1,627 research outputs found
Transmitting the Impulse: The Creative Treatment of Ronald McCuaig's Poetry and Actuality
No full textThe object of this research is to expand the practice of archiveology, a term coined by Joel Katz in 1991 and theorised more recently by Catherine Russell to describe the process of reusing found archival footage in expository documentary to “produce new modes of thinking about the past” (2018, 47). This research will experiment with poetry as a source of archive, adding to the more commonly deployed materials such as film, still photographs, or letters used in documentary production. The intention of the work is to illuminate the literary career of the Australian poet Ronald McCuaig (1908–1993), who was also my grandfather. Ronald McCuaig was described by Australian author Geoffrey Dutton as “Australia’s first modern poet” (1986, 49), and was widely respected for his literary contribution, which spanned from the 1930s to the 1990s. In recent years, however, his work and career had begun to fade from view. As an established documentary filmmaker, I have completed a significant practice-based study, experimenting with production methods for multiplatform outcomes. The rich archive collection that emerged throughout the study led me to question how it is possible to do justice to literature through my usual documentary practice. I have initiated a hermeneutical experiment, re-versioning McCuaig’s literary work—predominantly poetry—through the methodologies of archiveology and videopoetry.
Over the past ten years, audience screening options and spaces have changed dramatically, providing opportunities to develop work that provides for a multifaceted viewing experience, adding online spaces to traditional cinema or television viewing. These options provide an opportunity to experiment with archiveological practices for new viewing artefacts such as videopoems. I aim to demonstrate the impact of Ronald McCuaig’s original work and its potential to provide powerful social commentary, still of relevance in 2020, using Walter Benjamin’s ‘dialectical image’ as a conceptual framework. The outcome of poetry from the 1930s, reimagined into videopoetry with companion documentary sequences, results in a synthesis and an unusual and expanded outcome for a documentary filmmaker: a gallery exhibition. Rather than a single screening event, the exhibition includes multiple screening spaces, a material culture collection, furniture installations, an exhibition publication, digitised original anthologies, and an online space. The combination of these outputs and proposed future endeavours provides audiences with a more visceral connection to the poet, his life and work.Thesis (Professional Doctorate)Doctor of Visual Arts (DVA)Queensland College of ArtArts, Education and LawFull Tex
Arthur Fadden: a political silhouette
No full textThis thesis examines the political legacy of Sir Arthur Fadden, leader of the federal
Country Party (1940–58), prime minister (1941) and, until his record was surpassed by
Peter Costello, Australia’s longest serving treasurer (1940–41 and 1949–58). It traces
his life story from ordinary beginnings in north Queensland, through his foray into
business as an accountant and his long career in politics – local, state and federal. The
thesis argues that Fadden was integral to the establishment of the enduring coalition
arrangement between the Liberal Party and the Country (later National) Party that
remains in place to this day.
This thesis employs the methodology of political biography, building a portrait of
Fadden by looking at the influences that shaped him as a person and a politician. Yet it
is not a standard ‘life’ biography but rather a political inquiry into a political figure,
focusing particularly on his contribution to the coalition and his role as party leader. As
such the thesis contextualises Fadden very much as a man belonging to a particular
time and place in Australian history. Fadden has gone down in folklore as one of the
great characters in the Australian parliament. This thesis aims to bring his personality
and wit back to life, as part of the explanation for his political success.
Fadden held public office for close to three decades. Yet to date he remains a largely
forgotten figure in public discourse. This thesis hopes, in some part, to redress this lack
of attention. When Fadden entered the federal parliament in 1936 the conservative
parties were a loose grouping of fractious interests. By the time he retired in 1958 the
coalition was an entrenched feature of conservative politics. This thesis argues that
Fadden, through a unique blend of personal traits, such as his strength of character and a
belief in compromise and consensus, laid the foundations for an enduring coalition
arrangement that has seen successive conservative governments hold office federally for
forty-two of the last sixty years. Yet while he was conciliatory, Fadden showed that he
was not averse to pursuing his objectives with a degree of relentlessness. He was no
pushover, a fact recognised by prime minister Menzies and the Liberal members of
cabinet during policy debates in the early 1950s.
The most important explanation for Fadden’s success lies in his capacity for fostering
relationships. This thesis unpacks his relationships with political colleagues, party
leaders, public officials, the press and his constituents, and concludes that his
interpersonal skills are crucial to understanding his political longevity. Fadden’s career
proves that even at its most ruthless, politics is an intensely personal endeavour.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)Griffith Business SchoolGriffith Business SchoolFull Tex
Time Rhythm and Magic: Developing a Communications Theory Approach to Documentary Film Editing
No full textTime, Rhythm and Magic: developing a Communications Theory approach to Documentary Film Editing is principally concerned with the editing of documentary films, in particular the historical documentary. The essence of the study draws upon a reflective experiential analysis of the author’s extensive creative practice in documentary film production, with particular reference to the principles and techniques the author employs in documentary editing. The research argues that the process of constructing certain forms of documentary film involves the selection of small segments, or samples, taken from a whole and re-assembled into a reductive representation of that whole. The author finds that useful analogies can be drawn between this process in documentary film editing and the process of sampling, encoding and re-construction inherent in digital telecommunication systems.
The study also argues that a central component of both processes is the sharing and manipulation of temporal elements, and that although these manipulations are a crucial determinant of the cohesion and flow of a finished documentary film, they are invisible to the viewer. The documentary film editor is thus able to create convincing illusions which the audience perceives as reality—a creative process which might thus be described as a form of ‘magic’.Thesis (Professional Doctorate)Doctor of Visual Arts (DVA)Queensland College of ArtArts, Education and LawFull Tex
Civilising the City: Literary Societies and Clubs in Brisbane during the 1880s and 1890s
No full textThe central argument of this thesis is that, for all their differences of membership, affiliation, and program, the various literary organisations formed in Brisbane in the 1880s and 1890s variously contributed to the definition, creation and promotion of what we would now call 'civility' in a colonial society that was widely perceived, even by its own inhabitants, as raw, rude and 'un-civil'.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)School of Arts, Media and CultureArts, Education and LawFull Tex
Positioning Gestalt Professional Education in the Changing Cultural Context: The Experiences of Providers
No full textGestalt therapy is a form of psychotherapy founded in the early 1950s as an approach to enhancing the health of its clients within a supportive therapeutic relationship by enhancing their self-awareness, choice, and spontaneity. The provision of Gestalt professional education for Gestalt therapy practitioners is closely linked with the beginnings of Gestalt therapy. It mainly occurs in private training institutes. Gestalt professional education providers are under pressure to respond to the demands of a changing cultural context such as through the provision of credentials endorsed by national regulatory authorities. However, only limited empirical research has been conducted on that situation. The goal of this research project, then, was to explore the key understandings, dilemmas, experiences, and decisions of major players within Gestalt professional education institutes in relation to what they saw as the demands of the contemporary cultural context. Three research questions were formulated to address that goal:
(1) What are the understandings and experiences of the directors, academic staff, and students of Gestalt professional education institutes regarding the issues arising in their institutes from the contemporary cultural context?
(2) What are the understandings, choices, and directions informing their programs in response to those issues? and
(3) How are the institutes responding to the issues?
A qualitative multiple case study methodology was employed involving five institutes from Australia and New Zealand. Three sources of data were used to build each case: qualitative individual interviews; focus group discussions; and formal and informal documents. Participants were the institute directors, a selection of academic staff, and a selection of students. A peer-reviewed article has been published as part of the PhD project (O’Regan, Bagnall & Hodge, 2017). That article identified three common modes of Gestalt professional education in Australia and New Zealand. This study refined these modes as non- accredited, professionally accredited, and higher education. Following an interpretive and reflective analysis of the data, seven dimensions were constructed to articulate a cohesive response to the research questions:
(1) philosophical integrity, as the extent to which the given mode was seen as either facilitating or inhibiting an institute’s ability to conform to the underlying philosophy of Gestalt therapy;
(2) curricular quality, as the extent to which the mode was seen as influencing the rigour and quality of an institute’s curriculum;
(3) institutional autonomy, as the extent to which the given mode was seen as either facilitating or inhibiting an institute’s ability to make decisions freely and without external restraints;
(4) compliance costs, as the extent to which an institute was seen as being required to expend resources in order to join or stay within the given mode;
(5) student access, as the extent to which the mode was seen as promoting a diverse student population within an institute;
(6) institutional sustainability, as the extent to which the mode was seen as enhancing the ongoing financial security of an institute; and
(7) graduate marketability, as the extent to which graduates from the given mode were seen as being attractive in their professional field.
The study revealed that relevant stakeholders were faced with ambiguous and paradoxical demands in maintaining the integrity, rigour, and sustainability of their institutes. The major tensions centred on how institutes managed the threats to their sustainability while staying true to the philosophical underpinnings of Gestalt therapy. It was found that the mode of Gestalt professional education reflected how the institutes responded to the tensions inherent within each dimension. Each modal position presented advantages and disadvantages in managing those tensions. The study further highlighted the point that those within higher education risked their philosophical integrity by engaging in the performative and instrumental practices required by the regulators. Those institutes in the non-accredited mode (and to a lesser extent the professionally accredited mode), while complying with the existential and humanistic strivings of Gestalt, presented barriers for potential students from low socioeconomic backgrounds to join their institutes, aligned to the institutes’ user-pays model.
The research makes a unique scholarly contribution to the field, both in its substantive findings and in the modal and dimensional frameworks developed in the study. The substantive findings are expected to inform providers of Gestalt professional education in their reflections and deliberations on their own experiences, the options that they face, and the choices that they make. The modal and dimensional frameworks may serve as a model for future research into the field. The issues identified and examined in this project may have interest and value also for those from cognate educational settings.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)School Educ & Professional StArts, Education and LawFull Tex
Men's Behaviour Change Interventions with Fathers Who Use Violence: The Impact of the Caring Dads Program on Parental Alliance, Family Functioning and Wellbeing
No full textMen are the predominant perpetrators of domestic and family violence (DFV) with the risk of serious harm disproportionally borne by women and children. In Australia, men’s behaviour change programs (MBCP) form the most significant nationally auspiced response for abusive and violent men, beyond legal sanctions. This one-size-fits-all approach makes it difficult to determine efficacy and application to the diversity of intervention needs, or to establish suitability across a diverse perpetrator population. More broadly across Western contexts, responses are largely siloed across child protection and specialist DFV services, leading to a lack of holistic intervention. Often fathers have remained invisible or minimally engaged where legal sanctions against them are not taken. Yet, due to the complexities of family life, including the child custody rights of fathers, many families have ongoing contact with perpetrators. Recently emerging father-oriented programs have therefore sought to target domestically violent behaviour and poor parenting practice together, leveraging men’s motivation to be better fathers.
This study focuses on Caring Dads, a father-focused MBCP program, originating in Canada, which seeks to address the problem of violence in families resulting from both partner and child-directed abuse. The Caring Dads program has some evidence of effectiveness in Australian-comparative contexts, though the focus of evaluations has, to date, centred on improvements to mother and child safety. Such evaluations follow a gendered analysis of violence, which is important for identifying the program’s capacity to create improvements in the safety of women and children, but they do not address the concerns of co-parenting and whole-of-family wellbeing, which are significant when families continue contact in the wake of DFV. This thesis addresses a gap in the evidence by considering whether the Caring Dads program can improve parental alliance and family functioning for families where fathers have used DFV and continue contact with their families, either through remaining in families, or through post-separation parenting contact.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)School of Health Sci & Soc WrkGriffith HealthFull Tex
Spatial assessments of visitation and discourse about national parks using social media
No full textProtected areas such as national parks provide many cultural ecosystem services, including opportunities for tourism and recreation. Understanding patterns of visitation to national parks is important socially, environmentally and economically, as is public discourse about the parks. With the rapid increase in the use of social media there is an enormous volume of publicly available spatial data about national parks posted online, but what are the benefits and limitations of this still novel source of information for research and park management? Publicly available spatial data includes global positioning system (GPS) route data posted on social media platforms by mountain bikers, walkers and runners, as well as more general geographic information embedded in texts on microblogging platforms such as Twitter. This thesis examines how both of these types of spatial social media data can be used for monitoring visitation and discourse about national parks at a range of spatial scales from single parks to global assessments.
Firstly, the thesis compared how walkers, runners and mountain bikers use a series of connected urban national parks and reserves close to the city of Brisbane, Australia, using GPS route data from the social media platform MapMyFitness (Chapter 2). Route data was correlated with trail counter data, indicating that it could be used as a surrogate for monitoring within and among parks, and may, in some cases, give more reliable data particularly for mountain biking. Clear differences were found in how the parks and reserves were used for the three activities with mountain bikers travelling further and using more of the parks than walkers and runners. Also, mountain bikers and walkers preferred to visit on weekends, while runners use the parks more consistently throughout the week. The results highlighted how route data complements and expands on other visitor data including providing important spatial and temporal data to assist in managing issues such as conflict and unauthorised use.
Next GPS route data for walking and running was compared among different types of parks (urban to remote) and among social media platforms in south-east Queensland, Australia (Chapter 3). The amount of route data differed among the platforms MapMyFitness, GPSies and Wikiloc. Data from the fitness focused platform MapMyFitness was the most useful for visitor monitoring in the urban park, due to large number of routes posted. However, data from the platform only showed visitation on the formal trail network. In contrast, those posting routes for the remote park, particularly on Wikiloc, often went off the formal trail network. Therefore, the best social media platform to use for monitoring depends on the questions being asked and the type of park, with the popularity of platforms also varying among countries and over time.
To see if social media platforms could be used to assess the relative popularity of parks for walking, running and mountain biking, GPS route data was collected from Strava, MapMyFitness and Wikiloc for 40 national parks in south-eastern Queensland, Australia (Chapter 4). Although Strava was very popular with over 430,000 routes, the other platforms provided useful information for a wider range of activities (MapMyFitness) or a different group of walkers (Wikiloc). Distance to urban areas, and to a lesser extent, the types of trails and permitted activities, best explained the popularity of parks based on data from the two fitness-oriented platforms, Strava and MapMyFitness. For Wikiloc, however, the elevation range of the park was the best predictor of popularity with more adventurous walkers wanting to access rugged and remote areas. Understanding what makes a park popular for each activity is important when managing social and environmental issues particularly in popular urban parks.
For the last results chapter, the focus changed from GPS route data within a single park or region, to using text from the microblogging platform Twitter at a global scale (Chapter 5). Twitter data collected over a 6-month period was used to assess the scale of the discourse about national parks globally and to assess spatial information in the texts, including identifying which parks are talked about and by whom. The discourse was massive, in terms of number of tweets (>2 million), number of tweeters (~750,000) and covered a wide range of parks, with 264 national parks talked about at least 100 times. The size of the discourse about parks varied among countries, but predominantly it was about North American parks, and often sent by accounts in the USA. The number of tweets was correlated with the relative popularity of parks with visitors for the 40 most talked about parks on Twitter, particularly for the most popular parks in the USA. Twitter is therefore a useful source of data for park management, particularly in countries where the platform is popular and/or there are globally renowned national parks.
Overall, social media data including GPS routes, but also Twitter text, are an increasingly useful source of spatial information about parks including when assessing the movements of visitors in parks, factors influencing park popularity and what makes them noteworthy at a range of spatial scales from local urban parks to global networks. The individual results chapters, and overall results illustrated important benefits but also limitations with social media data including the range and scale of different data types as well as the ephemeral nature of social media platforms and the availability of data.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)School of Environment and ScScience, Environment, Engineering and TechnologyFull Tex
Assessing alpine vegetation dynamics using long-term ecological monitoring amidst rapid climate change
No full textAlpine ecosystems occur above the bioclimatic treeline and support cryophilic plant communities with high endemism, which are governed by low temperatures and short growing seasons. However, the climate of many alpine ecosystems is changing rapidly with warming temperatures, declining snow cover and lengthening growing seasons. Alpine vegetation dynamics in response to changes in climate over recent decades have been observed via long-term ecological monitoring techniques, but such studies are less common in the southern hemisphere including in the marginal alpine ecosystems of the Australian Alps. Therefore, the scale, ecological processes and implications of climate-induced dynamics are less clear for this important ecological, cultural and socioeconomic region. The central aim of this thesis is to understand the responses of vegetation in the largest contiguous alpine area in the Australian Alps, the Kosciuszko alpine area, to climate change over recent decades across varying spatial scales.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)School of Environment and ScScience, Environment, Engineering and TechnologyFull Tex
'Gathering Clouds' A Study of Plan Continuation, Risk, Rules, and Pilot Behaviour
No full textThe problem of general aviation pilots continuing flight into adverse weather has been recounted and endured since at least 1968. The problem is known as conducting a visual flight rules (VFR) operation into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC). When pilots operate an aircraft in IMC, the visual reference to the Earth’s horizon is lost or significantly reduced, and the pilot must change the way they determine which way is up. When operating in IMC, pilots turn to the aircraft’s flight instruments, like the
‘artificial horizon’ for the information they need to maintain control of the aircraft. That is, assuming the instruments that are necessary for this are fitted to the aircraft. The human vestibular system functions poorly when pilots cannot see the Earth’s horizon and yields a powerful physiological problem of false sensory illusions. Advanced pilot training, minimum experience requirements and a specialised instrument rating are required to remove the regulatory restriction that precludes pilots from operating in these adverse conditions.
Each year, for decades now, the accident and incident data associated with VFR flight into IMC tells the same steadfast story. Weather is regularly cited as the so-called causal factor in general aviation accidents. Statistics routinely show VFR flight into IMC
represents a small proportion of all general aviation accidents, and yet, the problem accounts for a disproportionate representation of the fatalities. In one five-year period in the United States, the VFR flight into IMC problem resulted in 583 deaths from 276 accidents. Analysis undertaken as part of this research project showed that between 2010 and 2019 in Australia, the problem was increasing, and around 28% of the problem occurred during commercial operations with fare-paying passengers onboard the aircraft.
The pilots who enter the adverse weather may do so intentionally or unintentionally, and each of these cases has unique influences and geneses. This research project explored an understanding of the intentional cases. Why would a good pilot
break the rules? Three studies were conducted to discover the latent beliefs that differentiate those who might intentionally conduct VFR flight into IMC and to identify which of these have the greatest influence. By uncovering these cognitive attributes,
theory-based behavioural interventions can target the specific psychological constructs that have the greatest leverage on the behaviour.
This research project applied the theory of planned behaviour as a theoretical framework, given its success in domains such as road safety, and oil and gas, to understand the psycho-social influences of rule-related behaviour. The theory of planned behaviour posits that the most immediate cognitive antecedent to performing a distinct behaviour is the formation of an intention. The theory suggests that behavioural intentions are formed and can be predicted, predominantly from just three kinds of beliefs that a person holds in relation to the behaviour: attitude toward the behaviour, social norms, and perceived behavioural control. This research project hypothesised an extended model of the theory of planned behaviour, which included the constructs of
personal norms and anticipated affect. It was hypothesised that constructs which reflected a pilot’s self-expectations, and the anticipated affect associated with these expectations, were likely to provide a greater explanation of the variance in this
particular context. The hypothesised model was referred to as the compliance behaviour model.
The model fit results from a structural equation modelling analytical framework demonstrated a respecified version of the compliance behaviour model was a valid, reliable, and sufficient model to explain and predict the formation of intentions to
conduct VFR flights into IMC. The compliance behaviour model achieved better model fit statistics than the unmodified theory of planned behaviour. The results showed that beliefs associated with social pressures and those associated with a pilot’s perception of their skills and ability were the primary influences on behavioural intentions. The results also showed that, surprisingly, those beliefs related to the hazardous consequences of conducting VFR flight into IMC (i.e., behavioural beliefs) had limited influence on a pilot’s intentions. The study uncovered the psychological beliefs that are most influential amongst pilots who might intentionally conduct VFR flights into IMC and explains why past attempts at intervention have been unsuccessful for so long.Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)School of Hum, Lang & Soc ScArts, Education and LawFull Tex
Characterisation of gene expression and virulence factors in Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae
No full textActinobacillus pleuropneumoniae is a Gram-negative bacterium causing the highly infectious disease porcine pleuropneumonia and is responsible for global financial losses to the swine industry every year. Though the virulence of A. pleuropneumoniae is complex and multifactorial, Apx toxins (ApxI-III) are the major contributing factors that causes lung lesions in pigs. Although vaccines are available to prevent A. pleuropneumoniae infections, they do not give complete protection and typically give protection against the serovars used to prepare the vaccine. Thus, a thorough understanding of gene expression and virulence factors is required to develop broadly protective pleuropneumonia vaccines. This thesis first investigated a novel pathway to prevent and treat pleuropneumonia infection by blocking the interaction between Apx toxins and the host cells. To determine the specific ligands bound by each Apx toxin, glycan array analysis using purified Apx toxins (ApxI-III, both the active and inactive forms e.g. ApxCA and ApxA) was carried out. Expressing both with and without ApxC allowed an assessment of whether this activation is required for interaction with the host glycan receptor. Significant work was needed to optimise overexpression and purification of Apx toxins. Glycan array analysis demonstrated that both ApxI and ApxII toxins bound to very similar glycan structures, such as gangliosides and Lewis antigens. Binding of Apx toxins occurred irrespective of activation by the cognate acyltransferase, ApxC. [...]Thesis (PhD Doctorate)Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)Institute for GlycomicsScience, Environment, Engineering and TechnologyFull Tex
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