Border

Impressive strands of research have convincingly shown, over the last decades, the emergent reality of increasing world-level interconnection in almost every field of social action. Corresponding theories, models and research designs, however, while conceptualizing this new reality in terms of incessant processes of the diffusion of specifically “modern” (i.e. mainly “Western”) models, policies and organizational patterns, and of the growing harmonization and standardization of fields of social action along “world-cultural” lines, have not gone unchallenged. Rather, cross-cultural studies and alternative social theorizing have pointed to much more complex developments of regional fragmentation, regionalization, and (re-) diversification; of multiple forms of adoption, transformation and hybridization of world-level models and ideas; and of the impact of specifically cultural – i.e. mental, semantic, religious etc. – cleavage or “border” lines. Thus, “multiple modernities”, “entangled histories”, social-cultural hybridization, and “culture-specific world of meaning” repeatedly raise the issue of identifying theories that allow one to systematically analyze, and explain, the intricate interaction of global processes with local agency, or of world-level forces with the self-evolutionary patterns of culture-specific meaning.

Border and Space in Education (the Theme for 2010 World Congress Comparative Education Conference)

‘Border’ is a key concept for analyzing the relationship between education and society at all levels. Borders can be national, regional, social or psychic; they can be fixed or shifting. Borders and ‘lines’ can be material (walls), psychological (in peoples’ minds) or metaphorical (the ‘glass ceiling’ for women’s careers). Discussions of borders are part of discussions of space, and of space-time.

‘Space’ can be absolute/concrete/fixed/measurable (rooms, properties, cities, territories) but also relative (flows and exchanges of energy, peoples, money and information in space and time); and relational (linked to how people operate together in or across these spaces). Space is something produced by human activity and in turn conditions it.

Educational space is where ‘difference’ is conceived, reproduced or contested. Our interests would be the linkages between material space (institutional buildings, camps), representations of space (maps and organizational charts as well as metaphors) and spaces of representation, (the lived or experienced space, our feelings and emotions, our senses of security or insecurity). Spaces are made in the living of our lives, and since they are always being made, the possibility remains for them to be made differently. ‘Border-crossers’, physically and psychologically, can defy or challenge structures, and can reclaim power or identity.

The production and control of space and borders is always tied up with questions of power and politics; and also with the production of inequality. Spaces and their uses can be classed, gendered, racialised, and sexualized. The production of space is also therefore linked to the production of identities, to spaces for assembly, or to keeping ‘others’ in their place, materially or symbolically – whether ‘members of the nation-state’, ‘believers’ or ‘the disabled’. Our educational concerns therefore link to inclusion and exclusion.

Reขbordering is an aspect of globalization, and it is thought that all themes would have globalization as a backdrop if not a direct concern, and as an opportunity as well as a threat. There would be concerns about responsibility across and within borders (for climate change, arms trade, movements of peoples). But also the concerns are about borders in terms of social divisions, the invisible and visible lines between groups, and how education can challenge those borders which deny freedoms, rights and capabilities. Then, what are the educational spaces for contestation of inequality, for interruption?

New Business and New Way of Learning

2009 was a big year for me. As an academic, there was a huge demand from the university and students for us to redefine our concept of teaching and learning. We know we need to keep on 'improving' our way of teaching..how to do it?...this is a big question I kept asking myself.

I did a number of activities to find the best solution for the abovementioned question.Je ne sais quoi kepts on running in my head when I went to the class, conducting a couple of projects with my mates, or reading articles on this topic. I think it's a real complication for people like me to understand points I raise. I hope this year I might start to see a bit of light at the end of the tunnel.

From the conference

I just came back from ANZCIES conference and there were a number of good papers presented by fantastic researcher in international and comparative education and social science. One of the best papers that impressed me immensely is 'Southern Theory and its Dynamics for Post Colonial Education' by Anne Hickling-Hudson (my all time Hero!). Anne started criticising the value (and representation) of Northern theories in most aspects of social science. The book by Connell states that it isn't a history of social thought, it does function as a critical historiography of selected social texts and their contexts. It starts by showing how the social science took their modern institutional form in the second half of the 19th century at the high tide of European imperialism.

Anne argues in her presentation that colonised and peripheral societies produce social thought about the modern world which has as much intellectual power as metropolitan social thought and more political relevance.

Actually there are a lot to be mentioned in this study and I am happy to share with you in terms of the paradigm in power and knowledge from the West-south perspective.

Natt

Australia and New Zealand Comparative Education Society Conference

Entering the Age of an Educational Renaissance: Ideas for unity of purpose or further discord?
24 - 27 November 2009

University of New England, Armidale

The theme for ANZCIES 2009 is Entering the Age of an Educational Renaissance: Ideas for unity of purpose or further discord? It is designed in response to the ever-increasing needs to advance our understanding of educational planning, behaviour, and development.

Is education perceived as a tool for peace? Can we use education to expand our imagination to explore new ways of thinking for collective action? What can we do to view education as a whole---from early childhood, primary, secondary, tertiary to lifelong learning? How can the world foster greater co-operation to offset fear of collapse, apathy, and complacency? Indeed, the world has changed, so how should education change with it? These and other related questions will be raised at the conference.

The aim of the conference is to present a series of papers that rigourously analyse discrete practical problems that help guide comparative and international research, uncover dilemmas, fallacies, myths, and/or to seek viable solutions to global and local concerns.

International Leadership Workshop in Thailand

Dr Nattavud Pimpa from the School of Management visited Burapha University in Thailand last month to organise and run a workshop aimed at capacity building in public sector leadership among local civil servants.

The project is an affiliation between School of Management and Burapha University’s Graduate School of Commerce. In 2007, Dr Pimpa won and Emerging Research Grant (ERG) from RMIT to conduct a comparative leadership research in Victoria and Thailand. The results of the project become the contents of the workshop.

Dr Pimpa’s work in the area of research and educational collaboration in international leadership and management won him this opportunity through a grant provided by the Australia-Thailand Institute (ATI), an organisation within the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

The workshop, held from Wednesday 29 September to 30 September, in Chonburi. Chonburi is one of the key strategic provinces in logistics, manufacturing and international trade and tourism in South East Asia. The workshop covered the concepts of Australian and Thai leadership characteristics, styles, effectiveness, inter-cultural leadership and team building in the Thai and Australian context. Fifteen local civil servants in the eastern Thailand participated in this workshop and created links among themselves and with RMIT.

“Leadership is a key function in all organisations and I believe that this workshop helps the participants from public health, education and local governance policy in the east of Thailand to implement the concept of leadership to their organisations” said Dr. Pimpa.

Co-organisers of the workshop included Dr. Timothy Moore from the University of Melbourne and Associate Professor Suda Suwannapirom, the Dean of the Graduate School of Commerce, Burapha University.

According to Associate Professor Suwannapirom, projects such as these are important because they ‘help create a strong academic bond between RMIT and the Thai government.’

Gender and Computer in Education

Williams, Ogletree, Woodburn, and Raffeld (1993) reported that male college students, compared with females, experienced more computer involvement in their daily lives and perceived themselves as more competent with computers. However, some studies did not reveal significant gender differences. For example, Zhang (2005) found that gender was not a significant factor in terms of college students’ receptivity for distance learning. Davis and Davis (2007) reported that no statistically significant difference was found on overall perception of computer competence based on gender

Studies on the use of computers by males and females in workplace and household settings have told a similar story. Earlier studies revealed that, in general, women seem to have less experience with computers and tend to be less skilled in the use of computers (Harrison & Rainer, 1992). In addition, women seem to suffer greater levels of computer anxiety (Igbaria &Chakrabarti, 1990). The more recent studies claim that
these gender differences have shrunk. For example, Morris, Venkatesh, and Ackerman (2005) studied over a half year the reactions and use behaviors among 342 workers being introduced to a new computer application. They found that gender effects in individual adoption and use of technology differed based on age. Specifically, gender difference in technology perceptions became more pronounced among older worker, but a unisex pattern of results emerged among younger workers. Ono and Zavodny (2005) conducted a comparative study between USA and Japan. They found that there were significant gender differences in computer and internet usage in both countries during the middle 1990s. By 2001, these gender differences had disappeared in the US but persisted in Japan. However, controversy exists in regard to the recently reported smaller gender differences. Some recent studies still document fairly visible gender differences. Schumacher and Morahan- Martin (2001) found that in general, men tend to have more favorable attitudes toward computers. Ong and Lai (2006) surveyed 156 employees from six international companies in Taiwan and found that men’s rating of computer self-efficacy, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and behavioural intention to use e-learning are all higher than that of women.