scholarly journals Kindergartens in Northern Norway as semiotic landscapes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anja Maria Pesch ◽  
Maria Dardanou ◽  
Hilde Sollid

Abstract Educational institutions have a responsibility to ensure that all children receive care and equal possibilities for development, independent of their linguistic and cultural background. However, there is little knowledge about how kindergartens ensure a welcoming and inspiring place for both transnational migrants, Indigenous children, and children from the majority population. Through a semiotic landscape analysis from two kindergartens in Northern Norway, this article contributes to this knowledge gap. Our starting point is that educational spaces are social, cultural, and political places. Applying a Bakhtinian perspective on semiotic landscapes as dialogues, the analysis focuses on two discourses. The first concerns diversity as an individual or shared value, and the second concerns balancing the ordinary and the exotic. We find that diversity related to transnational migration seems to be more integrated into the semiotic landscape, while the minoritised Indigenous Sámi people is stereotypically represented in kindergartens.

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 52
Author(s):  
Sylvia Schmelkes

The National Institute for the Evaluation of Education (INEE) in Mexico has begun to meet the challenges in evaluating indigenous children and teachers and the educational programs and policies targeted to them. Several evaluation projects are described in this paper. One is the “Previous, Free and Informed Consultation of Indigenous People,” which focuses on quality of education they receive. A second is the design of a protocol for reducing cultural and linguistic bias in standardized tests, which requires oversampling of indigenous students and the involvement of anthropologists, linguists and indigenous teachers in item development. A third is an indigenous language evaluation for candidates for entry into the teaching profession, which they must pass before they can work in indigenous schools. A fourth is the development of a qualitative instrument for evaluating teacher performance. The instrument asks evaluated teachers to contextualize their planning; scorers decide whether the plan is adapted to the cultural context and the characteristics of the children. The projects described are only a starting point. In the near future, several dilemmas, such as the apparent trade-off between contextualization and quality, have to be faced and solved.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-122
Author(s):  
Dhruba Prasad Niure

This study was carried out to explore the converging and diverging points of indigenous education and formal education systems of Nepal. The entire research process of the study was guided by the interpretive-constructivist paradigm followed by a case study design. Tharu teachers and students were chosen as a sample by using a purposive sampling method and then in-depth interviews, focus group discussion, and document analysis was used as the main methods of garnering intensive information regarding the similarities and differences of indigenous education and formal education systems primarily in reference to Tharu community. Study results reveal that both formal and indigenous education systems have their own educational goals, curriculum, teachers, and both of them impart particular knowledge and skills to the learners by using certain instructional techniques. Nevertheless, both education systems are not identical to each other in terms of learning environment, skills-focused, nature of learning, type of teachers, the medium of instruction, and assessment devices. As a result, Tharu children show poor academic performance within the formal education system as compared to non-indigenous children. Coherence between formal curricular contents and indigenous knowledge should be made to provide relevant and effective educational services to indigenous children within formal educational institutions for the purpose of improving their living standards in the future through quality education.


2018 ◽  
Vol 45 (6) ◽  
pp. 799-814
Author(s):  
Zuzana Uhde

The article focuses on structural causes of migration, putting forward an argument that such analysis sheds light on key shortcomings of today’s global geopolitical regime. First the author analyzes structural causes of transnational migration in global capitalism. She argues that transnational migrants represent a structural group of people who find themselves in a similar position in relation to social structures of current global economic architecture even though they do not necessarily have a collective identity. Second, the author discusses the methodological and practical limits of the current nation-state defined framework of responsibility for global justice which does not respond to structural causes of transnational migration and reproduces the internal contradictions of the international human rights regime. Following this critical analysis, the author focuses on the possibilities of extraterritorial obligations for justice, which are partly embedded in the current international law. Then she outlines an argument for a differentiated responsibility for global justice.


2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-35
Author(s):  
Jakub Chrenowicz

Niniejszy artykuł ma na celu usystematyzowanie wiedzy na temat poznańskiego okresu działalności Waleriana Bierdiajewa. Punktem wyjścia dla rozważań o słynnym dyrygencie są materiały archiwalne zgromadzone w Archiwum Teatru Wielkiego im. S. Moniuszki w Poznaniu oraz w Archiwum Akademii Muzycznej im. I. J. Paderewskiego w Poznaniu. Na podstawie analizy archiwaliów omówione zostały osiągnięcia Waleriana Bierdiajewa w dwóch nurtach jego aktywności: dyrygenckiej i pedagogicznej. Autor artykułu zaprezentował fakty dotyczące premier operowych i baletowych, poprowadzonych przez Waleriana Bierdiajewa w poznańskiej Operze, a także przeanalizował osiągnięcia pedagogiczne Waleriana Bierdiajewa w Akademii Muzycznej w Poznaniu oraz w innych uczelniach, w których słynny dyrygent pracował. Działalność Waleriana Bierdiajewa wiąże się z artystami, z którymi współtworzył on swoje spektakle. Studenci, spośród których kilku zostało słynnymi dyrygentami (symfonicznymi i chóralnymi) to postaci, przez pryzmat których można mówić o Bierdiajewie jako o pedagogu. Źródła związane z Walerianem Bierdiajewem stały się dla autora artykułu pretekstem do wspomnienia związanych z nim artystów – niektórych określanych dziś jako legendarnych, innych – mniej znanych czy wręcz zapomnianych. The article aims to systematize the information on Walerian Bierdiajew’s activity during his residency in Poznań. The starting point for reflections on the famous conductor are archive materials collected by the Archives of the S. Moniuszko Grand Theatre in Poznań and the Archives of the I. J. Paderewski Academy of Music in Poznań. Based on the analysis of the aforementioned materials, the two kinds of Walerian Bierdiajew’s achievements – conducting and teaching – have been discussed. The author of the article presents facts regarding opera and ballet premieres, conducted by Walerian Bierdiajew in the Poznań Opera House, as well as analyzes his didactic achievements at the Academy of Music in Poznań and other educational institutions he worked for. Walerian Bierdiajew’s activity is interconnected with other artists, with whom he co-created his performances. His students, some of whom became famous conductors (symphonic and choral ones), are personages who cast light on Walerian Bierdiajew as a pedagogue. Bierdiajew­‍‑related sources have become a pretext for the author to recall the artists associated with the conductor – some of them are now described as legendary, while others are less known or even forgotten.


Phronimon ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 20 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Barnard

This article seeks to explain and interrogate the sexual theories of homophobes observable on the African continent. I begin by exploring a possible explanation for the emergence and maintenance of certain homophobic sexual theories; Donald Moss’s arguments regarding the identification or disidentification economy will serve as a possible theoretical starting point. I then investigate three possible sexual theories of homophobes when mentally preoccupied with “the gay man.” Finally, I return to economies of identification as both a colonial perpetuation (in the form of adopting homophobic sexual theories) and as decolonial opportunity (in the form of conflictual identifications). I argue that homophobia and the constituent sexual theories could ideally be dissolved (among other settings) in educational spaces. In these educational spaces, I argue, the homophobe could be identifying with the “non-homophobic” pedagogue, which could bring about the dissolution of homophobia if the identification with the educator is strong enough.


2015 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-54
Author(s):  
Alexandra Deliu

AbstractTransnational migration is a vast social phenomenon that has become a valid option for many Romanians since 1989. Romania is an emigration country and the favourite destinations of its citizens are Italy and Spain. This is the context in which I present my work, which focuses on the formation of transnational migration patterns from a village in the southern region of Romania. The data were generated during field research conducted in August 2012, and the empirical material consisted of field notes and interview transcripts corresponding to recorded conversations with local migrants, authority representatives and people without migration experience. In this particular community, two patterns of migration were identified, for which variables such as ethnicity (Roma/Romanian) and religious orientation (Orthodoxy/Adventism) appear to have explanatory power. My inquiry takes as its starting point the identification of this variety of migration patterns and concentrates on analysing them in the regional and national contexts based on the scholarly framework provided by network theory. Two major differences exist between them: the time frame of living and working abroad (clearly demarcated as three months, six months or indefinite) and the nature of the work environment (departures based on a work contract between the migrant and a company located at the destination and departures accompanied by uncertainty regarding workplace concerns upon arrival). Making sense of these life strategies and their local configurations are the objectives of this paper.


Author(s):  
Trine Schreiber

Using actor network theory (ANT) as a starting point, the aim of the paper is to describe relationships between heterogenous actors in a particular kind of library work and to discuss how these relationships might potentially be part of a preliminary actor-network representing a profession of librarianship. The particular kind of library work involved in the discussion is user teaching and -guidance in libraries affiliated with educational institutions. The paper draws on this particular kind of work to illustrate the use of ANT in a discussion about the profession of librarianship. The data collection procedure has been guided by ethnographic methodology considerations. As an actor-network, a profession is not a static entity organised around fixed connections. It is undergoing shifts in character as new actors or relations are forged and old ones wear out. Regarding the particular kind of library work, the paper has a focus on actors such as librarians, teachers, students, digital technologies, and political paradigms of control. The author examines how librarians in the particular kind of library work create and maintain relationships with teachers and students. The paper provides a description of the ways influential actors such as digital technologies and political paradigms of control intervene in these processes. The paper concludes that through these relationships, new areas of work and new understandings of professions are under way to be established. These processes might lead to an actor-network intertwined with those many other actor-networks that librarians in general are involved in because of other practices and relationships.


2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Angelo Martins Jr. ◽  
Caroline Knowles

This article offers reflections on the process of researchingtransnational migration, and particularly the fieldworkchallenges and difficulties that can emerge when studyingco-nationals abroad. Based on two distinct research projectson transnational migration (one on Brazilians in Londonand the other on Britons in Beijing), which used similarmethodological tools and faced similar challenges, we arguethatcombining a mobile ethnographic methodologicaltool (documenting journeys) with in-depth biographicalinterviews and historical and contextual analyses, makes ourdata open to analyse migration as a translocal process at thesame time that provides a connection between both macroand micro scales of analysis. Our methodological tools allowedus to understand how people speak of, engage with andnegotiate mobile experiences in their everyday lives, in themacro political and social structures organising immigrationand emigration.We conclude by reflecting on the challengesof researching co-nationals abroad,our own positionalityin relation to our fieldwork and the multi-layered powerrelations involved in our respective research process.


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