4 research outputs found
Academic Capacity Building for Teachers as a Determinant of Student's Performance in Public Secondary in Kenya
No full textEducation is an important ingredient in the progress and changes of countries the world over. The purpose of the study was to determine the influence of capacity building for teachers on students’ academic performance in public secondary schools in Kenya. The article is an extract from a study done in public secondary schools in the Yatta sub-county, Machakos County, Kenya. The study was guided by the instructional leadership model. This study adopted a descriptive research design, survey method. The study was conducted among 247 respondents comprising 19 principals and 228 teachers. The study employed stratified sampling techniques and simple random sampling techniques. Data collection was done using questionnaires for principals and for teachers. Data were analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). The findings revealed a strong positive correlation between the principal’s involvement in capacity building for teachers and students’ academic performance from the principal’s perspective. However, the results of the teacher’s questionnaires indicated a weak positive correlation between the principal’s involvement in capacity building for teachers and students’ academic performance. The study concludes that principals' capacity building for teachers positively influences the student’s academic performance. However, capacity building in most schools has not been implemented appropriately. It was; thus, suggested that all principals working in public secondary schools enhance capacity building for teachers to ensure that they are always motivated which will in turn help to improve the student’s academic performance. Capacity building should be done in consultation with the teachers for it to be effective. It should be a policy from the ministry of education that capacity building for teachers is improved in all public schools
Never be silent : publishing & imperialism in Kenya, 1884-1963
No full textSocial communications are central to any social struggle. There is a sizable body of literature from other countries on the use of oral medium, newspapers, books and other forms of communications being used as tools for organising against a powerful enemy, as a training ground for cadres and for clarifying and developing revolutionary theory, ideology, organisation and practice. All this ensures a greater unity among those resisting oppression and exploitation. Thus revolutionary and liberation forces of Bolsheviks in the Soviet Union, the Communist Party of China, and in Vietnam had developed theories and practices of revolutionary publishing as part of their revolutionary work. This has also been the case during anti-colonial and anti-imperialist struggles in Africa, but very little of this has been systematically documented as an aspect of revolutionary communications policy and practice. While the
colonial communications systems have been reasonably well documented, the resistance communication systems remain largely undocumented and ignored. This book is an initial attempt to document this dynamic communications process in Kenya with its external struggles against colonialism and its complex internal struggles with overlaying divisions of race and class, Kenyan and foreign peoples. The main theme emerging from this experience is that people struggling to change their society always find ways of establishing their own system of communicating with the people they lead
and by whom they are led. Their mission of revolution, of change, of peace, of social and economic justice requires that they should never be silent. This was well understood and practised by the liberation forces in Kenya. They
were never silent
Te Tuhirau i Rehu i Ringa: Translating Sacred and Sensitive Texts: An Indigenous Perspective
No full textThis thesis centers on translator cognition. Through a series of interviews and think-aloud protocols (Chapters 3 – 5), it explores the ways in which a sample of translators (both Māori and non-Māori) negotiate the complex issues involved in translating between a local, Indigenous language (Māori) and an international one (English) and, in particular, how they approach the definition and translation of texts that could be regarded as being ‘sacred’ and/or ‘sensitive’. In their definitions of ‘sacred’ texts and ‘sensitive’ texts, all of the participants exhibited a peculiarly postmodern positioning, focussing primarily on perspective rather than on any absolute concept of truth or reality. With the exception of the Māori participants’ traditional definition of, and approach to texts deemed to be ‘tapu’ (see Chapter 3), all of the participants expressed beliefs about the translation process which were largely structurally-orientated. They emphasized the importance of respecting the cultural context out of which texts emerged and of attempting, in translation, to reflect the meanings deemed to reside in the source texts by virtue of the intentions of their authors. As witnessed in their think-aloud protocols, however, when involved in the actual process of translation the translators did not always adhere to the views expressed in their interviews, with translation procedures ranging from one that was primarily modernist and structural in orientation (but also reflecting the careful attention to co-text and cohesion that is characteristic of much recent research on discourse analysis) to one that was primarily postmodern and post-structural in orientation, being highly personal, autonomous and individualistic.
In the absence of any clear agreement about translation theory in the literature on translation (see Chapter 2), and at a time when pre-modern, modern and postmodern positioning and structural and post-structural perspectives vie for acceptance, each of the participants in this research project appears to have found his or her own way of traversing the complex terrain of translation practice without necessarily being fully aware of the way in which the decisions they made positioned them theoretically. What this suggests is the need for a type of training that introduces novice translators in an explicit way to a variety of theories about human language and communication and the ways in which they can impinge upon translation practice, thus creating a context in which translators are able to make critically informed decisions about how they will proceed in any particular instance, why they will proceed in these ways, and what is required in order to ensure that their beliefs about translation are in accord with their actual practices. Critical awareness of these issues is likely to be particularly important in the case of those involved in translating between international languages such as English and more localized, Indigenous languages such as Māori, where discontinuity in the transmission of the language has occurred and where, therefore, texts that are deemed to be of particular significance would otherwise be unavailable to those for whom the texts form part of their cultural heritage
Mythologizing the transition : a comparative study of Bahram Beyzaee and Wolfe Soyinka
No full textBahram Beyzaee, the Iranian playwright, screenwriter and filmmaker, and Wole Soyinka, the Nigerian poet, playwright, and novelist have produced artistic works that transcend the limitations of time and locality to become powerful comments on human life and socio-political and cultural institutions. This research study examines the major themes and dramatic techniques of these two writers to demonstrate how, in two very different cultural settings, traditional modes and themes appear in modem art forms to renegotiate cultural identity. I argue that both writers place themselves in a post postcolonial position which rather than being concerned about 'writing back against the centre' reflects on the cultural shortcomings that leaves their people at the mercy of vicious internal and external forces. I also demonstrate how they demythologize the traditional superstitious beliefs that haunt the present, foreground the inauthenticity of the modern hybrid obsessions that distort everyday life in their countries and mythologize and glorify the positive aspects of history and contemporary life to redefine cultural identity in terms of the best their cultures can offer. The first two chapters give an account of the history of Iranian and Nigerian performance forms in the context of socio-political, cultural, literary and artistic movements and traditions. The third chapter proceeds to present a short discussion of the theatrical vision and themes of Beyzaee and Soyinka and embarks on a general comparison of the two writers. Chapter four is focused on Beyzaee and Soyinka's depiction of the intellectuals as sacrificial heroes whose death may initiate social purgation and cultural regeneration and liberation. Chapter five is less mythical and more sociopolitical. It is a reflection on the writers' portrayal of women in their works and their success or failure in transcending literary and cultural stereotypes in a world where the means of production and socio-economic facts and the cultural developments associated with them demand a rapid movement away from patriarchal values. Chapter six is devoted to the study of another major issue in the process of cultural transition, namely, redefining the position of ethnic minorities in the myth of nationhood. This last chapter is followed by a brief conclusion, discussing the results and the future possibilities of drama in the context of rapid transition
