science are situated in Western cultural definitions, thus marginalizing indigenous knowledge, which is misconceived as irrational and illogical. This study used qualitative research methods. Ten teachers were purposively selected and interviewed to gain their insights into problems faced in incorporating indigenous knowledge into science teaching. The study found that the problems were attitudinal, institutional, and systemic. Teachers were found to be conservative “gatekeepers” who exhibited negative attitudes toward indigenous science and supported maintaining the teaching of Western science. The study suggests reforming and transforming science curriculum, policymaking, and teacher education to promote cross-cultural science in Zimbabwean primary schools

On Modern Science, Human Cognition, and Cultural Diversity

The development of modern science has depended strongly on specific features of the cultures involved; however, its results are widely and trans-culturally accepted and applied. The science and technology of electricity provides a particularly interesting example. It emerged as a specific product of post-Renaissance Europe, rooted in the Greek philosophical tradition that encourages explanations of nature in theoretical terms. It did not evolve in China presumably because such encouragement was missing. The trans-cultural acceptance of modern science and technology is postulated to be due, in part, to the common biological dispositions underlying human cognition, with generalizable capabilities of abstract, symbolic and strategic thought. These faculties of the human mind are main prerequisites for dynamic cultural development and differentiation. They appear to have evolved up to a stage of hunters and gatherers perhaps some 100 000 years ago. However, the extent of the correspondence between some constructions of the human mind and the order of nature, as revealed by science, is a late insight of the last centuries. Quantum physics and relativity are particularly impressive examples

Starting young?: links between childhood and adult participation in culture and science: a literature review

A selective review of research literature on the extent of childhood exposure to and experience of culture and science and subsequent adult cultural or science participation

On Legitimacy: Designer as minor scientist

User experience research has recently been characterized in two camps, model-based and design-based, with contrasting approaches to measurement and evaluation. This paper argues that the two positions can be constructed in terms of Deleuze & Guattari’s “royal science” and “minor science”. It is argued that the “reinvention” of cultural probes is an example of a minor scientific methodology reconceptualised as a royal scientific “technology”. The distinction between royal and minor science provides insights into the nature of legitimacy within