Poisoned chalice? English at an Islamic university in Kerala

English Today ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 15-18
Author(s):  
A. K. Muneer Hudawi
Keyword(s):  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Private Life ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Modern World ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Spare Time ◽  
Changing Times ◽  
The One ◽  
The Impact

Post 9/11, traditional Islamic educational institutions, better known by their Arabic name ‘madrasas’, have been catapulted into the foreground of heated and at times shrill debates on modernization and reform (Malik, 2008; Noor et al., 2008; Riaz, 2008; Hefner, 2009). Discussions on reforming the madrasa system revolve around, among other things, introducing ‘modern’ education in the madrasas and the role of English in this process. Contrary to popular assumptions, however, such tensions are nothing new. On the contrary, the madrasa has witnessed recurrent attempts at reform in Muslim societies during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Since the eleventh century, when it first emerged as the pivotal centre of Islamic higher learning, the madrasa has undergone many changes, adapting in varying degrees to local cultures and changing times (Zaman, 1999). Nevertheless, these changes and reforms may not necessarily conform to the standards set by Western liberalism and it would be a gross mistake to judge the success, merit and relevance of the madrasa through the prism of such a discourse, given that the very raison d'être of madrasas is the production, dissemination, promotion and preservation of Islamic learning in a modern world which has brought into sharp relief the divide between the religious and the private on the one hand, and the secular and the public on the other, a distinction with little precedent in earlier Muslim societies. It is modernity that constructed the notion of religion as occupying a distinct sphere in society. Developments in modern Europe, and especially the impact of the Enlightenment, have led not merely to the subordination of religion to the state or the confinement of the former to the sphere of ‘private’ life but also to ‘the construction of religion as a new historical object: anchored in personal experience, expressible as belief-statements, dependent on private institutions, and practised in one's spare time. This construction of religion ensures that it is part of what is inessential to our common politics, economy, science, and morality’ (Asad, 1993: 207).

Freedom of Expression versus Privacy and the Right to Reputation

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dirk Voorhoof
Keyword(s):  
Public Interest ◽  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
Media Freedom ◽  
Investigative Journalism ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Right Of Privacy ◽  
The One ◽  
Grand Chamber ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Impact

The normative perspective of this chapter is how to guarantee respect for the fundamental values of freedom of expression and journalistic reporting on matters of public interest in cases where a (public) person claims protection of his or her right to reputation. First it explains why there is an increasing number and expanding potential of conflicts between the right to freedom of expression and media freedom (Article 10 ECHR), on the one hand, and the right of privacy and the right to protection of reputation (Article 8 ECHR), on the other. In addressing and analysing the European Court’s balancing approach in this domain, the characteristics and the impact of the seminal 2012 Grand Chamber judgment in Axel Springer AG v. Germany (no. 1) are identified and explained. On the basis of the analysis of the Court’s subsequent jurisprudence in defamation cases it evaluates whether this case law preserves the public watchdog-function of media, investigative journalism and NGOs reporting on matters of public interest, but tarnishing the reputation of public figures.

scholarly journals RISKS OF THE EDUCATION

THE BULLETIN ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (390) ◽  
pp. 44-49
Author(s):  
R. Aetdinova ◽  
I. Maslova ◽  
Sh. Niyazbekova ◽  
O. Balabanova ◽  
Zh. Zhakiyanova ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Educational Institution ◽  
Final Analysis ◽  
Quality Education ◽  
The Other ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Modern World ◽  
High Quality ◽  
High Quality Education ◽  
The One ◽  
The University

The article justifies for the need to identify and to keep track, in practice, of different groups of risks inherent in educational institutions under current conditions of pandemic and post-pandemic transformation of education under the influence of modern world uncertainty. Transformation of education functions in the epoch of digital economy changes the content and types of risks concomitant to the activities carried out by schools. Schools belong to the most conservative types of organizations. However, the environment in which schools operate is constantly changing. An educational institution, as any enterprise, has to engage in the activity aimed at risk management. Manifestation of the risk is, on the one hand, fraught with threats and damage, on the other hand, with opportunities. Assessment of possible threats and risks allows timely projection of undesirable results, creation of a system for situational response to unforeseen circumstances and, in the final analysis, formulation of a strategy for development of the university which would allow achievement of modern high quality education, its fundamentality and conformity to important topical requirements of the personality, society and state. Causes of developing risks characteristic of educational institutions are disclosed. External and internal risks characteristic of educational institutions, sources generating them and the importance of managing them are analyzed. The analysis of risks made reveals multi-varied threats and opportunities in the external and internal envi-ronment of the institution and their ability to have a significant effect on educational, organizational and financial activities of the schools.

scholarly journals How Will the Use of Technology in Translation and Testing Affect Language Learning?

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 22 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Michael Bourne
Keyword(s):  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
Human Element ◽  
Use Of Technology ◽  
The One ◽  
Impact Of Technology ◽  
Age Range ◽  
The Impact

Technology has an ever increasing impact on how we work and live. Article adressed the issue of the impact of technology in two key areas of language learning. On the one side learners increasingly used technology to translate. Given this trend, was there any real need to learn a language. On the other side, educational institutions increasingly used technology to rate language proficiency. Given this trend, would the work of the teacher become less and less important. The survey was conducted by using quantitative method. The respondents’ age range was 18-25. There were 53 respondents, 35% were male and 65% were female. The instrument was a questionaire having 9 questions describing the students’ reliance on computer in translation. It can be concluded that learners of English indicate that they accept and welcome the role of technology in language learning, but there is a doubt that the role and participation of humans in the learning process will be completely replaced. The human element remains an important ingredient. (EE)

Liaison entre la religion et les fonctions culturelles de la famille

1969 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 355-368 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Voyé
Keyword(s):  
Family Environment ◽  
Parallel Evolution ◽  
Family Education ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Family ◽  
The One ◽  
Sociological Explanation ◽  
Hereditary Character ◽  
Socializing Agents ◽  
The Impact

The relatively hereditary character of diverse cultural phenomena has already drawn attention to the role that the family can play in this trans mission. It appears in particular that political orientations and the chances of access to different types and levels of education can frequently be explained by a specific family membership. Two types of argument are put forward here in order to explain how the family can appear as a privileged place of cultural apprenticeship: on the one hand psychological arguments linked with the primary and universal character of family education and the type of relations that this develops; on the other hand a more sociological explanation based on the repercussion that the more or less great complexity of learned language entails with regard to diverse exterior participations, and on the comparison between the impact of the family and those of other socializing agents on the successive choices which they will impose. To these explanatory elements of the existing link between cultural memberships and the family environment is added, for religion as much as for the family, the transition from the public to the private sphere. This parallel evolution will tend to increase the autonomy of religion on the plane of secondary elaborations for which it will borrow its mode of re-interpretation from the exigencies of daily life, particularly from the family.

Edwards the Mentor

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rhys S. Bezzant
Keyword(s):  
Jonathan Edwards ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
Cultural Engagement ◽  
Mentoring Relationship ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Metropolitan Cities ◽  
The One

Among his many accolades, Jonathan Edwards was an effective mentor who trained many leaders for the church. Though his pastoral work is often overlooked, this book investigates the background, method, theological rationale, and legacy of his mentoring ministry. He does what mentors normally do—meeting with individuals to discuss ideas and grow in skills—but undertakes these activities in a distinctly modern or affective key. His correspondence is composed in an informal style, his understanding of friendship and conversation takes up the conventions of the great metropolitan cities of Europe of his day, his pedagogical commitments are surprisingly progressive, and his aspirations for those he mentors are bold and subversive. The practice of mentoring is presented in this book as the exchange between authority and agency, in which the more experienced person in the mentoring relationship empowers the one in the position of a learner, whose own character and competencies are nurtured. When Edwards explains his mentoring practice theologically, he expounds the theme of seeing God face to face, which recognizes that human beings learn through the example of friends as well as the exposition of propositions. The book is a case study in cultural engagement, for Edwards deliberately takes up certain features of the modern world in his mentoring and yet resists other pressures that the Enlightenment generated. If his world witnessed the philosophical evacuation of God from the created order, Edwards’s mentoring is designed to draw God back into an intimate connection with human experience.

Space in common: Socially engaged art in the Athens of crisis

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charis Kanellopoulou
Keyword(s):  
Public Space ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Homeless People ◽  
Private Life ◽  
Cultural Dynamics ◽  
The Public ◽  
Socially Engaged Art ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
The Times ◽  
The Impact

During the last years ‐ within a constantly deepening social, political and economic crisis ‐ Athens’s public space appears challenging, presenting a character of ongoing re-evaluation and change. It is due to the impact of the crisis, for example, that the city’s public space is being approached once more by many citizens who, during the years before the recession, had chosen to transfer main activities and functions of public life to the more protected sphere of privateness. One notices the return to open spaces by locals not only for leisure but also for social interaction. Most emphatically, however, appears the fact of a rising number of population in need, such as homeless people, immigrants or refugees, who host aspects of their private life in the public sphere: most of the times, they are not only users, but rather habitants of public space, in a transitional situation of social suspension, lacking a sense of belonging. Under the light of the city’s different realities, and of an expected social co-existence, the article aims to present the practice of artists who become active in Athens’s public spaces of social ambivalence in Athens, by realizing socially engaged art projects. By focusing on case studies such as Nomadic Architecture Network’s projects, the Victoria Square Project by Rick Lowe and Maria Papadimitriou, Common Platforms, a Blind Date by Adonis Volanakis, along with Rafika Chawishe, or the UrbanDig_Omonia by the UrbanDig Project in Omonia square, among others, the article highlights the artists’ interest in understanding the historical and cultural dynamics of each area and in working with different participants of the community in an effort to find common ground and to create bonds among individuals of unalike backgrounds. The article shows how such artistic practices become a channel of creative expression and fruitful dialogue in environments of precariousness and intolerance. Showing the importance of cooperation and understanding, socially engaged art projects function positively as collaborative ‘heterotopias’ in turbulent times for Athens.

The Impact of Differentiation and Differential on Hong Kong's Career Public Service

2003 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-233
Author(s):  
Brian Brewer
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Public Administration ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Civil Service ◽  
The Public ◽  
Documentary Sources ◽  
One Country Two Systems ◽  
The One ◽  
Career Employment ◽  
The Impact

The public administration principles characteristic of many Commonwealth countries served as the foundations for building the Hong Kong civil service. These have continued to operate in line with the `one country two systems' concept under which Hong Kong has been administered, since 1997, as a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China. Career employment, hierarchy and public service values combined to provide an overarching unity to a system that nevertheless has developed considerable differentiation over time. This article examines the developments that are currently modifying Hong Kong's public sector. The discussion draws on documentary sources and a recently completed qualitative study on the experiences and perspectives of senior Hong Kong managers working in a dozen government departments and agencies. The discussion addresses questions about whether greater differentiation across government departments, in combination with increasing differential within these organizations, will ultimately bring about the demise of the traditional civil service system.

scholarly journals MEDIATION IN ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEEDING: MYTH OR REALITY NOWADAYS

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Administrative Law ◽  
Public Authority ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Public Authorities ◽  
Acceptable Solution ◽  
The Public ◽  
Service Conception ◽  
Administrative Proceeding ◽  
State And Local ◽  
The One

In legal life of the modern world common ways of resolution to the legal disputes (conflicts) are not always efficient, since, as a rule, interests and needs of the one side and sometimes even of the both ones are left unsatisfied. Appeal to the public authorities because of each law conflict results in overloading of courts and administrative authorities. Implementation of other alternative ways of resolution of legal disputes, for example, such as mediation, can be an option to improvement of justice access and to reduction of court overloading. The article is devoted to reviewing the peculiarities of implementation of the method of mediation in administrative proceeding. It reports on attributes of administrative law conflict and also on peculiarities of conducting the procedure of mediation. Scholarly works of domestic scientists such as Sydelnikov O. D., Krasilovska Z. V., Lysko A., Mazaraki N. A. and others have been devoted to this problematique. Mediation - is a consensual and confidential procedure extrajudicial settlements of conflicts, in which a mediator helps the sides to understand their interests and search efficient ways of achieving mutually acceptable solution. The sphere of administrative disputes is the most difficult for implementation of mediation procedure. It is specified by typical peculiarities for such disputes and also by legal nature of subjects of administrative legal relationship. Exactly because of this, some scientists refer to partial nonmediability of such disputes, as one of the side in this case is always an organ of public authority. Approaching a compromise between public authority and a citizen is a prioritized direction of state and local authority activity. The procedure of mediation can be applied only in certain administrative disputes. In this case it is possible to single out advantages of implementation of the mediation procedure in dealing with administrative law conflict, they are effectiveness, saving funds and time, speed, confidentiality, unloading administrative courts, embodiment the principle of service conception of the state, the principle of the rule of law and proper management.

scholarly journals The doctrines of original sin and the virgin birth: divine revelation or human construct?

2009 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
I. J. J. Spangenberg
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
World View ◽  
Original Sin ◽  
First Century ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Divine Revelation ◽  
Grand Narrative ◽  
Virgin Birth ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
The One

Two South African theologians, Ben du Toit and Anton van Niekerk, recently published books in which they argued that postmodern believers can no longer subscribe to the doctrines of original sin and the virgin birth. According to them both these doctrines reflect a pre-modern world-view which should be regarded as outdated. However, they would not like to take leave of the grand narrative of Christianity. There are some fundamental flaws in the reasoning of both scholars. The doctrine of the virgin birth is intertwined with the doctrine of original sin, and both are important to the orthodox doctrine of salvation. As it is not viable or consistent to tamper with some of the orthodox doctrines and try to keep the rest intact, we are left with two options, either to discard the whole system and start afresh, or to try and keep the whole package intact. However, biblical research since the Enlightenment has ruled out the second option. The paper argues in support of this case and attempts to offer a different way forward for Christians living in the twenty-first century than the one offered by Du Toit and Van Niekerk.

scholarly journals The Paris Agreement 5 Years Later: The Challenges of Climate Finance and Multilateral Development Banks

2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (5) ◽  
pp. 23-40
Author(s):  
Oscar Rosario Gugliotta
Keyword(s):  
Local Governments ◽  
Paris Agreement ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Climate Finance ◽  
Multilateral Development Banks ◽  
The Sustainable Development ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
Development Banks ◽  
The One ◽  
The Impact

Abstract In all matters regarding climate change, the modern world presents complex challenges which highlight how investments in infrastructure have as of yet been inconclusive. The emission percentages calculated by relevant studies demonstrate the need for long-term investments in infrastructures, to ultimately reduce the impact on the environment and our health. To this end, in alignment with the principles expressed in the Paris Agreement – reducing global warming and incentivising a zero-emission transportation system – and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), these new infrastructures will require a structural change that can be guaranteed by multilateral development banks (MDBs), given their nature, especially within developing countries. MDBs play an important role in supporting local governments, on the one hand creating a prosperous environment for sustainable infrastructures and, on the other, providing innovative financial instruments that could increase the financial sector’s participation. In this paper, aft er a brief excursus on the Paris Agreement’s role in the global climatic crisis, there will be an evaluation of the relations between MDBs and climate finance, with a focus on green bonds.

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