Moving towards normalising CALL: A case study from Timor-Leste

It is now widely understood that teachers are the main decision makers in the classroom, so when an innovation is introduced into a teaching and learning setting it seems that teachers‟ beliefs and attitudes may be a major determinant in the success or otherwise of that investment. This case study examines the process of a Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) application being introduced into a university setting. Bax (2003) posited that a new technology is „normalised‟ when it is invisible and fully integrated, just as pens and books have been, into everyday classroom use. To gain further insights into the process of an innovatory CALL application moving „towards normalisation‟ (Chambers & Bax 2006), the present study solicited university teachers‟ opinions and impressions towards the innovation over a period of five months. The innovation is a software application developed in the Computer Science Department at the University of Waikato (http://flax.nzdl.org/greenstone3/flax). The Flexible Language Acquisition Device (FLAX) uses digitalised libraries to provide language learning tasks for students, both texts and tasks being written by teachers or more able students. The English Department at the National University of Timor-Leste (UNTL) was the setting selected for the study, as the researcher had spent fourteen months there as a volunteer teacher in 2005-6. The case study is framed within a wider (2006-2011) collaborative curriculum project between UNTL and the University of Waikato. It was decided to collect oral, rather than written, data in order to align with the oral traditions of Timor-Leste. Thus, oral reflective journals captured participants‟ perceptions in audio-recorded discussions with a peer over three occasions. Focus groups of participants reflected on key issues at entry and exit points, and the researcher wrote her own daily reflective journal. The findings showed that the participants moved from a position of excitement tinged with concern to a position of confidence and readiness to implement FLAX during the reseacher‟s visit, indicating a positive move towards normalisation. A powerful insight gained by the researcher was that teachers were able to co-construct a range of ways of using the programme with their students in terms of autonomous learning, peer scaffolding and the importance of the affective domain in language learning. These findings reinforced the notion that the introduction of technologies is a social construct, not just a technological one (Bax, 2011). A further lens of investigation of the innovation was provided by Activity Theory, (Engeström 1987), which showed that the process of curricular normalisation is influenced by activity outside the classrom, and may strengthen or reduce the object of activity, in this case improved learning outcomes. The implications of the case study may have resonance in relatable settings. It seems that encouraging a collaborative approach may enable teachers to envision and ideate new ways to teach and learn, and incorporate new technologies into their own settings. This study may also have implications for external change agents as they contemplate assisting learning communities to normalise curriculum innovation

Challenging Functional Decline as a driver of care for hospitalised older adults: A discursive ethnography

Functional decline (FD) is considered a critical issue in health care incurring significant human and financial cost. In hospitalised older adults’ care, FD is defined pervasively as decreases in level of socio-biophysical capacity for activities of daily living (ADL) such as personal care and mobility, understood to result in further functional impairment and loss of independence. The health care system is concerned about the associated prolonged hospital stays, diminished outcomes at discharge, and increased dependence and/or mortality. This thesis uses discursive ethnography to get up close to examine functional decline as a discourse (social practices that produce knowledge) focused on older adults’ decreasing capacity in the material actualities of hospital experiences. Seven patients, 75 years or older, hospitalised for surgical repair of a fractured hip due to a fall were followed from admission to discharge. Participant observations afforded a view into performances of care within nurse/patient interactions. Conversations and recorded interviews offering a place for older adults and their nurses to discuss the situation. Foucauldian discourse analysis explicated how assessment technologies, generated by gerontological research to predict which older adults at greatest risk for FD, are constituted by a FD discourse based on norms reproduced from ADL technologies. Production and distribution of this discourse in the literature and hospital contexts display how these technologies when redistributed into hospitals are not benign in their effects, but as FD imbued discourses of care produce knowledge that normalises and drives nurse/patient interactions within everyday care: constituting nurse and patient subjectivities contingent on how it is taken up, resisted, or ignored, as nurses and patients position within such interactions. This thesis exposes how FD as a discourse acted to effect such positioning, eliding other knowledges, ways of perceiving older adults and enacting care. It provides new understandings that challenge such elisions and singular approaches to provide alternative positions more likely to provide patient centred hospital care for older adults, despite the pervasiveness of the hegemonic discourses that dominate and structure health care systems

Measuring phonological distance between languages

Three independent approaches to measuring cross-language phonological distance are pursued in this thesis: exploiting phonological typological parameters; measuring the cross-entropy of phonologically transcribed texts; and measuring the phonetic similarity of non-word nativisations by speakers from different language backgrounds. Firstly, a set of freely accessible online tools are presented to aid in establishing parametric values for syllable structure and phoneme inventory in different languages. The tools allow researchers to make differing analytical and observational choices and compare the results. These tools are applied to 16 languages, and correspondence between the resulting parameter values is used as a measure of phonological distance. Secondly, the computational technique of cross-entropy measurement is applied to texts from seven languages, transcribed in four different ways: a phonemic IPA transcription; with Elements; and with two sets of binary distinctive features in the SPE tradition. This technique results in consistently replicable rankings of phonological similarity for each transcription system. It is sensitive to differences in transcription systems. It can be used to probe the consequences for information transfer of the choices made in devising a representational system. Thirdly, participants from different language backgrounds are presented with non-words covering the vowel space, and asked to nativise them. The accent distance metric ACCDIST is applied to the resulting words. A profile of how each speaker’s productions cluster in the vowel space is produced, and ACCDIST measures the similarity of these profiles. Averaging across speakers with a shared native language produces a measure of similarity between language profiles. Each of these three approaches delivers a quantitative measure of phonological similarity between individual languages. They are each sensitive to different analytical choices, and require different types and quantities of input data, and so can complement each other. This thesis provides a proof-of-concept for methods which are both internally consistent and falsifiable

Indo-Fijian women as subversive bodies in Fiji’s sporting arena : an arts-based study

Whilst other sporting stories of women from the Global North and Black vs. White binary are well known, the local (Fijian) context (privileged Brown native vs. marginalised Brown (Indo-Fijian) settlers), is not. In Fiji, physicality is highly racialised and gendered, and Indo-Fijian women are most invisible in Fiji’s sporting arenas. Thus, the following research questions shape my dissertation: How do Indo-Fijian women perceive and make meaning about their physicality and gender in sport; How do local and global social constructs of gender impact young Indo-Fijian women’s sports participation in Fiji; How the attitudes, barriers/challenges, pleasures, and histories of resistance and opportunities of Indo-Fijian girls/women, influence their sports participation in Fiji, and how equitable, inclusive/exclusive and in/effective are Fiji schools’ Physical Education (PE) lessons in understanding, aiding and responding to Indo-Fijian girls’ cultural needs and perceptions of physical activity and sports? I have collected empirical data using arts-based methods, and drawn upon critical, intersectional and poststructuralist theories to study the sporting experiences of young Indo-Fijian women in Fiji. These theories and methods illuminated the multifaceted nuances that impact their sporting participation. The main findings challenge the previous stereotypes of Indo-Fijian women – lacking physicality and interest and being difficult to engage in sports. The findings disclose that athletic Indo-Fijian women disrupt the Fijian gender, racial and class orders by consistently exercising their sporting agency, and also actively negotiating PE and physical activity opportunities by pushing for innovative (team) sports despite their requests failing to penetrate the racial, gendered and orthodox perceptions of (PE) teachers and rigid practices within the legitimised curriculum. The dissertation provides suggestions for policy makers and relevant Fijian stakeholders such as schools, tertiary institutions, PE teachers/sports coaches and parents in valuing and acting on the requests and passions of Indo-Fijian women. It also emphasises the urgent need for inclusive and innovative pathways for girls and women in Fiji’s sporting arenas, thus fulfilling the country’s ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)

Sickle Cell Disease in Young Men, and Its Impact on Relationships

Background: Sickle Cell Disease (SCD) is a common genetic blood disorder with short and long-term physical and mental health effects. This population faces additional challenges such as stigma and health inequities, but also challenges within relationships, due to their condition. However, very little is known about how SCD affects romantic relationships, and specifically men’s perspectives on this. Method: A qualitative methodology, using semi-structured interviews, was utilised to explore how SCD impacts romantic relationships for men in the UK. Seven men aged between 20-39 were recruited to share their views and experiences. Thematic Analysis was employed to analyse the data. Results: Three interconnected themes were developed: ‘societal and cultural norms concerning romantic relationships’, ‘lack of awareness and understanding, misconceptions and stigma around SCD’, and ‘disclosing SCD within a romantic relationship’. Within these themes, topics around reproductive decisions, masculinity, sexual relationships, being a burden, and adapting and acceptance of SCD, were discussed. Conclusions and Implications: SCD impacts men’s romantic relationships in a host of areas. Supporting men with these difficulties may include change at individual level, for instance healthcare professionals using a holistic approach, including psychological therapy to support these men. In addition, broader/societal level approaches such as increasing awareness, knowledge and understanding around SCD, in order to reduce the detrimental effects felt by these men, and enabling them to live more fulfilling and satisfying lives

CLARIN. The infrastructure for language resources

CLARIN, the "Common Language Resources and Technology Infrastructure", has established itself as a major player in the field of research infrastructures for the humanities. This volume provides a comprehensive overview of the organization, its members, its goals and its functioning, as well as of the tools and resources hosted by the infrastructure. The many contributors representing various fields, from computer science to law to psychology, analyse a wide range of topics, such as the technology behind the CLARIN infrastructure, the use of CLARIN resources in diverse research projects, the achievements of selected national CLARIN consortia, and the challenges that CLARIN has faced and will face in the future. The book will be published in 2022, 10 years after the establishment of CLARIN as a European Research Infrastructure Consortium by the European Commission (Decision 2012/136/EU)

CLARIN

The book provides a comprehensive overview of the Common Language Resources and Technology Infrastructure – CLARIN – for the humanities. It covers a broad range of CLARIN language resources and services, its underlying technological infrastructure, the achievements of national consortia, and challenges that CLARIN will tackle in the future. The book is published 10 years after establishing CLARIN as an Europ. Research Infrastructure Consortium

A critical discourse analysis of student and staff constructions of their pedagogical relationships in two UK modern universities in an era of marketisation

This study in two English post-1992 universities uses a critical discourse analysis approach to examine the construction of student-staff relationships in an era of marketisation. There is little empirical evidence about how students and staff describe their learning and teaching relationships in a marketised environment, and in a period following such significant policy reforms. This thesis addresses the question of how consumerist discourses might open or close opportunities for learning and seeks to find out if, and how, alternative discourses are being deployed. Qualitative methods were used to gather data in vocational and non-vocational subject disciplines. The research approach was based on semi-structured interviews with staff and students, observations of student-staff interactions and documentary analysis of institutional documents. Student Forum meetings were observed, and they represent important, informal and under-researched spaces where learning and teaching experiences are shared and discussed. The thesis critically analyses different representations of the student in practice and argues from a social-constructionist perspective that there are multiple constructions of the student which may be deployed concurrently. In recognising different ways to be a student this contradicts the homogenised views on which policy and practices are typically built. The study also adds to the scarce literature on the practicalities of doing discourse work and outlines a phased approach, first identifying constructions of the student and then wider discourses. In addition to the consumerist ‘satisfying the customer’ discourse, four additional discourses are identified: ‘students under pressure’; ‘exercising autonomy’; ‘trajectories of student development’; and ‘contractual obligations’. The study questions the idea of seeking one enduring discourse for the student and argues for a new framework for understanding pedagogical relationships. This takes account of the complex and competing spheres in which accounts are formed, including family and community, policy environments, academia, day-to-day learning environments and social and moral environments