Visual narratives in the children's picture story book : an investigation of the extent to which the formal structuring of a visual narrative retrieves a pastiche of past experiences and images which in turn shapes and redirects the story

Throughout this research, the notion that illustrators of children's books embark on two types of activity has been reinforced at every turn. On one hand the artist acknowledges the external world by organising images of actions and events in the contexts of place and time. This process involves bringing ideas into a physical form and demands the structuring of characters, settings, and story development. Planning and decisions are informed by imperatives that recognise the need for conventions of articulation and communication to a particular target audience. These then become a mayor priority of bookmaking and are constantly impacted on by publishers1 demands and ethical constraints. The other perspective sees the illustrator as expresser where the core of visual narratives for children celebrates the potency of imagination. Here dreams, fantasies, memories and the unconscious become the conduits to shaping sequential images. The artist is engaged not simply in visually telling a story, but rather telling facets of his or her own story. This exegesis traces the evolution of my own picture story book Eddie's Fantastic Fortnight published by Five Mile Press Publishers in tandem with the insights and reflections of five of Australia's most prominent illustrators. It examines whether the structure invested in a visual narrative liberates expressive response, ascribing to the premise that bookmaking plays an informing role to imagination. Equally it adopts the alternative position which asserts that the essence of children's books is indeed fantasy, memory and dreams. This proposition views imagination and inspiration as the primary catalyst around which illustrators build their narrative. In the often lengthy processes of bookmaking, these considerations constantly shift. I have attempted to explore and reveal these mobile and ever changing priorities, not only in my own work, but also through leading exponents in the field.

Positivism: one ring to rule them all? A tale of information systems research methodology

The tale of research methodology in information systems is told through the fantasy of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings. The tale is intended to be at once a piece of light hearted fun in its placement of the struggles of research methodology as an epic story but, in the tradition of the court jester, attempts to provide a new perspective on Information Systems (IS) research methodology and our struggles with positivism in particular. Our tale is one of developing a greater maturity and confidence in IS methodology and introduces postmodern methodologies to Information Systems. Our tale, our pastiche, is itself postmodern.

Comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable: the role of journalism in the academy

The new professional disciplines such as journalism and public relations face unique challenges in entering the academy and as they formulate their own methodologies, pedagogies and theoretical frameworks there arises inevitable tensions between them and the more traditional disciplines.

As recently as January of this year in announcing the establishment of a new institute of journalism at Oxford University backed by £1.75m funding from Reuters, the vice chancellor of Oxford University, Dr John Hood, outlined plans to make this new centre one of the most authoritative sources of reliable analysis of journalism at an international, national and local level.

He went on to say that the aim of the institute would be to "break down the barriers of incomprehension and distrust which have tended to define the relationship between the academy and journalism." It is that ambivalent relationship which provides the focus for this paper.

As late as the mid 90s in the Australian academy focus was on the so called "Media Wars" with proponents of a pure and empirical form of journalism education declaring "No More Theory!" Tensions remain at least in the Australian context between the profession and practitioners and those who have moved to journalism education. Even within the ranks of the educators there are still divisions between those who see themselves only as practitioners with skills to impart, and those who see themselves as also building the disciplinary base.

Interdisciplinarity is often seen as the solution to such tensions but such hybrid mergings bring with them their own problems. This paper looks at the "Media Wars", their aftermath, and provides a case study of a discipline still seeking its own secure methodological and theoretical niche within the academy. It also poses its own solution in suggesting that it is time for a riotous Feyeraband type of play to produce the kind of disciplinary pastiche which will help in securing that niche.

Subculture : reassessing the meanings of style ; a theoretical base for the study of subcultures in the 21st century

Re-examines the body of subcultural theory originally set in place by Birmingham University's Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies in the 1970s. This was achieved through extensive ethnographic interviewing, and through utilisation of postmodern theoretical perspectives including pastiche (a kind of eclecticism) and hyperreality. The thesis emphasises the importance of grounding theory in practice.

WORK: hybridity and endurance within solo dance practice and performance

Drawing the line: Chinese calligraphy, cultural materialisms and the “remixing of remix"

Remix in writing has very different expressions, and is grounded in very different legal, philosophical and creative materialisms, in Western and Chinese cultures. The infringement of authors’ Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) in China is not only an irritant for Chinese-Western commercial and legal relations. It also points to different formations of the creative and legal domains across global space, and serves to introduce notions of creativity and originality that are largely unfamiliar in the West. Calligraphy, as a pictorial and material mode of writing, comprises a practice of Chinese remix in which the apprentice traces the lines of the master’s work: repetition of Yun 韵 (‘composed body movements’) stimulates the expression of Qing 情 (‘feelings’). What appears from a distance to be slavish imitation actually involves a philosophy of learning (or more precisely, of ‘unlearnt learning’) that, bypassing plagiarism’s traps, effectively ‘remixes remix’ as a creative model no longer dependent on the familiar Western rationales for the legitimacy of remix as appropriation, homage and/or pastiche. To see this though, one has to deploy a Taoist rather than a Confucian framework in the analysis of calligraphic practices. The case of Kathy Acker, allied with the work of Gilles Deleuze, reveals a largely invisible lineage of Taoist-influenced remix in Western creative writing. In this way, calligraphy emerges as a model of remix relevant to all forms of writing—for all writing is material, whether calligraphic or not. Further, as Acker shows, the materiality of writing constantly replenishes its remixing with cultural elements that may not be otherwise visible.