Kamal Fatehi, Jennifer L. Priestley and Gita Taasoobshirazi
Most international marketing studies, taking a sociological position, assume homogeneity within and heterogeneity between cultures. Taking a psychological position and based on…
Abstract
Purpose
Most international marketing studies, taking a sociological position, assume homogeneity within and heterogeneity between cultures. Taking a psychological position and based on the Mindscape Theory, the purpose of this paper is to support the hypothesis that there is intra-cultural and intra-market heterogeneity.
Design/methodology/approach
The translated survey for international use has many problems. These problems can greatly be minimized by the use of pictorial/geometric shapes that were used in this study. These shapes were constructed using redundant and non-redundant complexity, and made to be culture neutral.
Findings
Data analysis supported the presence of three of the four Mindscape types as was hypothesized, indicating individual intra-market heterogeneity in the three cultures under investigation. Additionally, the corollary hypothesis of transcultural heterogeneity was confirmed.
Research limitations/implications
It has been proposed that Mindscape types are partly innate and partly learned. What proportions constitute each part? Can the learned aspect be unlearned? Can different marketing strategies appeal to each? What marketing programs are better suited to influence the learned aspect? Future studies could explore these issues.
Practical implications
The findings of this paper have wide applicability and implications for international marketing strategy, including ways of deploying market segmentation, target marketing, positioning strategies, as well as configurations of marketing mix elements.
Originality/value
This paper used a novel and unique way for data collection and analysis. A geometric-pictorial survey was used for data collection. Data analysis was done with factor analysis and cluster analysis combined.
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James S. Chisholm, Jennifer Alford, Leah M. Halliday and Fannie M. Cox
This paper aims to examine ways in which English language arts (ELA) teachers have exercised agency in response to policy changes that have been shaped by neoliberal education…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine ways in which English language arts (ELA) teachers have exercised agency in response to policy changes that have been shaped by neoliberal education agendas that seek to further advance standardization and the primacy of measurability of teaching and learning.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors posed the following research questions of related literature: Under what conditions, in what ways and to what ends do teachers exercise agency within ELA classroom teaching? Through five stages of systematized analysis, this scoping review of 21 studies maps the evidence base.
Findings
Structural, material, interpersonal and pedagogical issues both constrained and supported agency. Teachers covertly exercised agency to be responsive to students’ needs; in some instances, teachers’ agentive practices reinforced institutionally sanctioned methods. Teachers’ agentive action aimed to combat the deprofessionalization of the field, foster innovative curriculum approaches and challenge stereotypes about students. The authors also found a range of definitions of agency in the research, some of which are more generative than others.
Originality/value
This paper addresses a gap in the research literature by illuminating contexts, consequences and conundrums of ELA teacher agency. The authors documented the range of structural, cultural and material conditions within which teachers exercise agency; the subversive, collective and small- and large-scale ways in which teachers realize agency; and the potentially favorable or unfavorable consequences to which these efforts are directed. In doing so, the authors also problematize the range of definitions of agency in the literature and call for greater attention to conceptual clarity around agency in research. As literacy researchers illuminate work that disrupts the marginalization of teachers’ agency, this scoping review maps the field’s knowledge base of agency in ELA teaching and sets up a future research agenda to promote the professionalization of teaching and advocacy for English teachers.
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Jennifer Farrar and Kelly Stone
Critical literacy foregrounds the relationship between language and power by focusing on how texts work and in whose interests (Luke, 2012, p. 5). It is highlighted as an…
Abstract
Purpose
Critical literacy foregrounds the relationship between language and power by focusing on how texts work and in whose interests (Luke, 2012, p. 5). It is highlighted as an “important skill” within Scotland’s national educational framework for 3-18 year olds, the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), yet, as this paper aims to show, what the concept means is far from clear for policy users (Scottish Government, 2009e).
Design/methodology/approach
Using a lens that draws from critical discourse analysis, critical content analysis (Luke, 2001; Beach et al., 2009; Fairclough, 2010) and Ball’s method of policy analysis (2015), the authors find that the term “critical literacy” has been applied incoherently within key CfE documentation, including the frequent conflation of critical literacy with critical reading and critical thinking.
Findings
The authors argue that the CfE’s use of “critical literacy” is a misnomer, given that the version presented is an amalgamation of literacy-related competences drawing largely from psychological and not socio-political perspectives of literacy.
Social implications
This is a missed opportunity, given the Scottish Government’s stated commitment to social justice in policy terms (Scottish Executive, 2000; Scottish Government, 2016), not forgetting the powerful benefits that a critically literate stance could bring to Scotland’s learners at this time of communicative change and challenge.
Originality/value
While the authors offer a contextualized view of the ways in which the term “critical literacy” has been incorporated into Scottish educational policy, they propose that its implications go beyond national boundaries.
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Damian Mellifont, Annmaree Watharow, Sheelagh Daniels-Mayes, Jennifer Smith-Merry and Mary-Ann O'Donovan
Ethical principles and practices frequently support the position that people with disability are vulnerable. Vulnerability in research traditionally infers a need for protection…
Abstract
Ethical principles and practices frequently support the position that people with disability are vulnerable. Vulnerability in research traditionally infers a need for protection from harm and raises questions over the person’s capacity to consent and engage. In addition, vulnerability in ethics infers a state of permanency and one that is all-encompassing for everyone within the vulnerable groups. This construction of vulnerability in effect legitimises the exclusion of people with disability from research or monitors and restricts how people with disability can engage in research. This results in an implicitly ableist environment for research. In this chapter, which has been led by researchers with disability, we argue that there is a critical need to move beyond a popularised social construction of vulnerability which serves to perpetuate barriers to including people with disability in research. Like all terms, the traditional and popular construction of vulnerability is open to reclaiming and reframing. Under this reconstruction, what is traditionally viewed as a limiting vulnerability can be owned, openly disclosed and accommodated. Following a pandemic-inspired ‘new normal’ that supports flexible workplace practices, and in accordance with UNCRPD goals of inclusive employment and reducing disability inequity, we argue that the pathway for people with disability as career researchers needs an ethical review and overhaul. We provide readers with a practical roadmap to advance a more inclusive academy for researchers with disability.
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What is the Purpose of the Library? The question is exercising not only the English librarian but his American colleague, and we notice that one of our contemporaries there has…
Abstract
What is the Purpose of the Library? The question is exercising not only the English librarian but his American colleague, and we notice that one of our contemporaries there has given some space to this fundamental question. The simple reply to the question would seem to be “To provide the community with the books it needs.” Such a reply, however, is likely to be regarded as an over‐simplification. Nevertheless, we may adhere to it because the operative word in our definition is “needs” and not “wants.” To discover the needs of a community, which are as manifold as there are people in it, is in itself a formidable task; to supply the books which are likely to satisfy them is a life‐work worthy of the ablest of men. These considerations should never be lost sight of in the attempts which occur from time to time to define a programme of library work. We are the last to believe that our province should be a limited one and we deprecate any attempt to thwart the enthusiasm of any librarian, young or old, who has something constructive to contribute. Our definition, however, is indisputable. The addition to it that the librarian makes was defined years ago in Brown's Manual, which declared his work to be the exploiting of books. A programme then, if there is to be one, is merely of the best methods of exploitation by good technique, tactful advertisement, and a personal service which radiates willingness. The librarian must always beware of the many attempts that are made to harness the library to particular movements, shibboleths or partisan‐ships: the so‐called programmes which endeavour to define a purpose for the library will often be found to be influenced by one of these three evils. The matter thus stated seems trite enough, but it would seem that there is necessity for its fequent re‐statement.
Globally, teachers are operating in environments influenced by past, current and anticipated crises. Students today need to develop the critical skills that will empower them to…
Abstract
Globally, teachers are operating in environments influenced by past, current and anticipated crises. Students today need to develop the critical skills that will empower them to be agents of change in response to these crises. Education for global citizenship offers an approach that can mediate both content and process priorities, yet many teachers do not have the tools and strategies needed to deliver these dual outcomes. Habermas’ theory of communicative action offers a framework through which teachers can harness the potential of the so-called learning lifeworld to educate for global citizenship. This is of particular importance when considering education through the lens of international sustainable development. The contextualisation of communicative acts within the learning lifeworld offers the prospect of elevating students as agentic leaders within their communities. This chapter focuses on and unpacks the concept of education for global citizenship as a key tool for overcoming current crises and positions the theory of communicative action as a viable theoretical framework in the delivery of that concept. The ethnographic case study presented explores students’ perspectives on how their learning lifeworlds shape their identities, highlighting the role of culture, society and person in combatting lifeworld colonisation and nurturing global citizens. It finds that the theory of communicative action can be used as a tool to help students develop self-directedness and independence. It is argued teachers can use communicative acts to promote and model the values of education for global citizenship, ultimately better preparing today’s students for tomorrow’s world.
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Jennifer Charteris and Dianne Smardon
Dialogic peer coaching as leadership can enable teachers to influence each other's professional learning. The purpose of this paper is to shift the emphasis from the role…
Abstract
Purpose
Dialogic peer coaching as leadership can enable teachers to influence each other's professional learning. The purpose of this paper is to shift the emphasis from the role associated with the designated title of leader to the purpose and relevance of teacher leadership in the context of dialogic peer coaching.
Design/methodology/approach
The research was undertaken as a small qualitative case study embedded in a school-based, teacher professional development project. Nine groups of peer coaches from five unrelated schools engaged in a formal process of collaborative inquiry over two years. Interview data from 13 volunteer teacher participants were analysed using the constant comparison method and themes determined.
Findings
The study revealed that there was growth in teacher leadership capabilities as they become dialogic peer coaches to each other.
Practical implications
Through their collaborative peer coaching dialogue teachers have the transformative space to articulate their thinking. They can engage in dialogic feedback where they are positioned as experts in their own practice.
Social implications
The teachers in this study are positioned within communities of practice as co-constructers of knowledge and co-learners. On the basis of the findings the authors suggest that this can support the development of high capacity leadership in schools. This stance contrasts with a technicist approach to teacher professional learning in which teachers are situated as absorbers or recipients of knowledge constructed elsewhere.
Originality/value
The research reported in this paper addresses three key elements of leadership: individual development; collaboration or team development; and organisational development. It outlines a means by which teacher leadership can be strengthened to address these elements in schools.
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A question of size THE Committee set up by the Minister of Education in 1957 to “consider the structure of the public library service in England and Wales, and to advise what…
Abstract
A question of size THE Committee set up by the Minister of Education in 1957 to “consider the structure of the public library service in England and Wales, and to advise what changes, if any, should be made n the administrative arrangements, regard being had to the relation of public libraries to other libraries,” was the first such since the Kenyon Committee which reported in 1927. One of the most controversial aspects of the Roberts Committee's deliberations was the consideration of the minimum size (in terms of population) of an independent library system.
In our last ‘Notes and News’ we made an unfortunate mistake. In writing on the poetry section of the School Library Association's book list Fiction, Verse and Legend we referred…
Abstract
In our last ‘Notes and News’ we made an unfortunate mistake. In writing on the poetry section of the School Library Association's book list Fiction, Verse and Legend we referred to the Bodley Head series of poetry for the young as ‘now regrettably out of print’. Before making this categorical statement we had referred to the Bodley Head's current catalogue ‘with complete back‐list’, and had failed to find any reference to the series, but we had also failed to notice the comparatively insignificant sentence on page ii of the cover: ‘Children's books are listed in a separate catalogue.’