Memes in Romania: A New Form of Political Participation

Political communication has been shaped by the technological and social changes our society has faced and social media has become the main platform of communication, allowing people to share their thoughts, images and therefore political ideas. With the political digitalization, the political meets the social through platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. From creating targeted posts for the online thought sharing, politicians are more relevant than ever, thanks to social media platforms. The process of creating a political image has now adapted to the specifici- ties of social media platforms. One of most popular structures of promotion to the masses: the memetic culture. Creating and sharing political content has been given a new meaning nowadays. If at first, memes have been perceived as an expression of humoristic content, they can now be seen as a new way of expressing political behavior—by creating and sharing a certain type of political memes, individuals can associate and support their beliefs towards certain political trends and candidates. The present study aims at proving that the act of meme-sharing on social media platforms can be perceived as a modern form of involvement within the political community. The results have shown that memes can indeed be an instru- ment of political participation and delegitimization.

The Historical Perspective of Russian Turn to the East: How Russia Became an Eastern Power in XXI Century

Russia’s so-called “turn to the East” policy has become one of the widely discussed issues among other issues in contemporary international relations. The new strategic relations with China and the beginning of a new era in Sino-Russian bilateral relations are the most representative results of the “turn to the East”. The history behind these relations is a factor with tend to be ignored by those discussing the matter. However, the historical view of Sino-Russian relations can provide us with new horizons in their interpretation. This article analyses the “turns to the East” from a historical point of view and theorizes new approaches towards their conceptualization. From the historical point of view, Russia’s “turns to the East” can potentially help the two countries overcome very profound obstacles in bilateral relations, such as the problem of Russia’s image in China after the border disputes with the Qing Empire. Undoubtedly, the “turns to the East” policy’s implications in the economic development of Russian Far East is one of the central topics. As well, the historical analysis of this policy can enrich nowadays discussion about Russian identity and Russia’s position in the East-West paradigm. Also, this article draws attention to the commercial aspect of Sino-Russian relations, which nowadays still represent an important criterion in judging the “turn to the East” policy’s effectiveness. By including examples of other countries’ relations with China, we tried to underline how history has become an instru- ment for developing relations with modern China and how this opportunity is applicable in the Sino-Russian context too.

Strengthening Motivation in the Mathematical Engineering Teaching Processes – A Proposal from Gamification and Game-Based Learning

Gamification and game-based learning (GBL) has been widely implemented in educational processes, mainly in elementary education; it has been applied less frequently in university education. The objective was to test the effect of game-mediated teaching strategies on mathematics teaching in first-year engineering students. A quantitative study was done within the framework of a design-based research. Eighty-one (81) students participated in the research, all from the Dif-ferential Calculus course. Twelve (12) didactic units were designed. The instru-ment used was the Synthesized Instructional Materials Motivation Survey (SIMMS), adapted to record the categories of Attention, Relevance, Confidence and Satisfaction (Keller's motivational model). A significant contribution of the pedagogical strategy and the different categories of motivation was verified, whereas the significance between collaboration and motivation was also evident (intervention 2). Finally, the strategy can provide preliminary evidences in reduc-ing dropout. In conclusion, game-based learning can be used to strengthen educa-tional processes in engineering.

Representation of the Handicraft Vocabulary of the Sura Volga Region in a Thematic Dictionary: Prerequisites for Creation, Composition and Structure

In the article, the author discusses the ways of grouping and representing the handi-craft vocabulary items of the Sura Volga region dialects in a thematic dictionary orga-nized by the onomasiological principle. First of all, the author localizes the dialects in question and gives a brief description of their emergence paralleled with the history of the territory where they are present nowadays, that is of modern Penza and Ulya-novsk Oblasts, which were colonized by Russian-speaking settlers only a couple of centuries ago. The author concludes that these secondary idioms belong mostly to the Middle Russian group of dialects and share a lot of common features, which allows regarding them as a certain continuum liable to description as a whole. The author justi-fies the necessity of a dictionary containing the dialectal handicraft vocabulary of the Sura Volga region and claims that an accurate depiction of a certain thematic group of dialectal lexical items, such as handicraft terms, demands specific principles of organi-sation. These principles widely contradict the traditional alphabetic arrangement: for example, a coherent description of a bunch of words denoting related items (e.g. craftsman, his working place and result of work), or drawing of areal maps typically used in linguistic geography. Having analyzed the terms related to felting, carpentry and weaving, the author develops a special method of representing the relevant material both via lin-guistic data, such as phonetic variants, syntactic distribution and morphological peculiari-ties of each item, and encyclopaedic information on how each handicraft action or instru-ment contributes to the result and what this final result is for each type of the handicrafts under consideration. Thus, the author has chosen to divide the words related to each handicraft into seven subgroups such as ‘actor’, ‘instrument’, ‘result’, and so on, which shows the whole picture of what handicraft activities are like and why they need the terms they actually have. If one wants to look for a certain word, not a notion, an alphabetic index at the end of the book can be addressed, where each word is provided with the information on how it can be found in the main text of the dictionary. Finally, the author describes the principles of illustrative material selection. In general, the author hopes her project can prove useful for the description of Russian dialectal handicraft vocabulary

Revolusi Islam, Gerakan Islam dan Negara Islam: Studi Atas Pemikiran Politik Kalim Siddiqui

According to Siddiqui, Islamic movement is a tradional instru- ment for change. Islamic movement is not a political movement with a manifesto written by a committee. It also not an ideology conceptualized by philosophers, historians, activists, and thinkers from various faculties. The Islamic movement is purely the manifestation of God. So it will get His direct keep and maintenance. Starting from the movement led by the Prophet (PBUH), the corrective agents spread widely in Islamic history, like a labirint planted in political culture of Muslims.

Conventionality Standards for Children in Conflict Zones: Colombian Case study

The main objective of this paper is to identify the multilevel perspective of hu-man rights protection for children in armed conflicts. For that, the pro persona or pro homine principle may be applied. It consists of an interpretative instru-ment provided by art. 29 of the American Convention of Human Rights and by art. 41 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The present analysis tackles distinct levels of protection, both at an international level and at the national level in Colombia and uses the pro homine principle to resolve eventual conflicts between the International Human Rights Law and domestic law.

J. Baudrillard’s Analytical Instrument Application Praxeology: Memory Policy Aspects Judgment

Since humanity faces an era of new global threats, information challenges and cognitive construction and reconstruction, therefore knowledge of the phenomenon of memory in activity is aimed at educating the person in specific current historical circumstances, as a skilfull individual and creator. The purpose of the following scientific exploration is to represent a praxeological judgement of memory policy determinants and by means of application of the specific analytical tool, named «the Baudrillard’s analytical instru-ment». With the help of this philosophical instrument we regard current issues and trends of subject’s activity development, as well as its meanings and concepts within the most significant philosophical concepts and ideas. Thus, the determinants analysis of memory policy in socio-humanitarian knowledge in our scientific research involves a philosophical overview of the Baudrillard’s analytical instrument results, fur tremor, regarding the so-cial sciences and humanities results, as well as their interdisciplinary nature in under-standing the essential aspects of the memory.

Adaptive Education based on Learning Styles: Are Learning Style Instruments Precise Enough?

Investigating the efficiency of learning style instruments is significant because it is a widespread technique and it enriches the understanding of the challenges of integrating such instruments into adaptive education systems. The results showed that current learning style instruments depend only on the textual form of infor-mation to present items; this might be leading to a bias in the measurement of learning styles as the textual forms of information are more suitable for verbal students than for others. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the precision of learning style instruments and the challenges of integrating them into adaptive education systems. This research followed a quantitative research approach. First, a new learning style instrument was developed using different forms of infor-mation (Figures, Charts, and Equations). Then, the preferred learning style of fif-ty students was measured twice, initially, by using the newly developed instru-ment and subsequently by using a VARK instrument, the results of both were compared.

Organizational communication and innovation in micro and small companies: a study on the application of the “Innovation Radar”

This paper is a study on corporate communication and the ability to innovate in small businesses. The guiding question seeks to respond whether organizational communication is able to make progress and / or support innovation in micro and small companies, and the main objective is to analyze the relationship between innovation and organizational communication. It was applied the case study method and document research for interpreting a diagnosis instru- ment called “Innovation Radar” in a small business company located in the countryside of São Paulo state. The diagnosis is made based on assessment dimensions aimed at checking the maturity and the degree of innovation in micro and small companies. By evaluating these di- mensions it was possible to build analytical frameworks and highlight the influence of corporate communication in promoting innovation. The results indicate that every dimension of the “In- novation Radar” can improve their performance by means of corporate communication.

THE USE OF VISUALIZATION IN NATURAL SCIENCE EDUCATION PROCESS: THE METHODOLOGY FOR MEASURING INSTRUMENT

Researches in visualization area are very popular in education studies. There were found out that visualization is useful in education as stimulating tool for perception, atten-tion, memory and imagination processes. To explore this in reality, we need to have valid in-strument which could prove statistically valid data about visualization use in education. The author of this article did not find the questionnaire which could involve mentioned things. According to this, there were made several pilot researches and statistical counts that proved the quality of constructed instrument. The aim of this article is to prepare and to test instru-ment (the questionnaire) for 9-10 grade students’ opinion about visualization use fostering cognitive, learning processes and motivation in scientific, geography and mathematics les-sons. Results. To reach the aim there were done pilot and diagnostic researches. There were participated 209 students in pilot research and 2708 students in diagnostic research. Results of pilot research enclosed categories and subcategories, which were compared to categories that were found in analysis of literature. Also, there was found out students’ meta-language, words, that enclose scientific definitions or analogues. According to results, questions were transformed in language that was common to research population aiming to get answers that are representing reality in education environment. The instrument was prepared to measure object in science education, also, it was adapted to measure object in mathematics and geog-raphy. There was tested content validity asking experts to evaluate whether each questions belongs to appropriate category. The results of evaluation were high and this leads to conclu-sion that instrument is valid in content aspects. Also, there was tested internal validity of in-strument. Each scale of questionnaire has high Cronbach alfa coefficient and the whole instrument is also evaluated highly. The instrument is valid and it measures 9-10 grade stu-dents’ opinion about visualization use fostering cognitive, learning processes and motivation in scientific, geography and mathematics lessons. Key words: visualization, use, scientific disciplines, questionnaire.