Étude de l’appropriation de l’orthographe française langue seconde/étrangère d’élèves arabophones du secondaire en Égypte

La présente recherche vise à décrire le développement orthographique des élèves arabophones de 1re année du secondaire en Égypte au début de l’apprentissage du français langue étrangère. Les recherches égyptiennes qui concernent le français écrit se sont préoccupées des erreurs grammaticales commises par les élèves. À notre connaissance, il n’existe pas d’études relatives à l’appropriation de l’orthographe française menée auprès de ces élèves. Afin de combler ce vide, nous avons souhaité apporter un éclairage sur les compétences orthographiques des élèves en essayant d’éclairer la documentation de ces compétences en français écrit par la mise en relation avec celle de jeunes enfants arabophones qui apprennent le français L2 au préscolaire lors de leur séjour au Québec. Afin d’atteindre nos objectifs, nous avons soumis 30 élèves arabophones du secondaire à une épreuve d’orthographes approchées à quatre reprises. Celle-ci s’est déroulée dans le cadre d’un entretien semi-structuré individuel dans lequel les élèves ont été invités à produire des mots et une phrase. L’analyse descriptive et statistique de la production écrite des sujets a permis d’observer trois types de préoccupations écrites : visuographiques, phonologiques et orthographiques. D’autre part, leurs écrits ont témoigné d’un transfert langagier de l’arabe L1 et de l’anglais LE, qui était parfois positif, d’autres fois négatif. Les résultats ont, enfin, révélé que les élèves ont utilisé trois stratégies, lexicale, phonologique et analogique, lors de leurs productions. En outre, une étude de cas multiples exploratoire avec quatre enfants arabophones du préscolaire au Québec a été effectuée. Ces derniers ont été individuellement invités à produire des mots et une phrase en français et en arabe. De manière exploratoire, nous avons mis en relation l’appropriation de l’écrit des élèves du secondaire et celle des enfants du préscolaire en français et en arabe, ce qui nous a permis de vérifier l’effet de l’âge sur le développement orthographique et sur le transfert langagier chez les apprenants. Les résultats obtenus indiquent que la performance écrite des élèves du secondaire était significativement plus réussie que celle des enfants du préscolaire et que les premiers étaient les plus susceptibles de produire un transfert langagier. Ainsi, l’âge de l’apprenant peut avoir un impact sur l’appropriation de l’écrit ainsi que sur le transfert langagier en français langue seconde/étrangère. Finalement, au-delà de son apport scientifique et pratique, la présente recherche propose des pistes de recherches futures.

Developing a model of technology appropriation: A Marxian perspective

This paper explores the philosophical origins of appropriation of Information Systems (IS) using Marxian and other socio-cultural theory. It provides an in-depth examination of appropriation and its application in extant IS theory. We develop a three-tier model using Marx’s foundational concepts and from this generate four propositions that we test in an empirical example of IS in anesthesia. Using Marxian theory, this paper seeks common ground among existing theories of technology appropriation in IS research. This work contributes to IS research by (1) opening philosophical discussions on appropriation and the human ↔ technology nexus, (2) drawing on these varying perspectives to propose a general conceptualization of technology appropriation and (3) providing a starting point towards a general causal model of technology appropriation.

A Marxian model of technology appropriation

This paper explores the philosophical roots of appropriation within Marx's theories and socio-cultural studies in an attempt to seek common ground among existing theories of technology appropriation in IS research. Drawing on appropriation perspectives from Adaptive Structuration Theory, the Model of Technology Appropriation and the Structurational Model of Technology for comparison, we aim to generate a Marxian model that provides a starting point toward a general causal model of technology appropriation. This paper opens a philosophical discussion on the phenomenon of appropriation in the IS community, directing attention to foundational concepts in the human-technology nexus using ideas conceived by Marx.

A grounded theory study of technology appropriation in anaesthesia

The human-technology nexus is a strong focus of Information Systems (IS) research; however, very few studies have explored this phenomenon in anaesthesia. Anaesthesia has a long history of adoption of technological artifacts, ranging from early apparatus to present-day information systems such as electronic monitoring and pulse oximetry. This prevalence of technology in modern anaesthesia and the rich human-technology relationship provides a fertile empirical setting for IS research. This study employed a grounded theory approach that began with a broad initial guiding question and, through simultaneous data collection and analysis, uncovered a core category of technology appropriation. This emergent basic social process captures a central activity of anaesthestists and is supported by three major concepts: knowledge-directed medicine, complementary artifacts and culture of anaesthesia. The outcomes of this study are: (1) a substantive theory that integrates the aforementioned concepts and pertains to the research setting of anaesthesia and (2) a formal theory, which further develops the core category of appropriation from anaesthesia-specific to a broader, more general perspective. These outcomes fulfill the objective of a grounded theory study, being the formation of theory that describes and explains observed patterns in the empirical field. In generalizing the notion of appropriation, the formal theory is developed using the theories of Karl Marx. This Marxian model of technology appropriation is a three-tiered theoretical lens that examines appropriation behaviours at a highly abstract level, connecting the stages of natural, species and social being to the transition of a technology-as-artifact to a technology-in-use via the processes of perception, orientation and realization. The contributions of this research are two-fold: (1) the substantive model contributes to practice by providing a model that describes and explains the human-technology nexus in anaesthesia, and thereby offers potential predictive capabilities for designers and administrators to optimize future appropriations of new anaesthetic technological artifacts; and (2) the formal model contributes to research by drawing attention to the philosophical foundations of appropriation in the work of Marx, and subsequently expanding the current understanding of contemporary IS theories of adoption and appropriation.

From liberation to appropriation : corsets and eroticism in Australian film

The corset, with its laces and stays, appears to the modern eyes little more than a stylish torture device. However, the corset enjoyed a reputation among the most fashionable women of the nineteenth century. Since small waists were the primary measure of corporeal beauty, corsets were nearly universal among Western women of the middle class upwards. Wearing a corset was also a marker of decency; only lower classes and women of dubious reputation did not wear corsets. From instrument of torture and symbol of submission to its appropriation by women as a marker of sexual liberation, the corset has gone under a sartorial and symbolic transformation remaining the most erotic element of women’s dress. This paper discusses the corset in two Australian films, Picnic at Hanging Rock (Peter Weir, 1974) and Moulin Rouge (Baz Luhrman, 2001), arguing that the corset provides a counterpoint in each film signifying the tension between beauty and respectability, on the one hand, and desire and transgression, on the other. We argue that the corset is the primary prop around which the narrative revolves as well as the key signifying hook for the audience. The fact that erotic motifs are so rare in Australian films makes the centrality of the corset in these films even more powerful as a discursive trope

Spelling instruction through Etymology : a method of developing spelling lists for older students

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether an approach to developing word lists centred on etymological roots would improve the spelling performance of older primary school students. Participants were 46 students in the last year of primary school in south-east Queensland (31 girls and 15 boys) across three classes, with two classes being assigned to control conditions. Students were evaluated pre- and post-intervention on three dependent measures: British Spelling Test Series spelling, spelling in writing and writing. The results of this intervention revealed improvements in spelling for girls but not for boys. The implications for improved teaching methods are discussed.

Domestic violence and family law : recognition and appropriation

The battered women’s movement in the United States contributed to a sweeping change in the recognition of men’s violence against female intimate partners. Naming the problem and arguing in favour of its identification as a serious problem meriting a collective response were key aspects of this effort. Criminal and civil laws have been written and revised in an effort to answer calls to take such violence seriously. Scholars have devoted significant attention to the consequences of this reframing of violence, especially around the unintended outcomes of the incorporation of domestic violence into criminal justice regimes. Family law, however, has remained largely unexamined by criminologists. This paper calls for criminological attention to family law responses to domestic violence and provides directions for future research.

The activation, appropriation and practices of student-equity policy in Australian higher education

Current national reforms in Australian higher education have prioritised efforts to reduce educational disadvantage within a vernacular expression of neoliberal education policy. Student-equity policy in universities is enmeshed in a set of competitive student recruitment relations. This raises practice-based tensions as universities strive to meet specific institutional targets for low-socio-economic status (SES) and Indigenous student participation, whilst broadening participation more generally within the sector. This paper seeks empirically to trace the activation and appropriation of federal policy through two sites of higher education policy practices: a state government-sponsored equity practitioner body and two differently positioned universities, Dawson and McIllwraith, as they engage with low-SES schools. Working together Dorothy Smith’s insights into the textually mediated activation of local practices, Levinson and colleagues’ concept of the local appropriation of authorised policy, and Bourdieu’s notion of the contested field, we demonstrate that the generation of state level and institutionally specific policies for student-equity practices not only articulates to federal policy, but also appropriates the ruling relations of mandated policy. Further, the scope of these creative local appropriations is organised within a hierarchical academic field through which particular institutional imperatives, as well as the needs of low-SES students, are negotiated. The analysis demonstrates the vernacularisation of policy in the national rearticulation of global discourses, in appropriation at the level of the state body and in the practices of equity workers.

Contradictions and the Appropriation of ERP Packages

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software typically takes the form of a package that is licensed for use to those in a client organisation and is sold as being able to automate a wide range of processes within organisations. ERP packages have become an important feature of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructures in organizations. However, a number of highly publicised failures have been associated with the ERP packages too. For example: Hershey, Aero Group and Snap-On have blamed the implementation of ERP packages for negative impacts upon earnings (Scott and Vessey 2000); Cadbury Schweppes implemented plans to fulfil 250 orders where normally they would fulfil 1000 due to the increased complexity and the need to re-train staff post implementation (August 1999) and FoxMeyer drug company’s implementation of an ERP package has been argued to have lead to bankruptcy proceedings resulting in litigation against SAP, the software vendor in question (Bicknell 1998). Some have even rejected a single vendor approach outright (Light et. al. 2001). ERP packages appear to work for some and not for others, they contain contradictions. Indeed, if we start from the position that technologies do not provide their own explanation, then we have to consider the direction of a technological trajectory and why it moves in one way rather than another (Bijker and Law 1994). In other words, ERP appropriation cannot be predetermined as a success, despite the persuasive attempts of vendors via their websites and other marketing channels. Moreover, just because ERP exists, we cannot presume that all will appropriate it in the same fashion, if at all. There is more to the diffusion of innovations than stages of adoption and a simple demarcation between adoption and rejection. The processes that are enacted in appropriation need to be conceptualised as a site of struggle, political and imbued with power (Hislop et. al. 2000; Howcroft and Light, 2006). ERP appropriation and rejection can therefore be seen as a paradoxical phenomenon. In this paper we examine these contradictions as a way to shed light on the presence and role of inconsistencies in ERP appropriation and rejection. We argue that much of the reasoning associated with ERP adoption is pro-innovation biased and that deterministic models of the diffusion of innovations such as Rogers (2003), do not adequately take account of contradictions in the process. Our argument is that a better theoretical understanding of these contradictions is necessary to underpin research and practice in this area. In the next section, we introduce our view of appropriation. Following this is an outline of the idea of contradiction, and the strategies employed to ‘cope’ with this. Then, we introduce a number of reasons for ERP adoption and identify their inherent contradictions using these perspectives. From this discussion, we draw a framework, which illustrates how the interpretive flexibility of reasons to adopt ERP packages leads to contradictions which fuel the enactment of appropriation and rejection.

Social networking and digital gaming media convergence : Classification and its consequences for appropriation

Abstract Within the field of Information Systems, a good proportion of research is concerned with the work organisation and this has, to some extent, restricted the kind of application areas given consideration. Yet, it is clear that information and communication technology deployments beyond the work organisation are acquiring increased importance in our lives. With this in mind, we offer a field study of the appropriation of an online play space known as Habbo Hotel. Habbo Hotel, as a site of media convergence, incorporates social networking and digital gaming functionality. Our research highlights the ethical problems such a dual classification of technology may bring. We focus upon a particular set of activities undertaken within and facilitated by the space – scamming. Scammers dupe members with respect to their ‘Furni’, virtual objects that have online and offline economic value. Through our analysis we show that sometimes, online activities are bracketed off from those defined as offline and that this can be related to how the technology is classified by members – as a social networking site and/or a digital game. In turn, this may affect members’ beliefs about rights and wrongs. We conclude that given increasing media convergence, the way forward is to continue the project of educating people regarding the difficulties of determining rights and wrongs, and how rights and wrongs may be acted out with respect to new technologies of play online and offline.

Teaching spelling in the middle years : reviewing programs for diverse student groups

In what follows, I draw attention to understandings about the teaching of Standard Australian English spelling developed by being immersed in the URL project site for four years though sharing professional dialogue with teachers and educators and entering into informal conversations with some of the students and their parents. My understandings focus on the potential and problematics of oft-used generic spelling programs and approaches for student cohorts marked by social, cultural and linguistic diversity. This article concludes by considering two possible extensions to the word study approach that may have utility for working with middle years students from diverse backgrounds: creating a discursive ‘Third Space’ that overtly recognises students’ language experiences and the technique of colour blocking to create a visual stress.

Four stories about copyright law and appropriation art

This article considers copyright law and the art of appropriation in an Australian context. It tells four stories about Australian artists - Imants Tillers, Gordon Bennett, Juan Davila and Tracey Moffatt. The stories examine the postmodern critique of copyright law, indigenous copyright and self-determination, the introduction of moral rights, and copyright, photography and film. The article concludes that the work of such contemporary artists has practical implications for the reform of copyright law.

Spelling strategies for recovery of pasture condition

This work will progess and extend recommendations and guidelines for use of integrated wet season spelling in Queenslands savannahs and woodlands. The research will generate a greater ecological and pasture production understanding of pastures and soils that exist in C land condition areas (major landtypes), and their recovery. Practical, cost-effective spelling regimes will be developed. Research will be conducted on-property with small plot exclosures and plots with controlled utilisation levels, examining ecological responses to different spelling regimes. This information will improve bio-economic modelling capacity. Industry consultations with producers and field staff will drive implementation of the recommendations arising.