Dialogical Relationship Research Articles

Secondary students’ perceptions of their school’s disciplinary processes

The term school discipline includes student self-management, classroom management, behaviour management, and school exclusion practices. This article is based on the perspectives of rangatahi on disciplinary practices from two different high schools. Ten Years 9–11 students from one school who had experienced exclusion, and 10 fully engaged Year 13 students in another school reflected on their strategic navigation of the culture of classroom and school discipline. Students were aware of how to exercise agency within their school’s disciplinary regime and called for more democratic and equitable processes and dialogical relationships with their teachers.

Genre experiments of bloggers in the Internet environment and socio-cultural support of the user

The article discusses the genre models of statements presented in the Internet environment as educational medium content on media platforms, video hosting, personal accounts of journalists-bloggers, analyzes the ways and means of accompanying the user in such an educational Internet discourse. The authors give a detailed comment on the current paradigm of genres of Internet communication, consider the genre-defining features that allow us to talk about typologies of genres of Internet resources and network blogs. In more detail, the authors dwell on the results of a discussion study on the description of Internet genres with an increased status of the subjective, personal principle. Particular attention in the description of personal genre experiences is paid to the methods of self-presentation and the choice of tools for virtual interaction with subscribers, the analysis of the means and techniques for organizing dialogue relations in Internet discourse in the genre form of an informative conversation, storytelling, ironic description or discussion discussion. Genre experiments are considered sequentially on the example of network book blogging and on the channel «Artifex Ru», a series of audio podcasts on the media platform «Arzamas» (Arzamas.academy) and TV program «Seminar» on the Russian channel «Culture». Each of the selected and presented materials offers relevant educational content and successfully promotes in the space of virtual discourse new and in demand by the target audience intellectual products in the field of cinema, theater or book production. The authors analyze the features of relations in Internet discourse and prove that such genre experiments serve the humanitarian tasks of cognitive socio-cultural and educational dialogue.

Emotional Intelligence, Soft Power and the Value of Dialogical Relationships in Intra/Interpersonal Communication

Emotional Intelligence, Soft Power and the Value of Dialogical Relationships in Intra/Interpersonal Communication

Debat i paròdia als versos de les trobairitz: Castelloza (BEdT 109,2) vs Bernart de Ventadorn (BEdT 70, 19)

This article documents and interprets the intertextual relationship between Castelloza's BEdT 109, 2 and Bernart de Ventadorn's BEdT 70, 19. After a brief introduction to Castelloza's poetry and its critical reception, we will analyse the clues that allow us to postulate, on the part of the trobairitz, an allusive intention to the song BEdT 70, 19 by Bernart de Ventadorn. The reading of Castelloza's song in the light of this dialogical relationship, as well as the insertion of the trobairitz's lyrical voice in the troubadour corpus considered as a whole, must allow us to question the traditional vision of Castelloza as a "melancholic" poetess, aware of her inferiority in relation to the esteemed being, revealing the parodic dimension of her poetry.

The Migrant Shakespeare project: The actor as ‘other’

In March 2021, during a time of loss and longing, the theatre company, Seyyar Kumpanya, under the artistic directorship of Naz Yeni, created a digital project called ‘Migrant Shakespeare’. Seyyar Kumpanya is a collective of Turkish-speaking actors who now, for various reasons, all live and work in and around London. Their project evolved into a sequential performance of ten monologues taken from different Shakespeare plays, each spoken by ten different actors who have English as a second, sometimes third, language. The directorial decision was made to transpose Shakespeare’s characters to the day-to-day contexts that socially and politically transform and define the migrant experience: Caliban becomes a hotel cleaner, King Lear a construction worker, Hamlet a meat packer and Katerina Minola a barmaid, simultaneously subservient while also ironically sarcastic and physically strong. Thus, at one level, all the actors were performing their own migrant identity. In this article my primary aim is to analyse the digital text of the ‘Migrant Shakespeare’ project. Methodologically, I describe the ten performances and record my personal attempt to make meaning within the dialogic relationship between myself as spectator, the author and the migrant actors. Shakespeare often imagined that it is only in faraway places and in displaced realities that we discover other possibilities that exist within ourselves. His plays feature (among many instances) a penniless and homeless old man, King Lear, thrust out into the wilderness, Prospero, the displaced Duke of Milan, who is exiled to an unpopulated isolated island and Prince Hamlet, a privileged young man who is transposed to an unrecognizable world of grief and loss. The migrant is similarly decentred on a daily basis, repeatedly required to redress the balance between old and new identities while being simultaneously present in both. This article attempts to understand how the experience of contemporary migration may be explored through the similar destabilization inherent in Shakespeare’s dramaturgy. Furthermore, I argue that the craft of acting mirrors the experience of the migrant. At one level, all actors are ‘foreign’, as their profession requires them to migrate from their individual identity to that of the character they are playing. A working actor is thus always concurrently present within two selves. Consequently, they are polysemic, that is, in performance actors signify the characters they portray, while simultaneously remaining different, functioning human beings. Generally audiences may, or may not, be directed to a meta-theatrical awareness of the actor’s two identities and herein can lie much of the enjoyment and/or meaning of performance. This article concludes that, where ‘Migrant Shakespeare’ is concerned, the spectator is directorially guided to incorporate a personal recognition of the migrant identity or ‘other’ within a reading of the performance text. Audiences are confronted by a strong awareness of the polysemic body of the migrant actor embodying Shakespeare’s often decentred and destabilized characters. I suggest that this process of complex signification destabilizes the text in performance creating new readings and, consequently, suggests a new decentred understanding of the concept of contemporary ‘Britishness’.

Coexistence: Citizenship and Democracy in Dialogue

AbstractThis article will explore the constituting elements of Christian–Muslim coexistence and their impact on the ongoing discourse on obstacles facing citizenship and democracy in multireligious societies. Coexistence is a living concept that acquires its constituents from the challenges and opportunities of the dialogue of life. It opens new paths for the ongoing discourse about equality and democracy in states with diverse religious groups. It offers an opportunity to go beyond the duality of self and other or minorities and majorities and fosters a dialogical relationship that transcends the concept of vested interests to the common welfare. Moving from equality to partnership brings the added value of religious and confessional differences in the service of shaping a very genuine and renewed social contract based on the principles of equality, participation, and dignity. This article focuses on Lebanon since it has been always perceived as a natural laboratory for interfaith encounters because of the particular multi‐confessional nature of the country.

Question(Ing) Strategies in British Political News Interviews: Grilling The Interlocutors as a Strategic Weapon

Every dialogue is constrained by a rigid framework, which manifests itself in its linear character (an initial-continuation-counter move structure or a question-answer relationship and dismissal-argumentation order of dialogue), and which illustrates the functional dependencies between sentences or sequences of sentences. The following study focuses on the discourse-pragmatic notion of the interviewer’s text-forming strategies, and, in particular, the question-answer relationship of political news interviews in Great Britain. Attention is focused on the questioning strategies employed by Andrew Marr in The Andrew Marr Show. Various types of questions within epistemic logic, which act as the strategic repertoire of the participants in dialogue games (Carlson 1983), are examined. The list of question types includes indirect and direct questions, where the former refer to sentential (yes-no), search (wh-questions), conditional, alternative, tag, ellipted, disjunctive or conjunctive questions (as instances of multiple questions), and the latter to questions presupposing the accomplishment of the specific epistemic state. Andrew Marr, as a dominant participant in this dialogue game, at least with reference to his role that presupposes topic control (selection and change of topics), will use this strategic weapon to influence the politicians’ performance and make them account for their political actions.

The Movement Between Agreement and Disagreement in Self Positions Through a Musico-Logical Metaphor.

In this article, I use a metaphorical concept in order to propose an interpretation for the dialogical relationship that occurs between I-positions in the human self. Metaphor is a useful tool for scientific production and its heuristic value has been demonstrated in several fields of knowledge. I claim a musico-logical metaphor to explain dynamic dialogic processes that occur when I-positions are in agreement or disagreement relationship. These dialogic processes are based on tension and release and, in a complementary way, can result in contradictory, tautological, or contingency relations between I-positions. These relations were categorized using concepts from Music and Logic, thus creating a theoretical model composed of metaphorical concepts. To provide evidence of how a musico-logical metaphor might contribute to the interpretation of relations between I-positions in the system of self, I discuss a case study of a rural worker and analyze how child labor marked his life trajectory throughout different moments. The musico-logical metaphor might contribute to dialogical processes understanding that occur at the border of the agreement-disagreement dyad in the system of the self, since this metaphor proposes to identify, from a cogenetic understanding, dialogic interactions between I-positions located in this border, thus transforming the agreement-disagreement dyad into a triadic agreement-border-non-agreement set.

ІНФОРМУВАННЯ СТОРІН ЯК ФОРМА ЗДІЙСНЕННЯ СОЦІАЛЬНОГО ДІАЛОГУ

The article is devoted to the understanding of the legislative and applied issues of informing as a form of social dialogue in Ukraine. Using the comparative method of researching the legislative norms on information and social dialogue, it is concluded that the general principles for the realization of the right to information and state guarantees in the field of information relations also apply to the legal relations of social dialogue. It is argued that the legislative term «information exchange» does not always meaningfully correspond to the actions that the parties of a social dialogue perform, therefore it is proposed to change the name of the form of social dialogue to «informing the parties to social dialogue». Based on the analysis of the norms concerning trade unions, employers' organizations, as well as social dialogue, two types of informing the social dialogues parties are distinguished: 1) at the request of the other party or independently on the basis of the legislative norms; 2) mutual informing of the parties (information exchange). Simultaneously, they can act both as an independent form of social dialogue realization and as the elements in other consultations or conducting collective negotiations. The necessity of eliminating legislative conflicts contained in the Laws of Ukraine «On trade unions, their rights and guarantees of activity», «On the organizations of employers, their associations, rights and guarantees of their activity», «On social dialogue in Ukraine» is proved. In particular, it is proposed to consolidate the right of the employer (outside of membership in an employers' organization) as a subject of legal relations of social dialogue at the local level to participate in the informing procedure under the legislation on social dialogue (mandatory persons, deadlines for providing information, etc.). The author also proves the need to legally detail the content and scope of information that may be the subject of informing upon request, demand or during the procedure for mutual informing the parties of social dialogue in accordance with the standards of ILO Recommendation No. 129 (communications between the administration and workers in the enterprise) and Directive 2002 / 14 /EU (on the establishment of general rules for informing and consulting employees of the European Community). Based on the analysis of the norms of collective agreements and contracts, it is concluded that the parties to social dialogue only prescribe their rights and obligations to inform, without detailing the procedure. Therefore, they do not use the legislative norm on the possibility of contractual regulation of these procedures.

Intertextual Aspects of Productions of Ukrainian Folk-Stage Choreography

The purpose of the article is to reveal the specificity of intertextuality in the choreographic text of Ukrainian folk stage dance productions. The research methodology is determined by the complexity and multifacetedness of the production of folk stage choreography as an artistic work and is represented by a combination of various research approaches, namely interdisciplinary, systemic, and cultural. The purpose of the study led to the use of comparative, structural-semiotic, hermeneutic, and intertextual analysis methods widely adapted in modern humanitarian science, the main principle of which is to consider the choreographic text as an open system that enters into various relationships with other systems. Intertextual analysis plays an important role in revealing the concept of a choreographic work, its relevance is based on the idea of dialogic essence and continuity of culture. Scientific novelty. The performance of folk stage choreography is studied through the prism of the concept of intertextuality of Yu. Kristeva and theoretical approaches to the study of the text of R. Barthes; the role of the choreographer-director and the audience in the context of the creation and interpretation of the choreographic text is considered; the concept of “intertextuality” in the context of the choreographic text of the production of folk stage choreography is clarified; it was found that the character of intertextuality directly depends on the specifics of communication, which is determined by the nature of the choreographic text of folk-stage forms. Conclusions. As a result of the extrapolation of Yu. Kristeva's concept of intertextuality and theoretical approaches to the study of R. Barth's text to folk-stage choreography, it was found that: the choreographic text of a folk-stage performance is created by means of synthesising various quotes that refer to a variety of cultural sources; in the multidimensional space of the folk stage production, the process of systematic birth of meaning and its release takes place; the concept of intertextuality in the context of the production of folk stage choreography blurs the contours of the choreographic text, turning it into an infinite artistic dimension of connections and associations. The conducted analysis allows us to define the phenomenon of intertextuality of folk-stage choreography performances as a special choreographic intertextual space, in the middle of which there is accumulation, coexistence and constant interaction of all the diversity of vocabulary of authentic and folk-stage dance. In its middle, any element of a folk dance is immersed in a general cultural context and correlates with an array of other choreographic texts, multiplying its own content, relevance and interpretive possibilities. Intertextual interactions in the choreographic text of a folk-stage dance provide an opportunity for the choreographer-director to enter the continuum of eternal themes of folk culture, enter into an artistic dialogue with the past achievements of dance culture and, thus, reflect their own vision of the scene-content part of the folk-stage dance, which, in turn, expands the figurative system of the new choreographic work, emphasises its multi-layeredness and serves as a basis for various interpretations. The choreographer-producer of the folk stage dance interacts not only with the reality surrounding them, but also with the entire corpus of their previous and contemporary choreographic works, and most importantly with folk dance primary sources, being in a state of permanent dialogue with them. The text of a folk stage choreographic production consists of various elements that come from different cultures, enter into a relationship of dialogue, parody, discussion with each other – all this multiplicity is focused in a certain point, which is the viewer. The viewer’s role in the interpretation of the choreographic text is crucial, as their previous experience, cultural and educational background will undoubtedly influence the amount of meaning they can obtain when viewing the choreographic work. Accordingly, the choreographic text acquires unity not in its origin, but in its purpose. The analysis of the manifestation of intertextuality as one of the fundamental techniques in the productions of folk stage choreography requires considering them as works that consist of texts that are actualised in a specific semiotic context and contribute to the preservation of Ukrainian folk dance culture in particular and the cultural memory of Ukrainians in general.
 Key words: improvisation, dance improvisation, improvisation in choreography, dance.

Influencerlar ve Metaverse: Metafluence Üzerine Diyalogsal İletişim İncelemesi

Metaverse is a common online community where physical reality increases and at the same time merges with virtual reality. Metafluence is a platform where influencers can provide their life practices, interact with their followers, buy digital artworks (NFTs) or to influence their followers to purchase. In this study, it is aimed to reveal what kind of a dialogue is established on the basis of the content in the Metafluence environment. Accordingly, the Metafluence web page is evaluated in terms of dialogical communication within the scope of qualitative research method using the case study research design. The dialogic analysis in the study is based on the criterias included in Kent and Taylor's (1998) article named "Building Dialogic Relationships Through the World Wide Web", as well as Kent et al.'s (2003) article named “The relationship between Web site design and organizational responsiveness to stakeholders”. The dialogic levels of the metafluence platform were examined within the framework of the six dialogic principles of dialogic communication. In conclusion, the metaflunce platform appears as a site in dialogical communication, and it can be said that virtual reality videos with avatars related to the concept of metaverse also support the interface design.

New Materialist Network Approaches in Science Education: A Method to Construct Network Data from Video

Lately, new materialism has been proposed as a theoretical framework to better understand material-dialogic relationships in learning, and concurrently network analysis has emerged as a method in science education research. This paper explores how to include materiality in network analysis and reports the development of a method to construct network data from video. The approaches, 1) information flow, 2) material semantic and 3) material engagement, were identified based on the literature on network analysis and new materialism in science education. The method was applied and further improved with a video segment from an upper secondary school physics lesson. The example networks from the video segment show that network analysis is a potential research method within the materialist framework and that the method allows studies into the material and dialogic relationships that emerge when students are engaged in investigations in school.

Social Action Is More Than Necessary Today

In the middle of Rotterdam stands Ossip Zadkine’s sculpture, The Destroyed City, as a symbol of the faded center in World War II (Figure 1). It is a human figure from which the heart has been snatched, raising the hands to heaven with a cry of fear. On Sunday, after church, I play around the sculpture on an almost barren city plain while my parents watch. Within their memory the bombing of their company. My playground is their pain. Sunday church attendance is primarily a sacred event. Vatican II is turning things upside down in my hometown. Suddenly, the ecclesiastical dogma of the 1950s is replaced by a passionate social debate. The church must be at the center of society. Stand up for the oppressed. I am excited at that huge revolt. Here, I am fascinated by social change.I remember my first steps in social work in a neglected and underprivileged district of Rotterdam. It is the early 1970s; the neighborhood develops into a multicultural one of native residents, activist students, and first-generation immigrants. I get involved in supporting local residents against the demolition policy of the neighborhood by the city council. People do not want to leave their old houses; they want a toilet, and a shower. No rats in the house. They want to maintain the social cohesion, the beating heart of the district.I start my studies in social work, initially sociotechnologically oriented, but later Marxist–Leninist ideas increasingly take root. Again, I feel trapped in dogma. I oppose ideological ideas. Until I read Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Human experience as a starting point. Freire sees liberation as a collective matter based on dialogue. It becomes a source of inspiration in working with people in disadvantaged situations. I shake off my last dogmatic feathers.My introduction to Gestalt therapy is in the mid-1980s. The approach has a powerful effect on me. The attention to the (body) process is liberating. But I miss the orientation to social action. The Gestalt movement has become unilaterally focused on personal development.I happen to be involved in the founding of a local nongovernmental organization (NGO) in Northern Ghana. We work with local groups to reduce poverty by improving access to education, water, microcredit programs for women. The Gestalt principle of the dialogical relationship can be found here in the age-old tradition of local village communities: “I am because we are.”The 9/11 attacks in New York are again a turning point. In response to the attacks, the European Association of Gestalt Therapy (EAGT) establishes the Human Rights and Social Responsibility Committee. Here, I meet an international group of dedicated colleagues who want to reconnect with the sociopolitical roots of Gestalt therapy. All are active beyond the therapy room. We initiate a first committee project with Peace Brigades International (PBI). PBI sends volunteers to areas of the world where human rights are at stake. With their presence, PBI protects hundreds of organizations and individuals, their families, and communities. Our committee supports these human right defenders by online “human accompaniment” for any difficulties they encounter during their fieldwork. A volunteer writes: “I had violent panic attacks after being held hostage for 24 hours by an armed rebel group. The accompaniment has helped me to reconnect to my body, the team, and my fieldwork. It was essential to know that someone was taking care for me from a distance.”A modern city center has arisen around the “Destroyed City.” The sculpture is not only a permanent symbol of the atrocities of World War II but also a cry of horror at the dramatic events in the world today: the destruction of the earth and its democracies, the fate of refugees worldwide. Social action is more than necessary today.

Social Action Is More Than Necessary Today

In the middle of Rotterdam stands Ossip Zadkine’s sculpture, The Destroyed City, as a symbol of the faded center in World War II (Figure 1). It is a human figure from which the heart has been snatched, raising the hands to heaven with a cry of fear. On Sunday, after church, I play around the sculpture on an almost barren city plain while my parents watch. Within their memory the bombing of their company. My playground is their pain. Sunday church attendance is primarily a sacred event. Vatican II is turning things upside down in my hometown. Suddenly, the ecclesiastical dogma of the 1950s is replaced by a passionate social debate. The church must be at the center of society. Stand up for the oppressed. I am excited at that huge revolt. Here, I am fascinated by social change.I remember my first steps in social work in a neglected and underprivileged district of Rotterdam. It is the early 1970s; the neighborhood develops into a multicultural one of native residents, activist students, and first-generation immigrants. I get involved in supporting local residents against the demolition policy of the neighborhood by the city council. People do not want to leave their old houses; they want a toilet, and a shower. No rats in the house. They want to maintain the social cohesion, the beating heart of the district.I start my studies in social work, initially sociotechnologically oriented, but later Marxist–Leninist ideas increasingly take root. Again, I feel trapped in dogma. I oppose ideological ideas. Until I read Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Human experience as a starting point. Freire sees liberation as a collective matter based on dialogue. It becomes a source of inspiration in working with people in disadvantaged situations. I shake off my last dogmatic feathers.My introduction to Gestalt therapy is in the mid-1980s. The approach has a powerful effect on me. The attention to the (body) process is liberating. But I miss the orientation to social action. The Gestalt movement has become unilaterally focused on personal development.I happen to be involved in the founding of a local nongovernmental organization (NGO) in Northern Ghana. We work with local groups to reduce poverty by improving access to education, water, microcredit programs for women. The Gestalt principle of the dialogical relationship can be found here in the age-old tradition of local village communities: “I am because we are.”The 9/11 attacks in New York are again a turning point. In response to the attacks, the European Association of Gestalt Therapy (EAGT) establishes the Human Rights and Social Responsibility Committee. Here, I meet an international group of dedicated colleagues who want to reconnect with the sociopolitical roots of Gestalt therapy. All are active beyond the therapy room. We initiate a first committee project with Peace Brigades International (PBI). PBI sends volunteers to areas of the world where human rights are at stake. With their presence, PBI protects hundreds of organizations and individuals, their families, and communities. Our committee supports these human right defenders by online “human accompaniment” for any difficulties they encounter during their fieldwork. A volunteer writes: “I had violent panic attacks after being held hostage for 24 hours by an armed rebel group. The accompaniment has helped me to reconnect to my body, the team, and my fieldwork. It was essential to know that someone was taking care for me from a distance.”A modern city center has arisen around the “Destroyed City.” The sculpture is not only a permanent symbol of the atrocities of World War II but also a cry of horror at the dramatic events in the world today: the destruction of the earth and its democracies, the fate of refugees worldwide. Social action is more than necessary today.

Unravelling the expectation-performance gaps in teacher behaviour: a student engagement perspective

Evaluation of teacher behaviour from the perspective of students is beneficial to higher education institutions striving to improve student engagement. This article aims to identify and close the gaps in teacher behaviour to improve student engagement in higher education. Through a survey of 838 students in four higher education institutions in Sarawak, Malaysia, this study found that teacher behaviour had a positive and significant impact on student engagement. By empirically scrutinising students’ expectations and performance evaluations of teacher behaviour, the findings revealed that significant expectation-performance gaps in teacher behaviour exist as students, across public and private universities, had expectations of teacher behaviour that were significantly higher than the actual performance of their teachers. This study demonstrated the importance of enhancing the quality of interactions and promoting interactive dialogic relationships with students in higher education to garner greater student engagement.

The Worth of Words: The Ethical Significance of Dialogue Structured as Asking–Responding in Józef Tischner’s Philosophy

The importance of words has been emphasized by many ethicians and philosophers. Within interpersonal relationships, a significant dimension of the analysis of the word is its value. Ethics is dependent on the value of words, since without honest words we cannot have a real dialogue or then build a trustworthy community. In this paper, the author tries to show that within such a philosophical framework, the most fundamental element is a question–answer relationship, which is a basic structure for a dialogue. Asking is given special consideration by the Polish philosopher and priest Józef Tischner, who sees a question as a kind of request in the world of poverty which demands an ethical response. In this article, the author also presents Tischner’s original philosophy of drama—especially in respect to his view on a dialogic relationship between people—and then relationships within various groups, from large societies and nations to small communities. The ethical, axiological, anthropological, and even agathological and ontological significance of dialogue as asking–responding are also presented as a basis for a deeper communication.

Прагматическая структура реагирующего сообщения и типология форм обратной связи в блоговом тексте

The article provides a linguistic analysis of various types of feedback in accordance with their pragmatic role and functional load in the format of interlocutors’ blog interaction. In the context of blog communication, dialogical relationships between senders and recipients of stimulating messages, which are a prerequisite for the exchange of opinions, are based on the respondent’s planned feedback. The differences between explicit and implicit feedback with stimulating messages are revealed. A working hypothesis is put forward that in blog communication, in comparison with oral spontaneous communication, implicit feedback plays a more constructive role and has a specific functional load due to the respondent’s delayed (asynchronous) response to the stimulus, the reactive activation of the means of establishing and maintaining phatic contact with the interlocutor and the subjective detailing of the dictal and/or modus content of the stimulating message. Due to the time and/or spatial distance between the interlocutors, as well as the presence of multiple respondents, feedback is predetermined by the addressee’s expectations regarding the planned interaction, and not by the fact of mutual recognition of individual intentions that characterize oral spontaneous communication. The projected response and mental representations of an imaginary responsive respondent shed light on the pragmatic differences between stimulating and responsive messages, through which the participants of the communication plan to continue the exchange of information and emotions. The repertoire of communicative strategies that acquire essential importance in the process of overcoming the problems of establishing and maintaining feedback in computer-mediated communication is determined. The current aspects of designing the interfaces of blogging platforms that influence the pragmatic contexts of feedback implementation are discussed. It is established that in blog interaction, when initiating a stimulating judgment, the lack of feedback can be a natural phenomenon that does not affect the effectiveness of communication. This idea confirms the hypothesis put forward and outlines the prospects for research.

Redefining School Education and the Public Sphere in the Age of Globalization

Globalization and the Fourth Industrial Revolution in the 21st century have contributed to transforming education and the public sphere defined by the nation state into a transnational dimension of the public sphere that transcends national boundaries. The public sphere of education does not refer to a fixed and pre-determined sphere, but rather to what is generated through the interactive and dialogical relationships among students, teachers, parents, and citizens. It is important to revitalize schools as democratic communities based on the idea of democracy as a way of life as opposed to school policies dominated by the neoliberalism of competition and choice and education standardization. In this essay, I offer seven perspectives on reclaiming teaching and learning and reimagining school education and the public sphere in local, national, and global dimensions.

Hybrid places

Abstract This article is about adaptations to the regimentation of public and private living through the reorganisation of domestic space and time routines a year into changeable Covid-related restrictions. The discussion is based on narratives and audio-visual artefacts generated by participants from 20 UK households through the methodology of photovoice and that articulate domestic-related boundary-making processes and forms of space hybridisation in the ongoing changes caused by the pandemic. In the article, Covid-19 signage is represented by language and other semiotic markings that engender an inside spatial and social semiotics and that stands in a dialogic relationship with the outside spatial and social semiotics as dictated by the pandemic, and where domestic landscapes articulate forms of transmedia code-mixing that invest written words, sounds, and screens.

Beowulf as Children’s Literature ed. by Bruce Gilchrist and Britt Mize (review)

Reviewed by: Beowulf as Children’s Literature ed. by Bruce Gilchrist and Britt Mize Alexandra Garner (bio) Bruce Gilchrist and Britt Mize, eds. Beowulf as Children’s Literature. U of Toronto P. 2021. Bruce Gilchrist and Britt Mize’s collection Beowulf as Children’s Literature effectively brings together many disparate fields and discourses, from assessing historical perspectives on Beowulf’s appropriateness for children, to examining particular case studies of children’s or young adult retellings, to considering representations of femininity in iterations with illustration. The nine included essays display an impressive range, approaching Beowulf adaptation/s for children conceptually and practically over the last two centuries of literary publication. The volume also includes Gilchrist’s fairly exhaustive bibliography of versions of Beowulf made for or marketed to children, as well as Mize’s interview with Rebecca Barnhouse and James Rumford, two authors of recent children’s adaptations of Beowulf. The collection traces two major threads: first, a historical focus, and second, essays on method and message. These two strands characterize the challenges with approaches to and adaptations of Beowulf as children’s literature—one that scholars working in children’s and young adult literature contend with regularly—which Mize precisely identifies in the Introduction to the volume: “a perception that children’s adaptations of long-appreciated literature will be only subtractive and attenuating, instrumental in purpose, and therefore analytically uninteresting” (5). The included essays demonstrate that Beowulf’s children’s adaptations and retellings are anything but, and show the nuances of different approaches to this single text in its many and varied remediations, adaptations, and recontextualization. Mize’s introduction disclaims this outdated perspective on adaptation directly, distancing the volume from fidelity discourses and identifying instead the dual challenge of remaking Beowulf for readers both modern and young. Despite this assertion that the volume focuses on what can be gleaned from considerations of Beowulf for children rather than question how faithful such adaptations are, discussions of authenticity, fidelity, and “genuine” medievalism do appear throughout the collection. Some, like Mize’s essay, “Beowulf, Bèi’àowǔfǔ, and the Social Hero” as an example, embrace the dialogic relationship [End Page 338] between the antecedent work and its Chinese adaptation to shine new light on the literary and cultural significance of the medieval poem. By re-experiencing the familiar Beowulf through the lens of its Chinese adaptation, Mize argues, we discover and must contend with different value systems at work with regard to heroism, identity, and community. Several of the included essays address this tension between familiar and unfamiliar in retellings and remediations of Beowulf, also touched upon by both Barnhouse and Rumford in their interview, “The Practice of Adapting Beowulf for Younger Readers.” Both Barnhouse and Rumford describe the challenges of retaining enough of the narrative, themes, and medievalism for it to be recognizably Beowulf while also adapting to their particular authorial agenda. Amber Dunai also examines the folkloric elements common to Beowulfs both medieval and modern in her essay “Tolkien, Beowulf, and Faërie: Adaptations for Readers Aged ‘Six to Sixty.’” Dunai adeptly navigates the complexities of these apparently contradictory perspectives in her assessment of the suitability of Beowulf texts for certain demographics of audiences, and how such attempts to categorize or restrict readership reveal implicit biases, priorities, and approaches regarding intended or expected audience. As an influential figure in the fields of medieval studies (and medievalism), fantasy genre studies, and children’s and young adult literature, Tolkien’s approach impacts subsequent literary and popular perspectives, and Dunai’s thoughtful essay thus will prove useful to many working in related fields. This preoccupation with the difference between literature for all and literature specifically for children is another sub-theme to the collection, which Barnhouse and Rumford explore from a publishing perspective while other essays engage it more academically. This is, of course, a question central to and inherent in the study of children’s and young adult literature; like the “Middle Ages” from which Beowulf originates, like the concept of the child itself, children’s literature is an entirely constructed and mutable category. Yvette Kisor’s “Children’s Beowulfs for the New Tolkien Generation,” examines the literary and aesthetic medievalisms that...