The Negligent Eye

An exhibition which explores artists use of scanners and the implications of this form of mediation. the exhibition aims to explore the social philosophical and aesthetic implications of scanning both as a technology and a form of attention due to the ever increasing speed of image circulation and production.This builds on former research such as Print in 3D at the V&A in 2009.

Exploring Perceptual Matters: A Textile-Based Approach

This research takes a practice-based approach to exploring perceptual matters that often go unnoticed in the context of everyday lived experience. My approach focuses on the experiential possibilities of knowledge emerging through artistic enquiry, and uses a variety of modes (like textiles, sound, physical computing, programming, video and text) to be conducted and communicated. It examines scholarship in line with the ecological theory of perception, and is particularly informed by neurobiological research on sensory integration as well as by cultural theories that examine the role of sensory appreciation in perception. Different processes contributing to our perceptual experience are examined through the development of a touch-sensitive, sound-generating rug and its application in an experimental context. Participants’ interaction with the rug and its sonic output allows an insight into how they make sense of multisensory information via observation of how they physically respond to it. In creating possibilities for observing the two ends of the perceptual process (sensory input and behavioural output), the rug provides a platform for the study of what is intangible to the observer (perceptual activity) through what can actually be observed (physical activity). My analysis focuses on video recordings of the experimental process and data reports obtained from the software used for the sound generating performance of the rug. Its findings suggest that attentional focus, active exploration, and past experience actively affect the ability to integrate multisensory information and are crucial parameters for the formation of a meaningful percept upon which to act. Although relational to the set experimental conditions and the specificities of the experimental group, these findings are in resonance with current cross-disciplinary discourse on perception, and indicate that art research can be incorporated into the wider arena of neurophysiological and behavioural research to expand its span of resources and methods.

Listening in to others : in between noise and silence

Since the launch of the ‘Clean Delhi, Green Delhi’ campaign in 2003, slums have become a significant social and political issue in India’s capital city. Through this campaign, the state, in collaboration with Delhi’s middle class through the ‘Bhagidari system’ (literally translated as ‘participatory system’), aims to transform Delhi into a ‘world-class city’ that offers a sanitised, aesthetically appealing urban experience to its citizens and Western visitors. In 2007, Delhi won the bid to host the 2010 Commonwealth Games; since then, this agenda has acquired an urgent, almost violent, impetus to transform Delhi into an environmentally friendly, aesthetically appealing and ‘truly international city’. Slums and slum-dwellers, with their ‘filth, dirt, and noise’, have no place in this imagined city. The violence inflicted upon slum-dwellers, including the denial of their judicial rights, is justified on these accounts. In addition, the juridical discourse since 2000 has ‘re-problematised slums as ‘nuisance’. The rising antagonism of the middle-classes against the poor, supported by the state’s ambition to have a ‘world-class city’, has allowed a new rhetoric to situate the slums in the city. These representations articulate slums as homogenised spaces of experience and identity. The ‘illegal’ status of slum-dwellers, as encroachers upon public space, is stretched to involve ‘social, cultural, and moral’ decadence and depravity. This thesis is an ethnographic exploration of everyday life in a prominent slum settlement in Delhi. It sensually examines the social, cultural and political materiality of slums, and the relationship of slums with the middle class. In doing so, it highlights the politics of sensorial ordering of slums as ‘filthy, dirty, and noisy’ by the middle classes to calcify their position as ‘others’ in order to further segregate, exclude and discriminate the slums. The ethnographic experience in the slums, however, highlights a complex sensorial ordering and politics of its own. Not only are the interactions between diverse communities in slums highly restricted and sensually ordained, but the middle class is identified as a sensual ‘other’, and its sensual practices prohibited. This is significant in two ways. First, it highlights the multiplicity of social, cultural experience and engagement in the slums, thereby challenging its homogenised representation. Second, the ethnographic exploration allowed me to frame a distinct sense of self amongst the slums, which is denied in mainstream discourses, and allowed me to identify the slums’ own ’others’, middle class being one of them. This thesis highlights sound – its production, performances and articulations – as an act with social, cultural, and political implications and manifestations. ‘Noise’ can be understood as a political construct to identify ‘others’ – and both slum-dwellers and the middle classes identify different sonic practices as noise to situate the ‘other’ sonically. It is within this context that this thesis frames the position of Listener and Hearer, which corresponds to their social-political positions. These positions can be, and are, resisted and circumvented through sonic practices. For instance, amplification tactics in the Karimnagar slums, which are understood as ‘uncultured, callous activities to just create more noise’ by the slums’ middle-class neighbours, also serve definite purposes in shaping and navigating the space through the slums’ soundscapes, asserting a presence that is otherwise denied. Such tactics allow the residents to define their sonic territories and scope of sonic performances; they are significant in terms of exerting one’s position, territory and identity, and they are very important in subverting hierarchies. The residents of the Karimnagar slums have to negotiate many social, cultural, moral and political prejudices in their everyday lives. Their identity is constantly under scrutiny and threat. However, the sonic cultures and practices in the Karimnagar slums allow their residents to exert a definite sonic presence – which the middle class has to hear. The articulation of noise and silence is an act manifesting, referencing and resisting social, cultural, and political power and hierarchies.

Safeguarding rural Australia: addressing masculinity and violence in rural settings : intentional violent harm to others in an Australian rural context: analysis of secondary data analysis

This report is an update of an earlier one produced in January 2010 (see Carrington et al. 2010) which remains as an ePrint through the project’s home page. This report focuses on our examination of extant data which have been sourced with respect to intentional violence perpetrated or experienced by males living in regional and remote Australia . and which were available in public data bases at production. The nature of intentional violent acts can be physical, sexual or psychological or involve deprivation or neglect.

Predication and propagation : a method for analyzing evaluative meanings in technology policy

In this article I outline and demonstrate a synthesis of the methods developed by Lemke (1998) and Martin (2000) for analyzing evaluations in English. I demonstrate the synthesis using examples from a 1.3-million-word technology policy corpus drawn from institutions at the local, state, national, and supranational levels. Lemke's (1998) critical model is organized around the broad 'evaluative dimensions' that are deployed to evaluate propositions and proposals in English. Martin's (2000) model is organized with a more overtly systemic-functional orientation around the concept of 'encoded feeling'. In applying both these models at different times, whilst recognizing their individual usefulness and complementarity, I found specific limitations that led me to work towards a synthesis of the two approaches. I also argue for the need to consider genre, media, and institutional aspects more explicitly when claiming intertextual and heteroglossic relations as the basis for inferred evaluations. A basic assertion made in this article is that the perceived Desirability of a process, person, circumstance, or thing is identical to its 'value'. But the Desirability of anything is a socially and thus historically conditioned attribution that requires significant amounts of institutional inculcation of other 'types' of value-appropriateness, importance, beauty, power, and so on. I therefore propose a method informed by critical discourse analysis (CDA) that sees evaluation as happening on at least four interdependent levels of abstraction.

Defining and mapping teacher practice in technology classrooms

The indecision surrounding the definition of Technology extends to the classroom as not knowing what a subject “is” affects how it is taught. Similarly, its relative newness – and consequent lack of habitus in school settings - means that it is still struggling to find its own place in the curriculum as well as resolve its relationship with more established subject domains, particularly Science and Mathematics. The guidance from syllabus documents points to open-ended student-directed projects where extant studies indicate a more common experience of teacher –directed activities and an emphasis on product over process. There are issues too for researchers in documenting classroom observations and in analysing teacher practice in new learning environments. This paper presents a framework for defining and mapping classroom practice and for attempting to describe the social practice in the Technology classroom. The framework is a bricolage which draws on contemporary research. More formally, the development of the framework is consonant with the aim of design-based research to develop a flexible, adaptive and generalisable theory to better understanding a teaching domain where promise is not seen to match current reality. The framework may also inform emergent approaches to STEM (Science, Technology, Education and Mathematics) in education.

Designing disruption : linking participatory design and design thinking in technology orientated industries

A vast proportion of companies nowadays are looking to design and are focusing on the end users as a means of driving new projects. However still many companies are drawn to technological improvements which drive innovation within their industry context. The Australian livestock industry is no different. To date the adoption of new products and services within the livestock industry has been documented as being quite slow. This paper investigates how disruptive innovation should be a priority for these technologically focused companies and demonstrates how the use of design led innovation can bring about a higher quality engagement between end user and company alike. A case study linking participatory design and design thinking is presented. Within this, a conceptual model of presenting future scenarios to internal and external stakeholders is applied to the livestock industry; assisting companies to apply strategy, culture and advancement in meaningful product offerings to consumers.

Young children’s beliefs about including others in their play: Social and moral reasoning about inclusion and exclusion

Previous research has emphasised the importance of active citizenship in the early years for the development of a tolerant and cohesive Australian society. This paper presents findings related to young children’s beliefs about exclusion based on gender and race. The findings draw from a larger study exploring the development of children’s moral and social values and teachers’ beliefs and practices related to teaching for moral development, in the early years of school in Australia. This current study examined reasoning about exclusion in early childhood with children aged 5-8 years. One hundred children from seven schools (Preparatory to Grade 3) answered questions relating to two scenarios in which the children had to make a decision about whether to include others of different gender or race in their play. The majority of children believed that others should be included in their play, regardless of their gender or race. When asked to explain, the children primarily gave reasons related to moral concern and fairness. Children were then asked whether they would continue to include or exclude if their friends (social consensus) or teachers (authority) suggested otherwise. The majority of children maintained their beliefs when beliefs to the contrary were voiced by their peers and teachers. The implications of these responses are discussed.