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Blogging has become a well-established method of online communication and publication, used by individuals and organisations to disseminate news, ideas and information. In their earlier forms, blogs were used as online diaries, but have now evolved into complex digital environments. The purpose of this paper is to consider whether blogging can be framed as a mode of work-integrated learning in the context of journalism and media education, and to ask whether blogging can develop transferable skills useful in graduate-level employment.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with established undergraduate bloggers to investigate which skills and attributes were developed through blogging.

When evaluated against the Prospects UK list of graduate attributes (the Government career’s service) blogging allows the development of the vast majority of transferable skills, abilities and behaviours expected of graduates. It is necessary to structure the curriculum to ensure that blogging is taught, and blogging activity monitored and evaluated, so that journalism undergraduates maximise the opportunities offered by blogging and fully reflect on their experiences.

This paper argues that these online environments, with their associated communities, offer journalism students opportunities for work-integrated learning. It argues that blog environments have the potential to enable students to develop journalism-specific skills, and enhance transferable graduate attributes including creativity, sophisticated communication competencies, initiative and problem solving. It suggests that blogging offers a platform for accessing experiential learning, and as such should be considered within a curriculum for work-integrated learning in the journalism and media subject area.

With oil prices hovering around historically low levels, it would be comforting to think that energy shocks are a thing of the past. However, energy markets have never been driven by economic factors alone: technology, policy and international relations all have to be taken into account.

Tribalism is at the forefront of public discussion across the political spectrum in America today. Zombie stories have also risen to unprecedented popularity. Amid present-day racial, political, and otherwise tribal tensions, the story I Am Legend has particular resonance. As the original inspiration behind the modern zombie trope, it was published as a novella in 1954 and has been remade as a film multiple times, in 1964, 1971, and 2007. Using grounded theory, I explore each film regarding what moral attitudes are portrayed concerning confrontation between rival milieus. My findings center on four themes: identification, compassion, ambivalence, and condemnation. Overall, in chronological order, the different renditions of the story exhibit decreasing compassion for the other and decreasing ambivalence about relations with the other. The most dramatic change is between the 1971 and 2007 remakes. Implications for what the changes in the morals presented in the story might reflect in terms of social changes in America are discussed.

There is a rich literary tradition of depicting human-dwelling places (usually houses) as living bodies, stretching from the Middle Ages to contemporary fiction. On several occasions, the interaction between the characters in these works and the house-body entity described has taken the form of a digestive journey. Rooms come to symbolise mouths, kitchens and even bowels, and sometimes the human body and mind are gradually incorporated into the external architectural space. This chapter examines two literary works in which this occurs – the ‘House of Temperance’ in Spencer's The Faerie Queene (1590) and Shirley Jackson's novel The Haunting of Hill House (1959). These two examples, from two very different literary traditions (Renaissance allegorical and modern Gothic horror respectively) show the fine line between revelation and horror, how spatial materiality and meaning are flexible and how a building may transform the character within it both psychologically and physically.

The management of children′s literature is a search for value and suitability. Effective policies in library and educational work are based firmly on knowledge of materials, and on the bibliographical and critical frame within which the materials appear and might best be selected. Boundaries, like those between quality and popular books, and between children′s and adult materials, present important challenges for selection, and implicit in this process are professional acumen and judgement. Yet also there are attitudes and systems of values, which can powerfully influence selection on grounds of morality and good taste. To guard against undue subjectivity, the knowledge frame should acknowledge the relevance of social and experiential context for all reading materials, how readers think as well as how they read, and what explicit and implicit agendas the authors have. The good professional takes all these factors on board.

This research focused on the management dynamics between library districts' discretion and privatization of library management. Previous research has reported conflicting effects of this dynamic. However, few studies have investigated privatization of library management by library districts. Additionally, previous research has accepted the premise that when public libraries change from general-purpose government to library districts, they will not implement privatization prior to forming districts. Therefore, this study aimed to determine whether conflicting effects arise in the dynamics between library districts' discretion and privatization in library management.

To address research gaps, an in-depth case analysis was conducted of the Jackson County Library District in Oregon, where library management has been privatized both before and after library district formation. The analysis divided the study period into three phases, which differed by legal basis and operating body. To clarify the characteristics of library management in each phase, changes in finances, staff hiring and library services were analyzed.

In Phase 1, privatization was implemented in response to the financial difficulties of the public library run by the county government. In Phase 2, the library district was formed with the aim of stabilizing revenue and securing management autonomy. During Phase 3, the library district and operating body were both operated by a private company. Although the financial resources of the library district were stable, it was unable to implement autonomous library management. This demonstrates that privatization cannot facilitate autonomous management, an advantage of library districts.

By investigating the conflicting effects of the dynamics between library district discretion and privatization, this research contributes to greater understanding in the fields of public management and library science.