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lntercultural Communication
Get PDFThe 1950s novel, The Ugly American, symbolized the mentality that generated the study of intercultural communication. The \u27uglies\u27 were the \u27beautiful people\u27 of the embassy set who made no effort to learn the language or culture and barely concealed their disdain for the \u27locals\u27 in rare excursions outside the golden ghetto of transplanted Western culture. The hero, a homely agronomist, went out among the peasants of Southeast Asia, gradually immersed himself in their culture and found he had much to learn from them. He alone communicated.
In the centuries of colonialism there have long been \u27ugly imperialists\u27, but the national independence movements of the post World War II period let people know that their cultures were not a mere receptacle for Westernization. They wanted equal cultural exchange. Militant movements among ethnic and racial minorities-American Blacks, Spanish Basques, Welsh and South India Tamils-rejected the notion that they were fodder for a national melting pot.
With the 1960s came massive overseas development efforts, and the technology of jet engines and satellite communications brought millions of people of different cultures into more intimate contact. The creation of the multinational corporation required that people of different cultures work together in the same organization.
In the 1960s the first university courses in intercultural communication were introduced, and this new field of communication studies took shape. This issue traces the efforts to form a separate area of research out of the traditions of cultural anthropology, linguistics, psychology and other fields
Children, Computers and the \u27New\u27 Literacy
Get PDFIn Kubrick\u27s sci-Ii film2001: A Space Odyssey the spaceship\u27s computer, named HAL, is made out to be a perfect machine though with human emotions and human fears. It can guide and plan with precision and also lip• read, sing, and conspire to take control. As its machine life systems are switched off, it cries out, \u27I am afraid; I can feel it.\u27
HAL is a popular image of the hopes and fears that beset contemporary Western man in the face of the computer in government, business, science and education and the family. The hope is that the drudgery of work and study will be eased, leisure enriched, and knowledge and learning advanced. The fear is that man can lose control of the \u27thinking machine\u27 he himself has created. Massive unemployment in \u27post-industrial\u27 societies is only one of the symptoms of this loss of control.
Children of the more affluent families in these societies are taking to the microcomputer and word-processor in ever-increasing numbers at home and at school, as excitedly perhaps as to television, the cassette player and video in earlier times. What are the social, cultural and educational implications of this micro boom? How is it changing concepts and structures of teaching and learning, and indeed of education itself? How is the skewed diffusion of micros widening the gap between information-rich and information-poor families, within nations and among nations?
This issue of TRENDS highlights the major approaches to the introduction of computers into the schoolroom, reviews the literature, and suggests questions for further research
Improving Children\u27s Television
Get PDFFew areas of television programming have provoked such strong public concern and protest as children\u27s programmes. Parents and educators fear that television may be disrupting the balanced development of children\u27s personalities or implanting harmful values. Most of the early research on children\u27s television was an attempt to determine more accurately whether content was truly violent or manipulative and whether violence, advertising or other content was having destructive effects.
This public reaction also sparked moves in the late 1960s to carefully design programmes such as Sesame Street which would be entertaining, instructive and contribute to the intellectual-emotional growth of the child.
In many cases the creators of these programmes asked child psychologists and researchers on children\u27s media to help in the planning of the content and methods. This opened up new directions in the research on children and media: formative research to design programmes; summative research to determine whether programme objectives were really being realised; and research on the potential of television for constructive, \u27prosocial\u27 programmes. Since many of the programmes were aimed at specific age groups - preschoolers, preadolescents, adolescents - this demanded research on the stages of child development and the growth of cognitive capacity.
This issue reviews some of the current debate regarding the design of programmes for child development
The Experience of a Personal Relationship with God: William Barry and the 20th Century Renewal of Ignatian Spirituality
No full textWilliam A. Barry made a significant contribution to the renewal of Ignatian Spirituality following Vatican II. A central theme of his life and work was the experience of a personal relationship with God. This thesis will tell the story of how Barry came to view the experience of a personal relationship with God as central to his own spiritual life and to Ignatian spirituality. It first explores Barry’s upbringing and formation in a pre- Vatican II Catholic Church and Society of Jesus, before turning to his experience of the transformations in the Church and the Society following Vatican II. It then narrates his particular encounter with the 20th century project of recovery and renewal of Ignatian sources and spirituality that was taking place in the Society and how this encounter helped him discover the centrality of the experience of a personal relationship with God in his own life and for Ignatian spirituality. Finally, it will examine Barry’s experience at the Center for Religious Development, where he and his colleagues developed an approach to spiritual direction and training spiritual directors focused on the experience of a personal relationship with God. Their work, rooted in Ignatian sources and inspired by the spirit of renewal of Vatican II and the 31st General Congregation of the Society of Jesus, constituted a remarkable contribution to the renewal of Ignatian spirituality. As a whole, this story reveals how the center of Barry’s own spiritual life and the center of Ignatian spirituality met, resulting in a transformative experience of grace that shaped the rest of Barry’s life and ministry
New Approaches to Media Education
Get PDFThere is increasing consensus among educators around the world that some form of education for the use of the public media - especially television - should be an integral part of the primary and secondary school education.
Teachers are daily experiencing the fact that one of the major cultural influences forming the imagination of their students is the often long hours watching television. Sometimes television is a more important \u27educational experience\u27 than the school. Too often, however, the school, family life and the· television set are three mutually antagonistic or indifferent poles that leave young people drifting in a no man\u27s land.
In the field of media education - as in any relatively new field - there are widely differing positions regarding how the school experience and the media experience can be brought together. For example, some would advocate a two-year media studies course as part of the regular school curriculum. Others think that classroom instruction has little influence over what young people think and do when actually watching television with the family or group of friends. Some suggest that the emphasis on media education is too narrow and that the subject should be communication education.
This issue reviews positions in the debate on a country by country basis. The article on Directions for Research summarises what seem to be the emerging points of agreement
Censorship in the Media
Get PDFThe principle of freedom of expression in the press, book publishing and broadcasting has been one of the hard-won battles in human history. Without this freedom, a democratic society,, could not exist. Yet every community and nation has to make painful decisions about what will, or will not be communicated. Libel and privacy are obvious examples. Otherwise our societies would virtually disintegrate. Does freedom of speech have limits? If so, how do we decide on these limits?
New forms of censorship are always creeping in. Currently it is insinuated that consumer protection groups such as Action for Children\u27s Television in the United States are censors in disguise. ACT itself is accusing the fundamentalist religious group, Moral Majority, of censorship goals. What are the norms for judging who is a censor?
This issue reviews some of the profoundly new patterns of thinking about freedom and censorship that have emerged in the last generation and the debate that surrounds the new logic fort defending freedom of expression
The New International Information Order
Get PDFIn the Nineteenth Century the lines of international communication tended to follow the paths of the NorthAtlantic empires. The cartel of European and American news agencies divided up the world according to the political and economic spheres of influence of the day. Reuters in London took the British Empire; Havas in Paris, the Latin world and French-speaking dependencies; Wolff in Berlin, the Scandinavian countries and Eastern Europe; the American Associated Press and United Press followed U.S. expansion. Just as roads held together the Roman Empire, so transoceanic cables, radio frequencies and satellites have been the lifelines of modern empires.
After World War II national liberation movements in Africa, Asia, and now in Latjn America, have changed the political organisation of the world. Yet the old structure of economic and information dependence persists. In this sense the North-Atlantic empires continue today.
The new nations rightly contend that they will not achieve real independence until they build a new pattern of equitable and horizontal communication among themselves. They also must transform an internal communication structure originally built around a traditional elite or a colonial expatriate enclave into a service for indigenous. democratic national growth.
This issue of Communication Research Trends focuses on two aspects of recent .research on the proposed New International Information Order (NIIO): 1) research revealing and defining the causes of Third-World dependency in international communications and. more important. 2) research on the effectiveness of new communication institutions such as the news agency of the Non•Aligned Countries
Molecular Scaffolding and Cargo Loading in Engineering Nanomedicine
No full textExosomes are naturally occurring nanoparticles with unique properties that make them particularly promising as targeted, versatile carriers in drug delivery. They have the potential to revolutionize the field with their capacity to localize in desired microenvironments and cross the blood brain barrier (BBB). Currently, the treatment efforts of diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease are greatly hindered by the presence of the BBB. Chemotherapy and radiation therapy are some of the most common treatments for cancers, yet they lack specificity. Modified exosomes loaded with molecular cargo may serve as a solution to these pressing drug delivery issues. Our project explores exosome surface modification by seven selected molecular scaffolds: CD63, LAMP-2B, VSVG, FAR, ACY, GPI, and C1C2, all of which have the ability to load protein drugs internally and/or externally respective to the exosome lumen. Through the use of molecular scaffold colocalization, imaging analysis, exosome harvesting, and uptake assays, we have determined that the molecular scaffold that most efficiently modifies the exosome surface is VSVG and recommend that it be used in future research efforts involving exosome cargo loading
Bridging Deterministic and Probabilistic Analysis for Dam Safety
Get PDFDams play a critical role in water supply, flood control, energy generation, and infrastructure resilience. However, many existing dams face significant risks due to aging structures, evolving environmental conditions, and outdated design methodologies. These dams pose a danger to downstream populations, demanding greater attention to investment in measures to help reduce risks to public safety and economic assets. Traditional deterministic methods for dam stability assessments rely on static factors of safety (FS), often resulting in either overly conservative or underestimated designs. In this approach, engineers input known material properties, loads, and the dam\u27s geometry into a single FS, which is compared to reference values to evaluate stability. While effective for quick analyses, this method overlooks uncertainties, potentially leading to overly conservative designs or neglect of critical safety aspects. Probabilistic methods provide a more comprehensive foundation for risk evaluation by quantifying the likelihood of not reaching a target performance objective rather than relying on a single safety factor threshold. This study focuses on analyzing the resiliency of a 326-foot Hardfill dam, under various loads (normal, unusual, and extreme) by bridging probabilistic and deterministic analyses to create a function that can predict the FS. The study integrates sensitivity analysis using Tornado Diagrams (TD) to identify critical parameters influencing stability, while providing a visual tool for practicing engineers. CADAM3D is the computer software used for the deterministic analysis and MATLAB for probabilistic analysis, allowing for a comparative assessment between traditional and probabilistic design approaches. This analysis involves a multi-linear regression approach to derive a straightforward equation for the estimation of the factor of safety, which includes parameters identified using the TD. The proposed procedure is more robust, computationally efficient, and more easily interpretable than conventional methods while accounting for uncertainties in the analysis. This study will allow professionals in the dam industry and dam owners to expedite the safety assessment of similar dams and to identify the parameter uncertainties affecting the dam response the most to allow for designs or retrofit strategies that are cost-effective
Cob Structure Optimization for Oaxacan Community Center
Get PDFOaxaca, Mexico is one of the most seismically active states in the country. Earthen-based structures are common in this area as well due to their cultural acceptance, affordability, and accessibility. However, due to the seismicity, these structures often face challenges related to durability. This project serves as an exploration, aimed at increasing the lifespan and resilience of cob construction. The design builds off of the work of GRUPEDSAC, a nonprofit focused on utilizing bioconstruction to provide structures for rural communities in Mexico. This thesis proposes the incorporation of a hybrid wall system that incorporates cob with timber framing, and is informed by risk assessmens of cob properties and a cost analysis