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Impact of Nearpod on Students’ Motivation and Learning about Minerals: A Case Study
No full textThis study examines the impact of Nearpod on students’ motivation and learning outcomes about minerals. The study adopted a quantitative method; a pre-experimental design type of one-group pretest-posttest design, whereby one group of grade 10 students (n=24) was taken as a sample. An observation tool was used to study students’ motivational behavior, and a two-tier multiple-choice diagnostic instrument was employed to assess student learning outcomes. The findings indicate that using interactive digital tools positively influenced students’ motivation to learn and increased their participation in the learning process. Furthermore, the study found that using digital technology enhances students’ understanding of the subject matter as evidenced by a significant improvement in the mean marks of the students in the post-test. The findings of this research suggest that the integration of interactive digital tools into the classroom can enhance student’s learning experiences and academic performance
Social Justice in the Domestic Realm: Time Poverty and Wellbeing during the COVID-19 Pandemic
No full textThe concept of time poverty is useful for investigating the widely reported exacerbation of gender inequality in families during COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. I explore the nature and frequency of this situation in Ontario, Canada to assess domestic inequality, free time, and gendered wellbeing as issues of social justice. Between January and June, 2021, I administered online time use surveys to 100 self-identified women and 100 self-identified men who were living with a spouse and had at least one child learning remotely. The combined responsibilities for the household, childcare, and children’s online learning were overwhelming for the vast majority of women. Consequently, their general experience in the context of the pandemic was one of intensified “time poverty,” a condition I conceptualize as incorporating paid work, the “patriarchal dividend” in domestic task allocation, the endless nature of feminized care-related responsibilities, and women’s consequent lack of recuperative leisure. I assess the nature of leisure, its importance to wellbeing, and the impact of its shortage on women’s lives. Finally, I consider theories of social justice that can illuminate and rectify the imbalances entrenched in gendered divisions of labour within families. The study contributes to pandemic and time poverty literatures, and to the social justice literature by identifying time poverty as an aspect of social injustice in the pandemic context
Caste, Constitution, Court, Equality: The Social Justice Imbroglio in Contemporary India
No full textHow do democratic ideals and constitutional provisions of inclusive citizenship and “reasonable classification” of universal rights to combat social oppression and promote social justice get worked out in the crannies of state policies, citizen politics and legislative and legal pronouncements? This article addresses these issues by revisiting the convoluted trajectory of positive discrimination (termed “reservation”) in India as an illustrative and instructive example. It combines an innovative reading of Constitutional Assembly Debates, constitutional provisions, constitutional amendments, and crucial Supreme Court rulings to trace the gradual undoing of constitutional ideals and provisions. An exploration of changing state policies in tune with the imperatives of a neo-liberal Hindu authoritarian regime, and shifting electoral demands of privileged upper castes and classes, allows the article to underscore a radical shift in ethos that has resulted in an interrogation of constitutional provisions for social equality and justice. A lack of consensus on the justifiability of (re)distribution of resources by extending special benefits to the socially suppressed (“backward”) castes and classes of citizens, has laid bare the ambiguities inherent in constitutional ideals and provisions, highlighted the resourceful use of such ambiguities by the socially entitled citizens to disavow caste-based social oppression, and insist on economic weakness that hampers equal opportunity as the fair ground for “reservation.” A shift in emphasis from “social backwardness” of the oppressed to “economic weakness” of the advantaged in the language of the state ratified by the Supreme Court, underscores the undemocratic consequences of democratic provisions. A serious interrogation of the fairness of reasonable classification of equality and the justifiability of distribution on the part of the socially privileged, has served to disavow calls for social justice and recognition of difference by the oppressed, and overturned the basic premise of equal respect that ground liberal theories of social justice and social democracy
Social Justice and the Language Classroom: Reflection, Action and Transformation (Book Review)
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Ethical Dilemmas of Conducting Research Among Precarious Status Migrants: Research Ethics Boards and Beyond
No full textIn Canada, research is governed by national ethical guidelines and standards enforced by institutional research ethics boards (REBs) to protect vulnerable populations, such as temporary migrant farmworkers. However, the rigid and inflexible application of these procedures often creates significant barriers for social science researchers striving to promote social justice for this population and may lead to antagonism between researchers and REB chairs. Institutional ethics frameworks frequently fail to account for the embeddedness of research within rural agricultural communities and the critical role these communities play in shaping ethical decision-making. When REBs overlook these relational and contextual dynamics, they impose requirements that can obstruct meaningful, on-the-ground ethical engagement. To illustrate these tensions, we focus on three challenges, namely, participant recruitment strategies, consent procedures, and protection from trauma. To avoid misunderstandings and antagonism, we call for a paradigm shift toward understanding research ethics as relations, that is, inherently embedded within complex networks of relationships, emphasizing iterative models of consent developed through ongoing negotiations between researchers, participants, and other community members. Bridging the gap between ethical research in theory and practice requires a relational paradigm that recognizes the need to mitigate hostilities and antagonism and emphasizes the importance of collaboration and dialogue – not only among academics, migrants, and community stakeholders but also between researchers and REB members
From Relics of Empire to Pillars of the Nation: The Czech Nobility and Catholic Church during the First Czechoslovak Republic
No full textAfter the foundation of the Czechoslovak Republic in 1918, the Catholic Church and the nobility of the Czech lands were attacked by the new nationalist government for their past support of Habsburg Austrian rule. Catholic statues were removed from public spaces in symbolic attacks on the Church’s social influence, while the nobility’s power was threatened by a programme of land reform. Instead of lashing out at the regime, the Catholic Church and the nobility both attempted to integrate themselves into the new sociopolitical order by embracing Czech identity and reinventing themselves as nationalist institutions. Both groups engaged in historical revisionism in order to defend their Czech credentials against nationalist attacks. Central to these efforts was the creation of ‘heroes’ who were used to assert Catholic and noble claims to ‘Czech-hood’ that competed with dominant liberal nationalist narratives. Both groups also entered the political arena of the new republic. There, they demonstrated a willingness to work within Czechoslovak institutions and to adopt the rhetoric of democracy and the nation-state while also lobbying for their own institutional interests
Monsters of Modernity: The Technological Invasion of Borders in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) and Ian McEwan’s Machines Like Me (2019)
No full textThis analysis aims to examine the intrusive potential of the mechanical and technological force of the ‘posthuman’ as a physical and existential threat on the borders of the self, leading to ‘two-way hybridizations’ that make it impossible to discern between the human and posthuman. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) and Ian McEwan’s Machines Like Me (2019) contextualize this threat, portraying monstrous Gothic representations of the cyborg. These monsters operate as a physical and technological force which seek to corrupt and destroy the once considered private realm of human experience. By harnessing elements of the Victorian and Neo-liberal Gothic which have historically enforced the notion of the human body as material, such as: the anatomy act of 1832, galvanism, screen-based trading, and phone hacking, the monsters attempt to diminish a sense of the human as a body with interiority, and instead, view them as just another border to breach and invade.  
Football, the 2022 Qatar World Cup, and Sportswashing: Do Western perspectives recognise the dangers of Edward Said’s concept of Orientalism in their approach?
No full textAlongside the Summer Olympics, the FIFA Men’s World Cup is one of the two most popular sporting events on the planet. As a truly transnational spectacle, it represents a special opportunity for the host to project an attractive public image around the globe. Qatar has attained exceptional wealth, primarily through gas and oil exports, and has been enacting innovative foreign policies, such as hosting the World Cup in 2022 with the intention of generating an attractive public image of legitimacy, which grants the ‘soft power’ that enables them to transcend their small state constraints. In this commentary, we present our opinion on how before, during, and after the tournament, Western/British media portrayed a narrative that was based on a polarised Western-Middle Eastern cultural conflict that significantly limited Qatar’s ability to transform their hosting of the World Cup into a more positive public image. We frame this by outlining how this approach and these beliefs are essentially driven by Orientalist accusations that position Western ideals as superior to Arabic ones, and we contend, using a Weberian approach, that this was – essentially – an unfair turn of events given the still young (comparable to the West) historical development of Arab states.  
