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China has one of the most powerful military forces in the world. However, a little over 100 years ago, the Chinese military was repeatedly defeated by Western colonial powers and Japan. These defeats motivated the Chinese to make dramatic changes to their military forces.
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China has one of the most powerful military forces in the world. However, a little over 100 years ago, the Chinese military was repeatedly defeated by Western colonial powers and Japan. These defeats motivated the Chinese to make dramatic changes to their military forces.
Description:
Objectives: Higher levels of depression have been documented among older adults who reside in an assisted living facility, compared with those who remain in their own homes. The aims of the current study were to test whether the relationship between housing type and depressive symptoms was mediated by a sense of belonging and whether housing type and sense of belonging interact to influence the depressive symptoms among older adults (moderation model).Method: A sample of 257 older adults who lived in their own homes and 166 older adults who lived in an assisted living facility completed the psychological subscale of the Sense of Belonging Instrument and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale.Results: Results showed that a sense of belonging partially mediated the relationship between housing type and depressive symptoms, such that living in a nursing home was associated with lower levels of belonging, and lower levels of belonging were, in turn, associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms. Residing in an assisted living facility was associated with depressive symptoms at low and average levels of belonging.Conclusion: Results highlight the need for more research on the role of sense of belonging as an influencing factor on depressive symptoms among institutionalised older adults for both theoretical and treatment goals.
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Over 2007-2008, a pedagogy subject in a pre-service teacher education degree was (re)designed to help students develop their understandings and skills and a wider, more critical appreciation of the work of teachers and approaches to curriculum. The rationale for designing and including the online modules in the subject was to develop information and communication technology (ICT) skills, and to deliver a blended learning approach, argued by some to be more effective, that is, have more advantages than traditional approaches. In this paper, the face-to-face teaching alongside the eLearning that occurred in the blended learning approach is analysed using Tom Reeves and John Hedberg's model (2003) for evaluating interactive learning systems. Arguably, this evaluation model can be usefully applied to higher education teaching that is not fully online, and can help to comprise an integral part of an action research approach. This paper is a 'proof of concept' piece, demonstrating the applicability of the model to a blended learning course. Demonstrating the application of Reeves and Hedberg's model fills a knowledge void on the literature surrounding blended learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
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This article investigates the usage of a diary as a transparent truth device in legal proceedings. I argue that this usage assays a very naı¨ve notion, perpetrated by the prosecution, that truth is self-evident when written by the hand of the defendant. Moreover, and more importantly, this approach demands that words have only one meaning, that semantics and context don’t matter, and that broader, overarching themes are unimportant, even when only very brief quotations, selected out of eight years’ worth of entries are used. The diary, itself, is effectively prosecuted here; it becomes the ‘monstrous’ criminal, yet at all times, a mere synecdoche for the ‘real’ monster herself.
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Direct democracy is seen as a means of reengaging citizens in the political process. However, it is a contested concept that requires further development by being grounded in a specific context. This article reports on research undertaken in Victorian local government where the New Public Management (NPM) has been in evidence for a number of decades which according to the literature has impacted on accountability to the broader community. The possibility of consultation and citizen participation in the local government budgetary process was examined. The results reported suggest that participation in the budgetary decisions in local government is possible.
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This article examines the implications of the Australian Football League’s Rule 30 on vilification in football and society. Considering the views of key industry, government, community, multicultural, Indigenous and academic stakeholders it addresses the themes of community harmony, multiculturalism and reconciliation. The paper evaluates the role of Australian Rules football in changing contemporary attitudes towards vilification and how public policy in this area has been driven by sports-led initiatives such as the AFL Rule 30. It briefly provides an international context for understanding these Australian-led initiatives. ”Racism denies people the fundamental human right to be judged by their character, by what is inside. This is why it is not easy to experience a lifetime of racial abuse, be constantly reminded of it and yet be expected to ignore it”. (The Age 1997: 16).
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This paper discusses a vital project which functions to advise local government on the relevance of cultural sustainability and the economic aspirations of Aboriginal people engaged in cultural practice and knowledge transmission in their communities. Project findings assert that the significance of emotional and spiritual attachment to place shapes Identity cultural expression. Cultural values and connection to River and Country, and the story-work of art and cultural practice, are also found to be important media for cultural survival. The project clarified the major elements of cultural sustainability in art and cultural practice and provided a framework for ongoing local government support. United Nations covenants, local council policy and Commonwealth initiatives all have key functions in supporting Aboriginal people's right to maintain and protect culture within Country. The paper demonstrates how local government organisations can participate in supporting vital cultural activity. It asserts that decisions on cultural futures should be within the hands of Aboriginal people themselves.
Description:
We know the world, our world, through stories (Turner 1988: 68). Stories in childhood, whether verbal or written, are inevitably accompanied by visual language forms. This might be the storyteller’s body or a puppet performing mime and gesture; it may be pictures in storybooks, or the endless hybrid combinations of these in film and the electronic media. Even a single photograph can perform in a narrative way: “A picture of a forest tells implicitly of trees growing from seedlings and shedding leaves; and a picture of a house implies that trees were cut for it and that its roof will soon leak. (Goodman 1981:111)” Within a story–making activity, however, the visual image is not a sole performer; it is a participant in an intertextual web of discursive forms and endless meaning-making exercises. It is a complex, fluid experience (Belova 2006). The aim of this paper is to raise some questions about how narrative processes might operate in and through visual texts designed to communicate social injustice and elicit emotional and moral response, such as social documentary photographs and fundraising campaign posters. Using the example of an Australian Salvation Army Red Shield Appeal poster, the paper reflects on how the engaged viewer might be implicated as both character and author in the resonance between the meta–narratives and personal stories from their own life–world and the meanings arising from the poster’s text. In doing so, concepts of interpellation and intertextuality help explain some of the processes which position and compel viewers to respond, and also how they contribute to identifying meanings which reach beyond commonly received readings.
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This article investigates how cultural landscapes (especially the potentially limiting organically evolved landscape) can be used as a research framework to evaluate historical mining heritage sites in Australia and New Zealand. We argue that when mining heritage sites are read as evolved organic landscapes and linked to the surrounding forested and hedged farmland, the disruptive aspects of mining are masked. Cultural landscape is now a separate listing for World Heritage sites and includes associative and designed landscape as well as those that have evolved organically. These usages have rarely been scrutinized with care. We analyse how mid-nineteenth century goldmining sites can be best thematically interpreted and understood for their heritage, indeed World Heritage, significance and, where appropriate, developed for their sustainable heritage tourism potential. Drawing on a number of research disciplines, a schematic framework is offered for interpreting and classifying these new world cultural landscapes based upon analysis of gold-rush heritage sites throughout the Trans-Tasman world. We evaluate and apply this framework to place-based case studies in Victoria, Australia and Otago, New Zealand
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Taking Broken Hill as an exemplar of Australian, indeed global, labour heritage, this article, analyses the survival of labour heritage and union practices in the town that continues to the present. It examines the interpretation of successive layers of industrial and labour history as a means of revealing a culturally dynamic and enduring community with close connections to its built heritage. The authors challenge the application of two-dimensional and static models of heritage interpretations too often applied to contested heritage sites. The authors argue that Broken Hill is a community whose determined social and industrial character and distinct built environment has transcended changing patterns of investment and economic decline.
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This paper investigates the application of the Six Sigma approach to improve quality in electronic services (e-services) as more countries are adopting e-services as a means of providing services to their people through the Web. This paper presents a case study about the use of Six Sigma model to measure customer satisfaction and quality levels achieved in e-services that were recently launched by public sector organisations in a developing country, such as Jordan. An empirical study consisting of 280 customers of Jordan's e-services is conducted and problems are identified through the DMAIC phases of Six Sigma. The service quality levels are measured and analysed using six main criteria: Website Design, Reliability, Responsiveness, Personalization, Information Quality, and System Quality. The study indicates a 74% customer satisfaction with a Six Sigma level of 2.12 has enabled the Greater Amman Municipality to identify the usability issues associated with their e-services offered by public sector organisations. The aim of the paper is not only to implement Six Sigma as a measurement-based strategy for improving e-customer service in a newly launched e-service programme, but also widen its scope in investigating other service dimensions and perform comparative studies in other developing countries.
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In this article we explore the importance of ‘everyday discrimination’ and other psycho-social variables for psychological wellbeing, considering differences according to age, gender and socio-economic position. Using employee survey data collected within Australian organisations we explore a statistically reliable model of the relationship between aspects of the psycho-social work environment, psychological wellbeing and job satisfaction. The employee survey was carried out in two phases during mid-2007 and mid-2008 in a national university, two international freight terminals of a large international airline, a national manufacturing company and the roadside assistance division of a motoring organisation. Structural Equation Modelling was used to configure a model including psycho-social factors: respect, support, training, job insecurity and personally meaningful work. Everyday discrimination and consultation with supervisor were considered in terms of their direct effect on psychological wellbeing and job satisfaction and their indirect effect via the psycho-social factors enumerated above. Importantly, this generalised model attempts to describe the interrelations of these factors effectively for various age groups, gender and socio-economic position. We identify age, gender and socio-economic differences in the strength and relative importance of these relationships. A further validation study with an independent sample will be required to verify the model proposed in this article. The implications for the design of workplace interventions concerned with age discrimination are discussed.