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A Double-Edged Sword: The Influence of the Canadian Government on Child Violence in the Twentieth Century
No full textA popular theory in history posits that violence decreases over time due to the development of a strong, centralized government. This paper examines the legitimacy of that theory by examining child violence statistics in Canada during the twentieth century, a violent century in the country’s past that also saw developments in child welfare. The effectiveness of these child welfare laws can be seen in a general decline in child abuse rates from 1940 to 1999. However, the success of welfare laws does not apply to all Canadian children. Examining the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee reveals that the Canadian government actively encouraged violence against Indigenous children throughout the twentieth century. Considering the abuse of Indigenous children by the Canadian government, this paper concludes that it cannot be argued that a strong, centralized government reduces child violence rates over time
Secondary Students’ Motivation Levels and Factors influencing Motivations through the Lens of Self-determination Theory
No full textThis study examines the levels of motivation among secondary school students in learning geography, as well as the factors influencing their motivation. Utilizing a convergent mixed-methods design, data was collected through survey questionnaires and focus group discussions. The quantitative findings indicated a high level of motivation among students, supported by qualitative findings revealing intrinsic and extrinsic motivations such as interest in the subject. Factors influencing motivation included teaching strategies, teacher attributes, and teacher-student relationships. Moreover, interactive teaching methods, friendly and approachable teachers, and positive teacher-student relationships emerged as significant influencers of student motivation. This study contributes to the understanding of motivational factors in the context of geography learning, providing insights for educators and policymakers to optimize teaching practices and curriculum design. The present study concludes with practical implications, limitations of the study and recommendations
Using Behavior Analysis and Therapy to Teach Dance to Neurodiverse Children in Day Treatment Education Program
No full textNeurodiverse children in day treatment programs often experience behavioral challenges that limit their opportunities to engage in recreational physical activities. These activities are important for physical health and aid in developing motor and socio-emotional skills. The present study used an explanatory sequential mixed methods design to evaluate the effectiveness of Dance With A B-E-A-T! (Behavior-Analysis-and-Therapy), a community-based program combining dance with applied behavior analysis (e.g., modeling, reinforcement), to teach three dance sequences to five neurodiverse participants (7-9 years) in a day treatment program. Within five sessions, the mean percentage of steps completed correctly increased from a combined average of 31.5% (range = 18.9-52.0%) to 61.4% (range = 53.3-72.0%) for all three dance sequences, two of which were statistically significant (p < .05). The participants described their experience as “fun”, “good”, and “happy”, and program counselors reported high consumer satisfaction, suggesting Dance With A B-E-A-T! benefited both participants and staff
Sauvagines (2019) de Gabrielle Filteau-Chiba : déconstruire la chasse et refaire le monde
No full textEn empruntant aux théories déconstructionnistes de Jacques Derrida, cet article examine la mise en récit de la pratique de la chasse dans Sauvagines de l’écrivaine québécoise Gabrielle Filteau-Chiba. Sa protagoniste – une agente de protection de la faune – envisage la chasse d’une manière différente de sa conception traditionnelle. Elle remet en question l’hétéronormativité et mène un combat contre l’exploitation de la nature qui culmine dans le piégeage d’un braconnier. Victime des tentatives d’intimidation de ce dernier, la narratrice abandonne son poste et décide de le prendre en chasse. En agissant tel un animal défendant son territoire, la protagoniste commet un acte objectivement illégal, mais légitime d’un point de vue éthique et écologique. Ses actions déconstruisent le rapport de force entre prédateur et proie et relèvent d’une forme de justice poétique. Le trappage fatal du braconnier, ainsi que le caractère symbiotique du rapport que la protagoniste établit avec son amante, soulignent non seulement l’interdépendance entre êtres humains et animaux, mais aussi le respect de la diversité présente dans la nature
Tender Readings: Perspectives
No full text9 young artists illustrate Brandon LaBelle and Annette le Fort\u27s book Touch, and Tender Readings. Books as Archives
Children of Bill 82: Reflective Histories of Disability and Childhood in Ontario, Canada
No full textThrough an analysis of personal histories, we reflect on changes in disability discourses in educational contexts since the 1970s. We argue that educational systems are deeply resistant to critical discourse of disability even while espousing social justice principles. We simultaneously recognize the disconnection between disability, education, and the lived experiences of disabled children, and the way in which their experiences are framed. We call for a more integrated discourse between academic theories of disability, professional systems, and children’s lived experiences in order to better care for children and their families, and to address injustice in education systems
Mental Health in Kenya: Tensions Between Human Rights Approaches and Colonial Care
No full textThe mental health situation in Kenya has been termed a silent epidemic threatening the mental wellbeing of the population. Deeply entrenched stigma and discrimination is systematic and directly influences access to mental health care, human rights violations, and social exclusion. Despite commitments to improve mental health care infrastructure, the ongoing impact of colonization perpetuates biomedical responses to mental health. Kenya ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) in 2008 though mental health, criminal, and civil laws continue to be in violation of the Convention. We take a human rights and equity lens to critically analyze the biomedical dominance in mental health policy and practice. We employ an intersectional analytic framework to contextualize experiences of mental health injustices and apply aspects of an Intersectionality Based Policy Analysis Framework to the Ministry of Health’s Kenya Mental Health Policy 2015-2030 (2015) and the Ministry of East African Community (EAC) Labour and Social Protection’s National Plan of Action on Implementation of Recommendations made by the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2016) to explore how policy discourses influence understandings of mental health and responses. We analyze a disjuncture between human rights and social determinants framings of mental health in policy, and how a default to western biomedical solutions for addressing mental distress dominate institutionally and in practice. We urge the Kenyan government to abolish coercive mental health practices, remove systemic barriers that hinder participation, and establish supports to empower people with psychosocial disabilities and their organizational representatives (USP-Kenya) to ensure mental health responses are consistent with international human rights treaties
Temporalization and the Digital Vigilante: Past Presencing, Un/Doing Futures and “Jewish Revenge” as Affective Justice in Talia Lavin’s Culture Warlords
No full textThis paper examines the figure of the hate-fighting digital vigilante as embodied through Aryan Queen, an online persona developed and depicted by self-proclaimed antifa member Talia Lavin in her book Culture Warlords. One chapter in the 2020 memoir relays Lavin’s pursuits to elicit and make known identifying information of Der Stürmer, an anonymous white supremacist online hater. I first locate Lavin’s undertaking in the porous policy landscape regulating online hate transnationally to make a case for its value as an entry into the navigation of hate on Telegram, a platform that has become a popular enclave for hate, and one that remains otherwise impenetrable to state efforts at formal governance. I then introduce the digital vigilante as a cultural figure that has become increasingly distinguished from, but developed in relation to, the classical or analogue vigilante in academic literature, albeit with only limited attention paid to the seemingly boundless temporality that constitutes the virtual sphere. Attending to processes of temporalization, I argue, can well serve an analysis of the moral universe within which the digital vigilante operates, thereby enabling a critical engagement with the motivations, methods, and intentions of her justice pursuits online. With the support of anthropological theories of temporalization – namely, past presencing, un/doing futures, and affective justice – I show that justice pursuits by way of digital vigilantism for Lavin are entangled with an affective longing for revenge, and manifest a complex intermingling of open wounds from injustices that emerge from and produce entanglements of the past, present, and future
“We Need to Live the World that is Possible”: Prefigurative Justice, Creative Collaboration, and the Activism of Rita Wong
No full textAlthough many writers and scholars struggle to cross the threshold between literary expressive culture and activism, poet Rita Wong has fostered and bridged both collaborative artistic and direct-action social justice work. Wong’s collaborations with Dorothy Christian, Larissa Lai, Cindy Mochizuki, and Fred Wah illuminate the promise of creative practice in confronting racial capitalism and climate destruction. This essay draws from the social movement theory of prefigurative politics, routed through abolition feminism and Indigenous place-based epistemology, to account for ethical consistencies between Wong’s poetics, collaborative artistic practice, and direct-action interventions. Prefigurative politics conveys “the embodiment, within the ongoing political practice of a movement, of those forms of social relations, decision-making, culture, and human experience that are the ultimate goal” (Boggs, 1977, p. 100). Wong’s work focuses on “Reckoning” at the pivot point of climate destruction: she writes, “our common survival depends on our collective ability to address the environmental devastation that has accelerated in this century, a devastation that will not end unless we learn to live by values that manifest and respect Indigenous relationships to the land and waters” (Wong, 2012, p. 535). Her scholarship and collaborative poetic engagements have attended to “Repairing” with words, performance, bodily engagement, and crafting a paradigm shift in alliance with human and nonhuman others, thinking with and through water. And Wong “Reworlds” through experimental and imaginative building of new relations, telling new stories. In keeping with prefigurative social movement practice, she and her collaborators act as if that new world has already arrived