She would say that, he's from Melbourne : fun and games with Dame Edna and Barry Humphries

This article explores the role that urban place and specifically urban comparison play in the public performances of both the comedian Barry Humphries and the character Edna Everage. In developing Claire Colebrook's analysis of satire as a form of humour that is physically and historically located, we argue that the initial success of Humphries’ satire rests on his elaboration of a specific series of geo-social locations. The article then examines the ways in which Edna makes the local her own global, demonstrating how Barry Humphries has progressively modified and internationalised Edna's provincialism so that his satirical cultural project is understandable over five decades and beyond her origins in Melbourne.

They went home: racialised spaces in contemporary picture books

This paper discusses Michel de Certeau’s theories of spatialised power and of resistance, especially his characterisation of what he describes as ‘tactics’ by which marginalised groups resist the strategies by which those in power gain and maintain control, in relation to a group of settler society picture books: Edna Tantjingu Williams, Eileen Wani Wingfield and Kunyi June-Anne McInerney’s Down the hole (2000); the Papunya School Book of Country and History (2001); Chiori Santiago and Judith Lowry’s Home to Medicine Mountain (1998); George Littlechild’s This Land Is My Land (1993); and Allen Say’s Home of the Brave (2002). These texts thematise colonial and assimilationist policies in Australia, Canada and the United States which required that racialised groups of children should be removed from their homes and families and placed in institutions. I argue that the first four of these texts position child readers both to understand the dislocation and pain caused by government policies such as those which enforced the removal of the Stolen Generation in Australia, and to appreciate the tactics of resistance by which children evaded or subverted institutional power. Home of the Brave deploys the symbolism of an adult’s journey into the past to show how strategies of repression serve to protect individuals and nations from shame and guilt, and demonstrates the transformative effects which result when the past is scrutinized.

A new model of workbased learning in the VET sector

This report provides a revised model of workbased learning for the vocational education and training (VET) sector in Australia, in response to emerging needs. The study provides a brief review of the theoretical foundations of the contemporary discussions surrounding workbased learning, drawn from literature on adult education and learning organisations. Literature on adult learning and learning organisations in the 1990's explored new dimensions of these topics and this new theorising enriched the concept of workbased learning. This examination of the literature enables the development of a model of an integrated approach to workbased learning. The model integrates compatible ideas from adult learning, learning organisations and action learning/research and facilitates new ways of thinking about workbased learning as a staff development model. This model confirms that workbased learning is an appropriate and relevant approach to staff development in contemporary times.

The never-ending quest : effective strategy-making and change management for high-performing VET organisations

This report summarises the evaluation of projects undertaken in 2001-02 as part of Reframing the Future's sub-program on Strategic Management and Change Management. It argues every Registered Training Organisation (RTO) in the vocational education and training (VET) sector in Australia needs managers who can design effective strategies.

The potential for communities of practice to underpin the National Training Framework

This report is an evaluation of the sixteen pilot projects that were funded to form Communities of Practice in the VET sector in 2001, as part of the Reframing the Future program. The major theme emerging from this evaluation study is that Communities of Practice in the vocational education and training (VET) sector in Australia have the potential to accelerate, intensify, enrich and enhance the implementation of the national training system.

Blackburn

This paper considers the hope and recommendations of Jean Blackburn, and what is actually happening in schools as a consequence of her vision.The actuality as a secondary school (Warrigul High School) prepares for the introduction of the VCE.

SLC6A4 STin2 VNTR genetic polymorphism is associated with tobacco use disorder, but not with successful smoking cessation or smoking characteristics: a case control study.

The aim of this study was to determine if variable number of tandem repeats (VNTR) in the second intron (STin2) of the serotonin transporter (SLC6A4) gene was associated with tobacco use disorder, successful smoking cessation, or smoking characteristics. In this case-control study, patients with current tobacco use disorder, diagnosed according to DSM IV criteria (n = 185), and never-smokers, diagnosed according to CDC criteria (n = 175), were recruited and received 52 weeks of combined pharmacotherapy and cognitive therapy. Successful smoking cessation was defined as exhaled carbon monoxide < 6 ppm. SLC6A4 gene STin2 VNTR polymorphism was assessed using a Multiplex-PCR-based method. At baseline, participants were evaluated using the Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence (FTND) and the ASSIST scale.