Active citizenship

The aim of this activity is to allow students to explore the nature of political action, which can be thought of as a form of active as opposed to passive citizenship. By learning about and reflecting upon past instances of political action, or activism, students will be able to start thinking about what is likely to make a campaign successful. It is intended that these reflections can then be applied to their own actions as active citizens. It is hoped that the historical case studies combined with the information provided on different campaigning tools and methods will help to make students feel empowered and inspired to take action. In setting students the task of planning an action, it is expected that time management and organizational skills will be improved. It is believed that by putting themselves in the shoes of activists and going through the process of planning an action, they will have an engaged learning experience. The reflective element of the activity encourages students to form and defend opinions on the relative strengths and weaknesses of different campaigning methods, and on the acceptable limits to political action. This learning activity has been designed presuming no prior knowledge of activism or its methods, and has been successfully used with first year undergraduate students from a variety of disciplines. However, the activity provides a basis for more in-depth study of several issues, or alternatively study into further examples of campaign organizations. There are 3 different learning activities presented on this web site. For a dynamic and well-illustrated introduction to contemporary activism, see Jordan, T. (2002) Activism!: Direct Action, Hacktivism and the Future of Society, London: Reaktion Books Ltd. This material is also available via JORUM.

Professional and Legal Issues INFO2009 - Introduction

Introductory lecture which sketches expectations of the module and deals with admin of establishing student groups

Handout - Categorising Professional and Legal Issues

two page handout, includes two task, one for class, one for homework

Professional, Legal and ethical issues - indicative topic list

indicative list of topic areas for professional, legal and ethical issues modules clustered into broad themes. Document is to be consulted in conjunction with other slides and notes for the module.

INFO2009 IT and Legal Issues Handout

Some of this set of resources is a verbatim copy of a google knol created by Norman Creaney of the University of Ulster. Other parts of the document contextualise the content in terms of preparing for a stage test in Legal and Professional Issues. The notes should be read in conjuction with other materials which have been provided as slides and handouts (notably handouts covering Workplace perspectives)

Copyright Issues - an exploration

This is a set of videos which explore issues associated with the use of digital video. The videos help bring home the observation that 'piracy' is viewed in many different ways by different people depending upon their context, and the prevailing local laws.

INFO2009 Cwk - Resource - by 'Legal Issues'

A link to our resource about the topic 'Open Source'. The website has information for you to learn about the topic and answer from multiple choice questions.

INFO2009 Cwk - Reference List - by 'Legal Issues'

A list of references that we used to create the resource

INFO2009 Cwk - Poster - by 'Legal Issues'

A poster about our resource on the topic of 'Open Source'

INFO2009 Cwk - Reference List - Word Format - by 'Legal Issues'

A list of references in word format

INFO2009 Cwk - Open Source - by 'Legal Issues'

A collection of our resource, poster and reference list

Introduction to Professional and Legal Issues: INFO2009

slides and activities outlining the extent of the module,outline of proposed courseworks. Includes a couple of activities

Legal Issues in Social Networking

Legal Issues in Social Networking - Analyzed Paper