"Gokum showed me how": Four Cree children's perspectives on language and culture maintenance

<p>Eighty percent of Indigenous children in Canada attend provincial schools off-reserve where there is no legal requirement for inclusion of Indigenous language or content in the curriculum. This has implications for the twin challenges currently faced by Indigenous communities in Canada of maintaining traditional cultures and languages while also overcoming a large gap in educational achievement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous children. While the challenges are well understood, there has been little research into these issues from the perspective of the primary stakeholders in education: children. This qualitative study explores the perspectives of four Cree children, their family members, and some teachers through a critical, social constructivist lens in the context of a James Bay Cree community in northern Quebec, Canada. This study asks, “How do Cree children who live on a reserve and attend non-Indigenous schools, and their families, make space for the expression and maintenance of their language and culture in daily life?” The data analysed include a ‘photovoice’ project conducted with the four students, and focus group discussions held with the children, their families, and teachers. The findings demonstrate that families maintain Cree traditions through land-based activities like hunting, supported by intergenerational teaching within the family. Although participants expressed cautious optimism for language maintenance, students and parents perceived that Cree knowledge has no place outside of Cree communities. Teachers felt constrained by their lack of confidence, resources or government mandate for including Cree content. Overall, between Indigenous communities’ twin challenges of culture maintenance and school achievement, achievement appears to be valued more highly by some parents and teachers. These findings have implications for how we understand the ongoing effects of colonization, globalization, and the hegemony of dominant languages and cultures in Indigenous education.</p>

"Gokum showed me how": Four Cree children's perspectives on language and culture maintenance

<p>Eighty percent of Indigenous children in Canada attend provincial schools off-reserve where there is no legal requirement for inclusion of Indigenous language or content in the curriculum. This has implications for the twin challenges currently faced by Indigenous communities in Canada of maintaining traditional cultures and languages while also overcoming a large gap in educational achievement between Indigenous and non-Indigenous children. While the challenges are well understood, there has been little research into these issues from the perspective of the primary stakeholders in education: children. This qualitative study explores the perspectives of four Cree children, their family members, and some teachers through a critical, social constructivist lens in the context of a James Bay Cree community in northern Quebec, Canada. This study asks, “How do Cree children who live on a reserve and attend non-Indigenous schools, and their families, make space for the expression and maintenance of their language and culture in daily life?” The data analysed include a ‘photovoice’ project conducted with the four students, and focus group discussions held with the children, their families, and teachers. The findings demonstrate that families maintain Cree traditions through land-based activities like hunting, supported by intergenerational teaching within the family. Although participants expressed cautious optimism for language maintenance, students and parents perceived that Cree knowledge has no place outside of Cree communities. Teachers felt constrained by their lack of confidence, resources or government mandate for including Cree content. Overall, between Indigenous communities’ twin challenges of culture maintenance and school achievement, achievement appears to be valued more highly by some parents and teachers. These findings have implications for how we understand the ongoing effects of colonization, globalization, and the hegemony of dominant languages and cultures in Indigenous education.</p>

International Student Engagement for Sustainability of Leisure Participation: An Integrated Approach of Means-End Chain and Acculturation

This study examined international students’ engagement in leisure activities using data derived from an integrated method and analyzed through acculturation and means-end chain approaches. A cluster analysis was conducted to identify acculturation types. An initial qualitative survey with 30 respondents produced the questionnaire items, and a quantitative survey to construct value maps was conducted targeting 415 respondents. The cluster analysis identified bicultural acceptance, heritage culture maintenance, and bicultural marginalization as distinct types that distinguish the acculturation level among international students. The results from three acculturation types indicate that the significant items and strong linkages between attribute-consequence and consequence-value at each level reflect the international students’ inner thoughts and ultimate value. Such strong associations provide value maps, which differ according to the acculturation types. Such findings present that availability of leisure services is necessary to better cater to the special interests of international students at different stages of acculturation. Given that international student mobility has increased substantially, relevant leisure professionals and organizations should understand that international students’ sustainable leisure engagement can only be achieved if attention is paid to cultural contexts.

Perception of English Learning Based on Local Wisdom for Junior High School Students in Desa Kolam Deli Serdang District North Sumatera Indonesia

Integrating local wisdom in the context of English learning is very important regarding to the culture maintenance. Learning English as a foreign language has two kinds of motivation namely instrumental and integrative. This study applied qualitative design by administrating the questionnaires to two teachers and 20 students. The results showed that the teachers had not integrated the local wisdom optimally and tended to apply the systemic knowledge in English teaching rather than the schematic knowledge. However, both of them showed their positive responses in relation to integrate the local wisdom in the teaching materials. Furthermore, most students showed their positive responses regarding to integrate local wisdom into English materials in order to maintain and protect their local wisdom and tradition.

Immunoinformatics Design of Multi-Epitope Peptide-Based Vaccine Against Schistosoma mansoni Using Transmembrane Proteins as a Target

Schistosomiasis remains a serious health issue nowadays for an estimated one billion people in 79 countries around the world. Great efforts have been made to identify good vaccine candidates during the last decades, but only three molecules reached clinical trials so far. The reverse vaccinology approach has become an attractive option for vaccine design, especially regarding parasites like Schistosoma spp. that present limitations for culture maintenance. This strategy also has prompted the construction of multi-epitope based vaccines, with great immunological foreseen properties as well as being less prone to contamination, autoimmunity, and allergenic responses. Therefore, in this study we applied a robust immunoinformatics approach, targeting S. mansoni transmembrane proteins, in order to construct a chimeric antigen. Initially, the search for all hypothetical transmembrane proteins in GeneDB provided a total of 584 sequences. Using the PSORT II and CCTOP servers we reduced this to 37 plasma membrane proteins, from which extracellular domains were used for epitope prediction. Nineteen common MHC-I and MHC-II binding epitopes, from eight proteins, comprised the final multi-epitope construct, along with suitable adjuvants. The final chimeric multi-epitope vaccine was predicted as prone to induce B-cell and IFN-γ based immunity, as well as presented itself as stable and non-allergenic molecule. Finally, molecular docking and molecular dynamics foresee stable interactions between the putative antigen and the immune receptor TLR 4. Our results indicate that the multi-epitope vaccine might stimulate humoral and cellular immune responses and could be a potential vaccine candidate against schistosomiasis.

Preserving Javanese Language by Translating Traditional Song used in Dieng’s Dreadlock Hair Cutting Tradition to Support Banjarnegara Local Tourism

Language is served as evidence of human being civilization. Through language, culture is shared. When a language goes extinct after its speakers are gone, a culture is also threatened. To preserve a language and the culture embedded in it, language maintenance is needed. One of the ways to do it is by translating the language for foreign visitors in a tourism event. This research shows how the Javanese language is translated in a song containing prayer in a religious-traditional tourism event called Ngruwat, in Dieng, Banjarnegara, Central Java. The data were collected and analyzed using translation theory and methodology. The result shows that translating the old Javanese language means learning the language and exposing it to people who serve as language and culture maintenance.

Javanese Culture Maintenance by Utilizing Natural Resources for Traditional Cuisine to Promote Tegal City Culinary Tourism

Utilizing local natural resources in traditional cuisines is done to maintain local tradition and culture reflecting local wisdom. This research shows how Tegal City use local vegetable and meat in traditional cuisine to keep the livestock and crops stock, to preserve the tradition and culture embedded in the cuisine, and to promote the culinary tourism. It was done by holding a folklore field research to collect and analyze the data. The result shows that those efforts are beneficial for the local people to preserve their natural resources, tradition, and business that maintain their local identity as part of their local culture.