Tradition as past is a modernist idea

As outlined in the theme of this conference, the problematisation of the notion of 'progress' relates to a questioning of the West's teleological aspirations for the future. This critique has allowed for the presence of a multiplicity of ways of perceiving the world, including those from outside the West's intellectual tradition. However, within architectural discourse, conceptual plurality has been largely limited to movements such as critical regionalism or postmodernism, which have tended to question the direction or desirability of progress, rather than its fundamental nature.

This paper looks at an example of recent architecture by an Asian diasporic community in Melbourne. This is a building that appears to be 'traditional' in style, in other words atavistic and antithetical to 'progressive' architectural ideals. However, looking at it through different philosophical understandings of duration can provide us with alternative interpretations to these assumptions.

By this I am not referring to disillusionment with progress, as expressed through postmodernist and neo-traditionalist movements in the West, but ways in which looking at the 'traditional' architectures of non-Western cultures from their own philosophical positions might provide alternative definitions pf the idea of 'progress'. The increasing presence of non-western 'traditional' architecture in the West implies that West modernity might not be the only 'tradition' that has a viable future. Consequently, the idea of 'the future' as something to aspire to, might be the outcome of a particular dominant historicity rather than a universal condition.

Training packages and the AQTF: freedom to move or components of a compliance-driven straightjacket?

This paper reports on a PhD research project being undertaken through the Faculty of Education, Deakin University. Training Packages and the Australian Quality Training Framework (AQTF) form part of the ruling relations of VET, but how do they operate in practice? Do they provide frameworks within which training professionals are free to use judgement and respond in innovative ways to local learning and assessment contexts? Do they impose rigid 'guidelines' within which the decision-making authority of practitioners over appropriate practices is displaced by that of auditors, constraining creativity and creating pressures towards conformity? Or does their impact vary, depending on how they are interpreted and who is doing the interpreting? My PhD research explores issues relating to the use of Training Packages in workbased learning. Interview data suggests that, in practice, different training organisations respond very differently to a regulatory framework that aims to achieve national consistency. Some practitioners describe working in a compliance-driven environment, in which their ability to meet the needs of learners is stifled by standardised training and assessment practices imposed by Training Packages and the AQTF. This view is reflected in phrases such as 'you're not allowed to…', and 'you always feel uneasy because you've got AQTF compliance, inspections, auditors'. In contrast, other practitioners talk about having freedom to design learning and assessment programs for their particular target group and context, providing they stay within broad guidelines that guarantee national recognition of qualifications they issue. This view is reflected in comments such as 'it just leaves it open … to be as creative and flexible as you like', and 'It just gives us freedom'. This paper explores the proposition that the impact of these abstract and generalised texts is influenced by local interpretations, and it considers the role that organisational culture plays in determining these interpretations.

Genre, gender and interpretation of movie trailers an exploratory study

Commercial movies cost tens of millions to make. Because they are now released on thousands of screens simultaneously, movie trailers are a major and necessary method of intensively promoting movies before they disappear from cinemas forever. Yet there is a paucity of research about how potential audiences react to these trailers. This study aimed at exploring consumers’ interpretations of movie trailers. Nineteen in-depth interviews were the means of data collection, using nine trailers for yet to be released movies from the romance/drama, action, comedy and thriller categories. Genre provided a focus for exploring consumers’ interpretations of movie trailers. Evaluative judgments of movies came first as a result of the value of genre to the consumer and then as a result of content which conveyed the movie would be involving relative to past movie experiences. Interpretations about the target audience for a movie were also influenced by assumptions that genre preferences differ according to gender. The findings pose implications for the construction of movie trailers.

International and culturally inclusive curricula-an engineering management unit audit case study

SEB421 Strategic Issues in Engineering is a final-year engineering management study unit at Deakin University in which the enrolled student population has grown to include significant numbers of international students. Given this change, it was considered timely to conduct a review of the unit, with regard to principles of international and culturally inclusive curricula. Despite the historically white Anglo-Saxon male culture of engineering education in Australia, there are a wide range of international and cultural aspects related to engineering education. A review of the literature reveals a diversity of interpretations of 'internationalisation' and 'cultural inclusiveness'. From a pragmatic perspective, it is noted that organisational policy can provide guidance for academic staff seeking to make courses more inclusive. From a review of the literature and relevant university policies, a list of 'international and culturally inclusive curricula' guidelines for engineering management education was developed. Comparing a prior audit of SEB421 with these guidelines revealed progress on international and culturally inclusive curricula, but identified opportunities for improvement. The guidelines were applied to the curriculum/syllabus, content/study materials, conduct and assessment of the unit, to identify further opportunities for improvement. A plan for improvement of the unit and an associated timetable for this work were developed. It was noted that some changes can be made immediately, while others are contingent upon the timetable imposed by university systems. It was further noted that issues of change within a single study unit intersect with wider issues of program curriculum, and, while pilot activities can provide a start, eventually the wider issue of international and culturally inclusive curricula across the entire undergraduate engineering program needs to be considered.

Observation of pain assessment and management- the complexities of clinical practice

• Pain assessment and management are complex issues that embrace physiological, emotional, cognitive, and social dimensions.

• This observational study sought to investigate nurse–patient interactions associated with pain assessment and management in hospitalized postsurgical patients in clinical practice settings.

• Twelve field observations were carried out on Registered Nurses' activities relating to pain with their assigned patients. All nurses were involved in direct patient care in one surgical unit of a metropolitan teaching hospital in Melbourne, Australia. Six observation times were identified as key periods for activities relating to pain, which included change of shift and high activity periods. Each observation period lasted 2 hours and was examined on two occasions.

• Four major themes were identified as barriers to effective pain management: nurses' responses to interruptions of activities relating to pain, nurses' attentiveness to patient cues of pain, nurses' varying interpretations of pain, and nurses' attempts to address competing demands of nurses, doctors and patients.

• These findings provide some understanding of the complexities impacting on nurses' assessment and management of postoperative pain. Further research using this observational methodology is indicated to examine these influences in more depth. This knowledge may form the basis for developing and evaluating strategic intervention programmes that analyse nurses' management of postoperative pain and, in particular, their administration of opioid analgesics.

Modelling corporate collapse: definitional issues of the collapse event

This paper investigates problems associated with interpretations of corporate collapse, and argues for a unified legal, rather than financial, definition of the event. In the absence of a formal definition of the event of corporate collapse, the integrity of sample selection becomes questionable; moreover, comparisons between empirical studies becomes less useful, if not altogether futile, due to the lack of a common ground in the basic building block. Upon close examination of 84 studies on ratio-based modeling of corporate collapse, between 1968 and 2004, this paper finds evidence in favor of a legal interpretation of the event of corporate collapse. Specifically, studies that adopted a legal definition are five times as many as those that opted for a financial explanation.

Youth and sexualities : pleasure, subversion and insubordination in and out of schools

These cutting-edge international essays challenge dominant narratives of queer youth predicated on oppression and victimization. As school systems address the emergence of Gay-Straight Alliances and calls to provide equal educational access, researchers, educators and youth workers are paying increasing attention to sexuality, gender and schooling. Yet present discourses are limited to liberal understandings of tolerance, safety, and equity that are defined by a separation of "queer" and "normal." This text documents and offers radical interpretations of the creativity of queer youth in challenging existing practices. Interdisciplinary analyses offer multiple vantage points for reconceptualizing adolescent sexual subjectivities and institutional and cultural practices.

Screening Michael Jackson's face : reading Martin Bashir's living with Michael Jackson

The screening of Martin Bashir's Living with Michael Jackson on Australian television elicited a phenomenal amount of interest in the news media, at water coolers and on the Internet. Much of the response in the Australian print media was critical of Bashir's representation of Jackson, as well as denouncing Jackson as sad victim, warped predator and allround freakshow. This article considers these interpretations to argue that the production and consumption of 'wacko Jacko' is underpinned by the increasing instability of the natural in an age of information technologies, as well as the collapse of boundaries between documentary and fictional entertainment forms.

Emerging methodological issues in environmental education research

This presentation draws on recent experience in the “Environment and School Initiatives” (ENSI) project to explore emerging issues in the methodology of action research in environmental education. The ENSI project has been operating for close to twenty years, involving some twenty (mainly European) countries in the conduct and reporting of attempts to adopt an action research perspective in environmental education curriculum development and professional development. The presentation will locate the project within an historical perspective on research in environmental education before considering differing interpretations of the action research methodology in a range of different (country-based) professional settings. With examples from case studies of action research in environmental education, the presentation suggests that action research is best characterised by adoption of certain principles such as deliberate reflection by practitioners, respect for „practical knowledge‟ of teachers and teacher-generated narrative data, and recognition of the significance of context, rather than by adherence to any recipe-like methodological formula. A corollary of this is that methodologists need to acknowledge and respect the „exigencies of practice‟ within which practitioners of action research in environmental education conduct their professional work.

Reflections on the public interest in accounting

The expression, ‘the public interest’ is so ingrained in policy development, that reforms in accounting are often championed under the notion that such developments will enhance the well-being of the community. While the public interest is well understood at policy level, at operating level the expression is ambiguous and has a multiplicity of interpretations. Current conceptions of the public interest are inadequate to define a principle which must stand as a measure of public policy. Who exactly is the public, what are the interests of the public, and what does it mean to serve the public interest? Consequently, members of the accounting profession are expected to comply with a principle that is vague and ambiguous. This paper undertakes a critical analysis of the public interest in accounting relying on a typology of public interest theories (normative, consensualist, process, and abolitionist theories) developed by Cochran [Cochran CE. Political science and “the public interest”. The Journal of Politics 1974;36(2):327–55]. The analysis indicates that existing knowledge and understanding of the public interest, is in part, consistent with some aspects of the Cochran’s [Cochran CE. Political science and “the public interest”. The Journal of Politics 1974;36(2):327–55] typology of public interest theories and inconsistent in others. The analysis also indicates that there is room for the profession to provide further guidance on the meaning of the public interest and how to apply it in practice.

Maintaining dignity and managing stigma in the interview encounter : the challenge of paid-for participation

The interview is both popular and problematic in social research. In this article, we describe and make problematic interviews from a study conducted with impoverished elders in Melbourne, Australia. Participants were paid $20 for each of two interviews. The result of the paid-for participation was double-edged in that it provided funds for impoverished participants, but the payment modified the exchange of free and open discussion. We describe key exchanges within the research interviews to exemplify how participants managed their experience and presentation of stigma and dignity. We demonstrate, with examples from the transcripts, strategies used by participants to gain agency over the process, while at the same time maintain enough of a semblance of conversational genre to make paid-for participation legitimate. We see this as an interesting methodological event that should inform analysis, interpretations, and the validity of interviews, rather than a problem with the interviewee.

The role of sister city relationships in the enhancement of trade : Latrobe City (Australia) and Taizhou (China)

Traditionally the role of Sister City relationships has been a political and cultural one involving local governments across the world. Over the decades this role has been questioned in both its efficacy as well as its
focus. Hundreds of Sister City relationships have developed and in Australia velY few can be said to have produced long term and worthwhile outcomes. New interpretations of the /ill1ctionality of Sister City relationships in Australia (and elsewhere) has resulted and has shifted towards an inclusion of a consideration of the commercial utility of such relationships and not solely cultural (0 'Toole 2001). Today especially with current strong trade relations with China, new models are sought to provide sustainability and long term prospects to such relations. This paper examines the possibility of special sister city relations between
Australian and Chinese cities using their sister city links. Specifically an examination in this paper is undertaken of the City of Latrobe and Taizhou as a case study of interest which provides sustainable trade potential between two strong small medium enterprise (SME) economies.

Examination of selected national policies towards mandatory folic acid fortification

The purpose of this paper is to present an examination of the contrasting policies towards mandatory folic acid fortification in six countries from different regions of the world. Three questions are addressed: 1) What is the policy of the country? 2) Why was the policy adopted? 3) What lessons have been learned? Policy contrasts among countries were assessed as reflecting different interpretations of the potential risks and benefits associated with folic acid fortification. Although commonalities were identified, it was considered unlikely that there could be a standard policy response for all countries. Instead, a country-by-country policy response based on national circumstances is indicated.

'I am, by God, fit for high positions' : on the political role of women in al-Andalus

Narrating and explaining the fairly emancipated women in al-Andalus has been fraught with ambiguity for the approximately one century of scholarship on the subject. There has been much stereotyping depending upon the investigator's particular perspective. This paper clarifies the roles of Andalusian women in political relations from the Muslim Conquest in 711 through the fall of Granada in 1492. The interpretations used in historiography pit a traditionalist trend, in which continuity from the pre 1slamic past is stressed, against the anti-continuist trend, in which an Oriental culture of the Muslims added the distinctive features of Iberian character today. In order to evaluate the two historiographic approaches, the contributions of seven prominent women are presented and evaluated for their social contexts during the eight centuries of al-Andalus. Comparisons are then made to prominent women in other political contexts within the Arab world in order to evaluate the strength of the two competing historiographic perspectives.

Dissociations between implicit and explicit memory in children : the role of strategic processing and the knowledge base

A review of the literature shows that explicit memory develops substantially from three years of age to adulthood, while implicit memory remains stable across this age range. Previously, this developmental dissociation has been attributed to different memory systems, or to confounds with perceptual vs. conceptual processing. Prompted by an alternative developmental framework, the experiments reported here provide evidence against both interpretations. Instead, it will be argued that (a) the implicit - explicit developmental dissociation reflects differences in strategic processing (strategy use and metamemory) across childhood and (b) that implicit memory can show development if a child's knowledge base in the tested domain is developing with age.