Redesigning science teacher education to reflect the nature of contemporary science

Evidence that many students are not being captivated by school science has led to advocacy of revising the science curriculum. However, there need to be accompanying changes in science teacher education. This study is designed to lay foundations for innovation in the pre-service education of secondary science teachers, involving a reconceptualisation of the nature of contemporary science and a course structure that links science teaching with broader science public reform initiatives. We held a series of Focus Groups, built around Government Research Priority areas, which brought together people from industry, government, research organisations, and community groups involved in science and its applications. In the groups the participants discussed how science currently operates in their area, ways in which the area will develop in the coming decade, and what implications there are for the nation and its citizens and for science education. What emerged was a concern for public responses to science at a range of levels, and a very different view of science practice and community involvement with science to that represented in current university and school science courses. This was confirmed in interviews with science graduates working in disparate fields, and also focus groups of school students. The paper will report on the insights generated, and explore the implications for redesigning the pre-service education of science teachers.

Representing experience : changing audience relationships in contemporary art

By practice and research this exegesis includes the audience in the making of art, by using the responses of others that inhabit the artwork. It also establishes 'not-knowing' as a methodology to examine changing relationships to audience in contemporary visual arts.

Television journalism : the cultural politics of contemporary current affairs interviewing

This thesis examined television current affairs interviewing to determine the influence of the cultural politics of Australian commercial and non-commercial networks. Marketplace pressures to rate highly was the major influence on commercial programs resulting in the use of shorter dramatic interviews, more celebrities, fewer politicians, hidden cameras and ambush interviews.

Cultural politics and the appropriation of Theravada Buddhism in contemporary Burma (Myanmar)

In Burma, under the State Peace and Development Council, Burmese culture and Theravada Buddhism have become conjoined, the distinctions between the sacred and the secular have become blurred, and the political and the cultural have become intertwined, as the military regime seeks to legitimate its political power and authority.

Changing politics of male homosexuality in contemporary Singapore

Over the last few years, the Singapore government appears to have been softening its hard line position on homosexuality in Singapore. This thesis examines the various developments that have recently taken place in this area; assesses the role of the media in homosexual related stories and coverage, and conducts a comprehensive survey eliciting views of young people towards a wide range of established and emerging homosexual issues in Singapore.

Rethinking homework in contemporary Australia : a feminist sociocultural analysis

This thesis develops ethnographically-based studies to offer new perspectives on the practice of homework in Australia. The thesis argues that homework is not simply a technique for improving school performance but is a form of pedagogical work that mediates home-school relations and generates classed and gendered emotional labour.

Kai Tai Chan

Analyses the work of choreographer and director Kai Tai Chan whose different pathway through dance and theatre opens up discourses about the nature of non-ballet concert dance in Australia. Orthodox paradigms of training and performance making are interrogated and a greater understanding of the relative nature of those practices is established by analysing the competing ideologies, philosophical frameworks and aesthetic understandings of these practitioners.

The idiosyncratic movement potential of the dancer's subject body in the work "Deep map"

An investigation into choreographic processes employed within contemporary modern dance. This involved the exploration of working methods used in the making of "Deep map" nos.1, 2 & 3, presented in Melbourne from 1997-2000. The focus of that method was the placement of the dancer as 'subject' whilst maintaining the role of the choreographer as 'auteur'.

All the animals are gone? The politics of contemporary hunter arcade games.

Recent proliferation and popularity of personal computer and console games has meant that scholarship around video arcade games has been largely ignored. Arcade games had their halcyon days during the 1970s and 1980s when 'Space Invaders', 'Pong' and 'Donkey Kong' were household names. The inception of scholarship into games occurred in the 1990s; a time when arcade games were writ small in the cultural imagination, at least compared to the newer home computer and video games. Thus in games theory they are typically discussed only in terms of their role as antecedents to their more popular kin. Moreover, they seem innocuous because they are so publicly accessible. Against this assumption, and lack of scholarship, this paper explores a selection of contemporary arcade games which we describe as 'hunting' games. Arcade hunting games are first-person shooter (FPS) involving one or more players shooting simulated wild animals. They are commonly situated in cinema foyers, hotels, and family entertainment centres. However, despite a presumption of institutional moderation afforded by the public accessibility of these spaces, this paper argues that this genre works through a range of political modalities that require more scholarly consideration than currently given.

Dance movement therapy in Australia : a survey of practitioners and practice

This article reports the results of a survey of 41 dance-movement therapy practitioners in Australia. Issues for dance-movement therapy practice in Australia were investigated within the themes of practitioners; programs and clients, and philosophical and industrial concerns. Overall, it was apparent that the dance-movement therapy profession in Australia is both diverse and homogenous: therapists’ professional orientations and backgrounds, and the types of settings in which they work, are very diverse, but therapists are much more similar in their ages, gender, cultural backgrounds and geographic location. The issues raised by the variation and lack of diversity are discussed, along with possible strategies to address them.