The dying town syndrome : a survey of urban development in the Western District of Victoria,1890-1930

The experience of urban settlement in the Western District of Victoria suggests that the pattern of growth and decline in small towns is tied to the pattern of land use. This, in turn, is determined by the economic and technological factors which influence farm management and practices. At times, these factors have encouraged urban development and small towns have flourished. For the most part, however, these forces have not been conducive to sustaining long-term growth and prosperity and small towns, have been trapped in a cycle of growth and decline.

Voluntarism, salvation, and rescue : British juvenile migration to Australia and Canada, 1890-1939

This article explores the relationships between governments and selected voluntary organisations involved in British migration to Australia and Canada from the 1890s to the Second World War. Prior to the Great War, there was considerable ill feeling by Dominion governments, especially Australian, towards philanthropic organisations, which appeared to undermine official immigration schemes through their attempts to reclaim and transplant the unwanted. Although voluntary associations were later subsidised by the British government and came under the group nomination schemes of the 1922 Empire Settlement Act, they were still viewed with suspicion. Organisations focusing on 'salvation', 'redemption' and 'rescue' in their migration work, however, provide us with an alternative ideology to the idea of building up 'fit populations' in the Dominions, where the notion of 'fitness' was perceived in a number of ways, not least in terms of class.

Coronary heart disease trends in England and Wales from 1984 to 2004 : concealed levelling of mortality rates among young adults

Background: Trends in cardiovascular risk factors among UK adults present a complex picture. Ominous increases in obesity and diabetes among young adults raise concerns about subsequent coronary heart disease (CHD) mortality rates in this group.

Objective: To examine recent trends in age-specific mortality rates from CHD, particularly those among younger adults.

Methods and results: Mortality data from 1984 to 2004 were used to calculate age-specific mortality rates for British adults aged 35+ years, and joinpoint regression was used to assess changes in trends. Overall, the age-adjusted mortality rate decreased by 54.7% in men and by 48.3% in women. However, among men aged 35–44 years, CHD mortality rates in 2002 increased for the first time in over two decades. Furthermore, the recent declines in CHD mortality rates seem to be slowing in both men and women aged 45–54. Among older adults, however, mortality rates continued to decrease steadily throughout the period.

Conclusions: The flattening mortality rates for CHD among younger adults may represent a sentinel event. Deteriorations in medical management of CHD appear implausible. Thus, unfavourable trends in risk factors for CHD, specifically obesity and diabetes, provide the most likely explanation for the observed trends.

Teachers' stories of change : an interpretive study of behavioural studies teachers' experiences of change in Tasmanian schools and colleges 1984-1994

Major changes in teachers’ work in Tasmania occurred in the decade 1984-1994. Understanding of those changes has, to date, primarily come from the perspective of educational administrators. A different perspective on the changes comes from the stories told by teachers of Behavioural Studies, teaching grades 11 and 12 in government and non-government schools. Twenty teachers participated in taped interviews or videorecorded focus groups. Their stories were transcribed and analysed using an adapted form of grounded theory to explicate the meaning(s) of the changes for these teachers. Interpretation of the teachers' stories has also been framed by understandings drawn from narrative studies of teachers and their work. The core analytic category of the teachers’ stories of educational change is the conflict between the ideologies of teacher professionalism and economic rationalism. The major themes of the teachers’ stories are systemic and administrative change, control, histories of the Behavioural Studies subject, workload, students and stress.

Communicative language teaching of a foreign language : the Indonesian 1984 senior high school English syllabus

This thesis examines the implementation of the 1984 English syllabus, which is claimed to be communicative. The study was conducted in three government Senior High Schools in Singaraja, northern Bali. The results indicate that the implementation of the Communicative Approach has been constrained by the limited resources, inadequate professional development and the national examination system, the EBTANAS.

Unionism on the waterfront in the Port of Geelong 1886-1890

The thesis looks at three areas: the formation of the Port of Geelong, the rise of waterfront unionism within the port of Geelong and the impact of the great maritime strike of 1890 on waterfront unionism within Geelong.