Connecting Diversity : Paradoxes of Multicultural Australia

Commissioned by SBS, and published in March 2006, Connecting Diversity: Paradoxes of Multicultural Australia is a follow-up study to SBS’s 2002 report, Living Diversity: Australia’s Multicultural Future. The attitudes of many younger Australians from culturally diverse backgrounds reveal paradoxes about Australian multiculturalism today. This report sheds light on their views, experiences and expectations and the role of media in their lives. Younger, culturally and linguistically diverse Australians are often the subject of mediafanned controversy about disaffection, ‘ethnic gangs’ and cultural isolation. While these controversies tend to be localised – Cronulla, Inala or Bankstown – Connecting Diversity tells a national and quite different story. This research builds upon the findings of the 2002 report, Living Diversity: Australia’s Multicultural Future, which challenged common assumptions about contemporary multicultural Australia. In an era of fragmenting media and assumed political apathy, Connecting Diversity further examines many of the findings of the earlier study, with a new focus on younger people, cultural identity and media use. Connecting Diversity reveals individual experiences and often contradictory ideas about media and diversity in Australia. Disjunctions appear to exist between an individual’s experience and their thoughts about Australia’s national identity. Multiculturalism is valued for broadening the appreciation of difference, yet this support can coexist with concerns about perceived segregation, usually ‘elsewhere’ in Australia. Younger people tend to be more comfortable with cultural difference than previous generations and cite their own diverse network of friends as one of the reasons for this. Even so, some describe experiences of racism that engender a feeling of exclusion from ‘mainstream’ society. In their everyday lives, social relationships are navigated through regular and familiar connections on the one hand, and experiences and expressions of disconnection on the other. Racism and tolerance may be expressed almost simultaneously. These disconnections are often managed through ‘practical tolerance',allowing them to negotiate these apparent contradictions. The connections can be based simultaneously on such things as work, family,religion, friendships or location. The result is a multilayered sense of personal belonging and community connection. A large number of respondents in these focus groups expressed frustration at the failings of media, especially news and current affairs coverage, yet spoke enthusiastically about the accessibility and range of media compared to what was available to previous generations. In their many forms, media remain a key ingredient of self-identification among younger Australians of culturally diverse backgrounds who are especially cynical about media and disillusioned by their perceived inability to influence issues that are important to them. These findings reveal that although they may be cynical about media messages, these younger Australians are looking for connection through media and are seeking ways to participate in meaningful ways. This raises questions about the possibilities for media to empower younger people to play a part in genuine cultural democracy. By capturing the attitudes of Australians of culturally diverse backgrounds under the age of 40, Connecting Diversity: Paradoxes of Multicultural Australia provides an insight into social trends and the generational and cultural changes that are now shaping Australia.

The child, the text and the teacher : reading primers and reading instruction

From the late sixteenth century, in response to the problem of how best to teach children to read, a variety of texts such as primers, spellers and readers were produced in England for vernacular instruction. This paper describes how these materials were used by teachers to develop first, a specific religious understanding according to the stricture of the time and second, a moral reading practice that provided the child with a guide to secular conduct. The analysis focuses on the use of these texts as a productive means for shaping the child-reader in the context of newly emerging educational spaces which fostered a particular, morally formative relation among teacher, child and text.

Proximity-to-goal as a constraint on patterns of behaviour in attacker–defender dyads in team games

The aim of this study was to determine whether spatiotemporal interactions between footballers and the ball in 1 vs. 1 sub-phases are influenced by their proximity to the goal area. Twelve participants (age 15.3 ± 0.5 years) performed as attackers and defenders in 1 vs. 1 dyads across three field positions: (a) attacking the goal, (b) in midfield, and (c) advancing away from the goal area. In each position, the dribbler was required to move beyond an immediate defender with the ball towards the opposition goal. Interactions of attacker-defender dyads were filmed with player and ball displacement trajectories digitized using manual tracking software. One-way repeated measures analysis of variance was used to examine differences in mean defender-to-ball distance after this value had stabilized. Maximum attacker-to-ball distance was also compared as a function of proximity-to-goal. Significant differences were observed for defender-to-ball distance between locations (a) and (c) at the moment when the defender-to-ball distance had stabilized (a: 1.69 ± 0.64 m; c: 1.15 ± 0.59 m; P < 0.05). Findings indicate that proximity-to-goal influenced the performance of players, particularly when attacking or advancing away from goal areas, providing implications for training design in football. In this study, the task constraints of football revealed subtly different player interactions than observed in previous studies of dyadic systems in basketball and rugby union.

On IT and business value in developing countries : A complementarities-based approach

Developing economies accommodate more than three quarters of the world's population. This means understanding their growth and well-being is of critical importance. Information technology (IT) is one resource that has had a profound effect in shaping the global economy. IT is also an important resource for driving growth and development in developing economies. Investments in developing economies, however, have focused on the exploitation of labor and natural resources. Unlike in developed economies, focus on IT investment to improve efficiency and effectiveness of business process in developing economies has been sparse, and mechanisms for deriving better IT-related business value is not well understood. This study develops a complementarities-based business value model for developing economies, and tests the relationship between IT investments, IT-related complementarities, and business process performance. It also considers the relationship between business processes performance and firm-level performance. The results suggest that a coordinated investment in IT and IT-related complementarities related favorably to business process performance. Improvements in process-level performance lead to improvements in firm-level performance. The results also suggest that the IT-related complementarities are not only a source of business value on their own, but also enhance the IT resources' ability to contribute to business process performance. This study demonstrates that a coordinated investment approach is required in developing economies. With this approach, their IT resources and IT-related complementaries would help them significantly in improving their business processes, and eventually their firm-level performances.

Comparing retail union strategy in a neoliberal context : the case of Australia and New Zealand

Retail employees are amongst the most vulnerable workers in the context of neoliberal market economies. In many countries, low paid retail employees comprise around 10 per cent of the workforce (ABS 2011). The retail labour market is typically highly feminised and youthful, with many employees in part time and various forms of precarious employment (Tailby & Pollert 2011). However, the industry and its trade unions have rarely been the focus of academic study (Tilly & Carré 2011). This paper thus aims to analyse and compare trade union strategies in the retail industry in Australia and New Zealand, by utilising findings from a larger comparative study. The respective unions studied are the Shop Distributive and Allied Workers Union (SDA) in Australia and the National Distribution Union (NDU) in New Zealand. Data from interviews with union officials at different levels and from different regional locations in Australia and NZ are analysed. Union policy documents are also utilised to support the empirical data. Key findings from the comparison of retail unions’ strategy in Australia and NZ include: 1) the importance of institutional factors and internal political differences in shaping and constraining union strategies; 2) different emphases on external relationships and variations in partnership approaches; 3) the need to recruit to ‘stand still’ by retail unions in both countries; and, 4) similarities and differences in the unions’ organising approaches. The paper concludes by examining the implications of these findings for retail unions’ strategic choices and their ability to deliver workplace justice for employees.

(Un)doing gender : ways of being in an age of uncertainty

Children’s literature has conventionally and historically been concerned with identity and the often tortuous journey to becoming a subject who is generally older and wiser, a journey typically characterised by mishap, adventure, and detours. Narrative closure in children’s and young adult novels and films typically provides a point of self-realisation or self-actualisation, whereby the struggles of finding one’s “true” identity have been overcome. In this familiar coming-of-age narrative, there is often an underlying premise of an essential self that will emerge or be uncovered. This kind of narrative resolution provides readers with a reassurance that things will work for the best in the end, which is an enduring feature of children’s literature, and part of liberal-humanism’s project of harmonious individuality. However, uncertainty is a constant that has always characterised the ways lives are lived, regardless of best-laid plans. Children’s literature provides a field of narrative knowledge whereby readers gain impressions of childhood and adolescence, or more specifically, knowledge of ways of being at a time in life, which is marked by uncertainty. Despite the prevalence of children’s texts which continue to offer normative ways of being, in particular, normative forms of gender behaviour, there are texts which resist the pull for characters to be “like everyone else” by exploring alternative subjectivities. Fiction, however, cannot be regarded as a source of evidence about the material realities of life, as its strength lies in its affective and imaginative dimensions, which nevertheless can offer readers moments of reflection, recognition, or, in some cases, reality lessons. As a form of cultural production, contemporary children’s literature is highly responsive to social change and political debates, and is crucially implicated in shaping the values, attitudes and behaviours of children and young people.

Becoming a 'Bastion Against Tyranny' : Australian legal education and the government of the self

Research into legal education suggests that many students enter law school with ideals about using the law to achieve social change, but graduate with some cynicism regarding these ideals. It is often argued that law schools provide a negative, competitive, and conservative environment for students, pushing many away from social justice ideals towards more self-interested, vocational concerns. This article uses Michel Foucault’s work on the government of the self to suggest another way of understanding this process. It examines a range of prescriptive texts that provide students with advice about how to study law and ‘survive’ law school. In doing so, it posits that this apparent loss of social ideals does not necessarily always signify that the student has become politically conservative or has had a negative educational experience. While these legal personae may appear outwardly conservative, and indeed still reflect particular gendered or raced perspectives, by examining the messages that these texts offer students, this article suggests that an apparent loss of social ideals can be the result of a productive shaping of the self. The legal persona they fashion can incorporate social justice ideals and necessitate specific ways of acting on those ideals. This analysis adds to the growing body of research that uses Foucault’s work to rethink common narratives of power and the shaping of the self in legal education, and provides legal educators with new ways of reflecting on the effects of legal education.

In search of the Korean digital wave

This article sets the context for this special themed issue on the 'Korean digital wave' by considering the symbiotic relationship between digital technologies, their techniques and practices, their uses and the affordances they provide, and Korea's 'compressed modernity' and swift industrialisation. It underscores the importance of interrogating a range of groundbreaking developments and innovations within Korea's digital mediascapes, and its creative and cultural industries, in order to gain a complex understanding of one of Australia's most significant export markets and trading partners. Given the financial and political commitment in Australia to a high-speed broadband network that aims to stimulate economic and cultural activity, recent technological developments in Korea, and the double-edged role played by government policy in shaping the 'Korean digital wave', merit close attention from media and communications scholars.

Strolling through the (post)modern city: Modes of being a flaneur in picture books

The city and the urban condition, popular subjects of art, literature, and film, have been commonly represented as fragmented, isolating, violent, with silent crowds moving through the hustle and bustle of a noisy, polluted cityspace. Included in this diverse artistic field is children’s literature—an area of creative and critical inquiry that continues to play a central role in illuminating and shaping perceptions of the city, of city lifestyles, and of the people who traverse the urban landscape. Fiction’s textual representations of cities, its sites and sights, lifestyles and characters have drawn on traditions of realist, satirical, and fantastic writing to produce the protean urban story—utopian, dystopian, visionary, satirical—with the goal of offering an account or critique of the contemporary city and the urban condition. In writing about cities and urban life, children’s literature variously locates the child in relation to the social (urban) space. This dialogic relation between subject and social space has been at the heart of writings about/of the flâneur: a figure who experiences modes of being in the city as it transforms under the influences of modernism and postmodernism. Within this context of a changing urban ontology brought about by (post)modern styles and practices, this article examines five contemporary picture books: The Cows Are Going to Paris by David Kirby and Allen Woodman; Ooh-la-la (Max in love) by Maira Kalman; Mr Chicken Goes to Paris and Old Tom’s Holiday by Leigh Hobbs; and The Empty City by David Megarrity. I investigate the possibility of these texts reviving the act of flânerie, but in a way that enables different modes of being a flâneur, a neo-flâneur. I suggest that the neo-flâneur retains some of the characteristics of the original flâneur, but incorporates others that take account of the changes wrought by postmodernity and globalization, particularly tourism and consumption. The dual issue at the heart of the discussion is that tourism and consumption as agents of cultural globalization offer a different way of thinking about the phenomenon of flânerie. While the flâneur can be regarded as the precursor to the tourist, the discussion considers how different modes of flânerie, such as the tourist-flâneur, are an inevitable outcome of commodification of the activities that accompany strolling through the (post)modern urban space.

Professional identity of management accountants : leadership in changing environments

The professional identity of management accountants (MAs) is evolving. According to 8,727 descriptors expressed by 1,158 participants, a range of characteristics of MAs are competing in shaping the identity of future MAs. Respondents strongly valued qualities such as professional principles, hard work, intelligence, analytical and forward thinking in MAs. Further, more innovative, dynamic and people-oriented qualities were strongly suggested for future MAs, with roles relating to multi-skilled business integrator, business partner/advisor, leader, change agent, and decision enabler/maker. Cultivating leadership qualities in the management accounting profession is critical according to participants. Projecting a positive image of the profession and CIMA, and innovative training in management and leadership skills can further support MAs to meet future challenges. Most of all, understanding business and continued personal development by individual MAs is highly valued in shaping the future leadership identity of MAs. Our quantitative data show positive relationships between the professional identification, image and reputation, and leadership qualities of MAs. This suggests that the more one identifies with the profession, the more one is likely to report higher levels of leadership qualities that support members to internalise the desired meaning of their profession and to create a positive image and reputation. After the financial crisis of 2008–2009, the image of financial professions has been tarnished and unpredictable markets and unstable employment opportunities have challenged the profession across all sectors. Many respondents, especially CIMA members, suggested that the turmoil of the financial crisis did not impact negatively but rather elevated the pivotal role of MAs in contributing to cost efficiency and value creation.

Reading in the Australian curriculum English : describing the effects of structure and organisation on multimodal texts

The recently introduced Australian Curriculum: English Version 3.0 (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority [ACARA], 2012) requires students to ‘read’ multimodal text and describe the effects of structure and organisation. We begin this article by tracing the variable understandings of what reading multimodal text might entail through the Framing Paper (National Curriculum Board, 2008), the Framing Paper Consultation Report (National Curriculum Board, 2009a), the Shaping Paper (National Curriculum Board, 2009b) and Version 3.0 of the Australian Curriculum English (ACARA, 2012). Our findings show that the theoretical and descriptive framework for doing so is implicit. Drawing together multiple but internally coherent theories from the field of semiotics, we suggest one way to work towards three Year 5 learning outcomes from the reading/writing mode. The affordances of assembling a broad but explicit technical metalanguage for an informed reading of the integrated design elements of multimodal texts are noted.

Control and application of minimally-actuated underwater vehicles

Establishing a persistent presence in the ocean with an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle capable of observing temporal variability of large-scale ocean processes requires a unique sensor platform. In this paper, we examine the utility of Lagrangian profiling floats for such extended deployments. We propose a strategy that utilizes ocean model predictions to facilitate a basic level of autonomy to achieve general control of this minimally-actuated underwater vehicle. We extend experimentally validated techniques for utilising ocean current models to control under-actuated autonomous underwater vehicles by presenting this investigation into the application of these methods on profiling floats. With the appropriate vertical actuation, and utilising spatiotemporal variations in water speed and direction, we show that broad controllability results can be met. First, we apply an A* planner to a local controllability map generated from predictions of ocean currents. This computes a path between start and goal waypoints that has the highest likelihood of successful execution over a given duration. The computed depth plan is generated with a model predictive controller, and selects the depths for the vehicle so that ambient currents guide it toward the goal. Mission constraints are included to simulate and motivate a practical data collection mission. Results are presented in simulation for a mission off the coast of Los Angeles, CA USA, that show surprising results in the ability of a drifting vehicle to maintain a prescribed course and reach a desired location.

Extending persistent monitoring by combining ocean models and Markov decision processes

Ocean processes are complex and have high variability in both time and space. Thus, ocean scientists must collect data over long time periods to obtain a synoptic view of ocean processes and resolve their spatiotemporal variability. One way to perform these persistent observations is to utilise an autonomous vehicle that can remain on deployment for long time periods. However, such vehicles are generally underactuated and slow moving. A challenge for persistent monitoring with these vehicles is dealing with currents while executing a prescribed path or mission. Here we present a path planning method for persistent monitoring that exploits ocean currents to increase navigational accuracy and reduce energy consumption.

Decision support for the safe design and operation of unmanned aircraft systems

Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) describe a diverse range of aircraft that are operated without a human pilot on-board. Unmanned aircraft range from small rotorcraft, which can fit in the palm of your hand, through to fixed wing aircraft comparable in size to that of a commercial passenger jet. The absence of a pilot on-board allows these aircraft to be developed with unique performance capabilities facilitating a wide range of applications in surveillance, environmental management, agriculture, defence, and search and rescue. However, regulations relating to the safe design and operation of UAS first need to be developed before the many potential benefits from these applications can be realised. According to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a Risk Management Process (RMP) should support all civil aviation policy and rulemaking activities (ICAO 2009). The RMP is described in International standard, ISO 31000:2009 (ISO, 2009a). This standard is intentionally generic and high-level, providing limited guidance on how it can be effectively applied to complex socio-technical decision problems such as the development of regulations for UAS. Through the application of principles and tools drawn from systems philosophy and systems engineering, this thesis explores how the RMP can be effectively applied to support the development of safety regulations for UAS. A sound systems-theoretic foundation for the RMP is presented in this thesis. Using the case-study scenario of a UAS operation over an inhabited area and through the novel application of principles drawn from general systems modelling philosophy, a consolidated framework of the definitions of the concepts of: safe, risk and hazard is made. The framework is novel in that it facilitates the representation of broader subjective factors in an assessment of the safety of a system; describes the issues associated with the specification of a system-boundary; makes explicit the hierarchical nature of the relationship between the concepts and the subsequent constraints that exist between them; and can be evaluated using a range of analytic or deliberative modelling techniques. Following the general sequence of the RMP, the thesis explores the issues associated with the quantified specification of safety criteria for UAS. A novel risk analysis tool is presented. In contrast to existing risk tools, the analysis tool presented in this thesis quantifiably characterises both the societal and individual risk of UAS operations as a function of the flight path of the aircraft. A novel structuring of the risk evaluation and risk treatment decision processes is then proposed. The structuring is achieved through the application of the Decision Support Problem Technique; a modelling approach that has been previously used to effectively model complex engineering design processes and to support decision-making in relation to airspace design. The final contribution made by this thesis is in the development of an airworthiness regulatory framework for civil UAS. A novel "airworthiness certification matrix" is proposed as a basis for the definition of UAS "Part 21" regulations. The outcome airworthiness certification matrix provides a flexible, systematic and justifiable method for promulgating airworthiness regulations for UAS. In addition, an approach for deriving "Part 1309" regulations for UAS is presented. In contrast to existing approaches, the approach presented in this thesis facilitates a traceable and objective tailoring of system-level reliability requirements across the diverse range of UAS operations. The significance of the research contained in this thesis is clearly demonstrated by its practical real world outcomes. Industry regulatory development groups and the Civil Aviation Safety Authority have endorsed the proposed airworthiness certification matrix. The risk models have also been used to support research undertaken by the Australian Department of Defence. Ultimately, it is hoped that the outcomes from this research will play a significant part in the shaping of regulations for civil UAS, here in Australia and around the world.