THE ROLE OF SOCIETY TRANSLATORSHIP IN CROSS-CULTURAL INTERACTION

Globalization and mass migration cause living of different cultures together. Immigrants take their own culture to foreign countries. Hence, cultural varieties occur in target countries. Foreign cultures cannot be reshaped, so different cultures meet and live together in target countries. Integration of different cultures is an obligation for cultural pluralism. In order to build a multicultural and tolerant society, society translators who know the cultures of immigrant societies have some important roles. In addition, society translators could contribute to building a stable integration in target countries. Hence, it is important to train society translators not only on target language, but also on target culture. This study has qualitative design investigates contemporary cross-cultural interaction, cultural variety, hybrid cultures and multi-culturalism by interpreting the obtained data. In addition to these, contribution of society translators who know the cultures of immigrant societies to building multicultural policies will also be investigated.  Article visualizations

Negotiation in cross-cultural marriages : an exploratory qualitative study among middle class professionals in Hong Kong

This thesis attempts to focus on families and their children (if any) in cross-cultural marriages. These families potentially face extra stress and strains in addition to those which all families face. As a result of recent social and economic changes, certain roles such as those of the breadwinner and caregiver, traditionally male-female roles, may be becoming more interchangeable. Cross-cultural families’ may have differences in cultural backgrounds, attitudes and expectations, as well as potential support networks, so the research will investigate whether these sorts of changes place even greater than usual demands on families. Therefore, it may be important for couples to be able to negotiate in respect to roles and activities as it is a form of interaction and communication. Negotiation usually takes place between couples because both have something to offer and gain from the process in order to achieve a win-win situation between them. Whilst the literature addressing the division of labour among cross-cultural couples in Western societies has grown considerably, there is relatively little research which examines the situation between cross-cultural couples in Hong Kong, where such unions are quite common. Hence, this research aims to investigate the process of negotiation (if any) between husbands and wives in cross-cultural marriages with relation to their roles within the family. It also attempts to elaborate the roles of domestic helpers and ageing parents, which may mediate or complement the duties of couples and, perhaps, enhance family harmony and family care to family members. The present study adopts a qualitative approach and grounded theory for data collection in examining a negotiation process between husbands and wives. A total of 14 middle class cross-cultural married couples (aged 30 to 58) were interviewed. Different sources of information such as literature, in-depth interviews with couples and opinions from key informants were also adopted to enrich the findings and to enable triangulation to enhance the reliability of the data. The findings show that all of the cross-cultural couples shared the household division of work due to the egalitarian attitudes they held towards each other. They tended to be more tolerant to each other. It is noted that domestic helpers can complement the duties of couples. The roles of full-time domestic helpers are essential because they take the pressure off couples, whereas part-time domestic helpers are very helpful in doing jobs that couples do not want to. It is also suggested that ageing parents in Hong Kong only complement the duties of couples after the women has given birth. With respect to negotiation strategies, the more popular ones used were: compromising, accommodating and collaborative (problem-solving). It is also hoped that such strategies may be developed for social help, with direct relevance to the social stability of cross-cultural families in Hong Kong

The role of stories in understanding the cultural context surrounding information systems practices

The culture of an organization constitutes the environment into which information systems (IS) practices take place. Despite the importance of culture in the organizational theory and management literature, this topic has received little attention in the IS area. The culture of an organization can be looked at from different angles. In addition to the usual view of culture, the integration view, two other perspectives have been identified in the literature: the differentiation and fragmentation perspectives. While the integration perspective focuses on the assembling role organizational culture is normally said to play, the differentiation perspective highlights important differences among groups of people in the organization and the fragmentation perspective includes the notion of ambiguity and uncertainty in the conceptualization of culture. This study uses organizational stories as a way to investigate the culture of an organization and as a way to better understand IS practices. It uses simultaneously the three organizational culture perspectives in order to get a broad picture of the cultural context surrounding IS practices. More specifically, the objective of this interpretive study is to investigate three research questions related to (1) the nature of the stories told and the themes that they carry, (2) the functions that these stories play in the organization, and (3) the relationships between themes and IS practices. Using an in-depth case study strategy, stories and their interpretations were collected from a software-development company using primarily semi-structured interviews. The results emphasize the bias resulting from the use of the integration perspective as the only way to look at the culture of an organization. This bias had a profound impact on the literature; it helped shape the identification of important organizational actors, the definition of stories, and the conceptualization of their functions. In this study, a broader conception of significant stories is given along with a broader range of functions that stories may fulfill. Finally, the results highlight the importance of cultural elements in understanding the general context surrounding IS practices and explore in more detail two very contemporary IS activities: implementing team reorganization (change) and managing outsourcing relationships

Interventions at the end of life – a taxonomy for ‘overlapping consensus’

Context: Around the world there is increasing interest in end of life issues. An unprecedented number of people dying in future decades will put new strains on families, communities, services and governments. It will also have implications for representations of death and dying within society and for the overall orientation of health and social care. What interventions are emerging in the face of these challenges? Methods: We conceptualize a comprehensive taxonomy of interventions, defined as ‘organized responses to end of life issues’. Findings: We classify the range of end of life interventions into 10 substantive categories: policy, advocacy, educational, ethico-legal, service, clinical, research, cultural, intangible, self-determined. We distinguish between two empirical aspects of any end of life intervention: the ‘locus’ refers to the space or spaces in which it is situated; the ‘focus’ captures its distinct character and purpose. We also contend that end of life interventions can be seen conceptually in two ways – as ‘frames’ (organized responses that primarily construct a shared understanding of an end of life issue) or as ‘instruments’ (organized responses that assume a shared understanding and then move to act in that context). Conclusions: Our taxonomy opens up the debate about end of life interventions in new ways to provide protagonists, activists, policy makers, clinicians, researchers and educators with a comprehensive framework in which to place their endeavours and more effectively to assess their efficacy. Following the inspiration of political philosopher John Rawls, we seek to foster an ‘overlapping consensus’ on how interventions at the end of life can be construed, understood and assessed

In search of a third place: a telecollaborative model for languaculture learning

This thesis presents a five-year, global classroom project, in which French and American students study the same texts (literature, film remakes, works of sociology and anthropology), while corresponding using ICTs. Their reflections provide the basis for the development of conceptual and perceptual toolkits, containing consciousness-raising activities on individual and culturally-biased semantic and perceptual differences and similarities. Students compare home culture images and the corresponding images from the other culture(s), in an attempt to arrive at a "third place" (Kramsch 1993), as an intercultural speaker (Byraml995; 1997). Feedback and transcripts from participants are used to assess the effectiveness of this pedagogy of languaculture in broadening discourse options and educational opportunities, and of the role of telecollaboration in student motivation and engagement. The analytical framework draws on insights of Bakhtin, Vygotsky and Flarre and Gillet, focussing on the learner as agent, and language as fundamentally dialogic in nature. Telecollaboration provides access to multiple discursive perspectives and negotiation of meaning, whereby students, especially the more motivated, ask real questions and receive real answers. The global classroom leads to a change in the locus of control, increasing motivation and encouraging students to appropriate their own learning. Significant individual, group and cross-cultural differences emerge in the interpretation and degree of appropriation of the materials and opportunities for intercultural communication. This thesis provides research-informed, pedagogical guidelines for developing similar intercultural telecollaborative courses and makes a creative contribution, both to the dialogic teaching of language as culture and to the integration of new technologies into the curriculum

Environmental Determinants of Fruit and Vegetable Consumption Among Adults: A Systematic Review

The current ecological approach in health behaviour research recognises that health behaviour needs to be understood in a broad environmental context. This has led to an exponential increase in the number of studies on this topic. It is the aim of this systematic review to summarise the existing empirical evidence pertaining to environmental influences on fruit and vegetable (FV) consumption. The environment was defined as ‘all factors external to the individual’. Scientific databases and reference lists of selected papers were systematically searched for observational studies among adults (18–60 years old), published in English between 1 January 1980 and 31 December 2004, with environmental factor(s) as independent factor(s), and fruit intake, vegetable intake or FV intake combined as one outcome measure as dependent factor(s). Findings showed there was a great diversity in the environmental factors studied, but that the number of replicated studies for each determinant was limited. Most evidence was found for household income, as people with lower household incomes consistently had a lower FV consumption. Married people had higher intakes than those who were single, whereas having children showed mixed results. Good local availability (e.g. access to one's own vegetable garden, having low food insecurity) seemed to exert a positive influence on intake. Regarding the development of interventions, improved opportunities for sufficient FV consumption among low-income households are likely to lead to improved intakes. For all other environmental factors, more replicated studies are required to examine their influence on FV intake

Jakość przestrzeni publicznej centrum miasta – przetestowanie nowej metody oceny na grupie miast średnich regionu łódzkiego

This paper presents the outcomes of research on the quality of public space of town center, led in chosen medium-sized towns of Łódź region, using the authors’ method of assessment. Method consists of three elements: graphic valorisation, checklist valorisation and surveys, each of them giving numerical results, which enables comparison of the quality of public space in different aspects. The final effect of the method is ranking of towns, which can be analysed applying adopted criteria. Research revealed that the most important criterion of the high quality of public space of town center is well planned and executed revitalisation program, which introduces positive changes in all aspects identified as factors of quality of public space, between them animation of new activities.Artykuł prezentuje wyniki badań jakości przestrzeni publicznej cen­trum miasta przeprowadzonych w wybranych miastach średnich regionu łódzkiego, przy zastosowaniu autorskiej metody oceny. Metoda ta składa się z trzech elementów: waloryzacji graficznej, waloryzacji tabelarycznej i badań sondażowych, w wyniku których otrzymywane są rezultaty liczbowe, umożliwiające dokonywanie analiz porównawczych przestrzeni publicznej miast w różnych aspektach. Ostatecznym efektem metody jest ranking miast, którego wyniki można przeanalizować stosując przyjęte kryteria. Badania wykazały, że najważniejszym czynnikiem wysokiej jakości przestrzeni publicznej centrum miasta jest właściwie zaplanowany i przeprowadzony program rewitalizacji, który wywołuje pozytywne zmiany we wszystkich aspektach zidentyfikowanych jako czynniki jakości przestrzeni publicznej, w tym animację nowych aktywności

For scientists, for students or for the public? : the shifting roles of natural history museums

This article aims to discuss the main roles of natural history museums and to show how these purposes have evolved and adapted throughout the museums’ history, as a response to the development of natural sciences and societal change, from their creation in the 18th century to the present. It strives to demonstrate how the balance between research, teaching and disseminating knowledge to the public has successively shifted, without ever forsaking any of these functions. It is focused on Portuguese museums, but examining their place within international trends