Korean Wave

The Influences of Korean Wave on Vietnamese Youth During the first two decades of the 21st century, the Korean wave has spread to many countries around the world, including Vietnam. The Korean wave had a profound influence on the psychology and interests of the Vietnamese people, especially the youth. Therefore, the study titled â€Å"The Influences of Korean Wave on Vietnamese Youth† will find out the effects of the Korean wave on young people’s behaviors.On the other hand, the study also helps Vietnamese enterprises gain more experience about the success of this phenomenon so that they are able to take advantage of these effects on their business, which targets Vietnamese customers. Overview about Korean Wave In the last two decades, the Korean wave has earned a very huge popularity in many countries around the world. Following the initial surge of interest in Korean television dramas and popular music, nowadays all things made in Korean ? from food, movies and dances to fashion and language ? are quite the rage.The Korean wave is establishing itself as a global phenomenon that has already washed over East Asia and is now reaching the shores of Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. Korean Wave in the World The Korea Tourism Organization conducted an online survey of 12,085 non-Korean visitors from 102 countries on its website from May 11th to May 31st, 2012. The questionnaire, which included seven questions related to Korea, had been provided to the interviewees in different languages to see what makes the foreigners interested in the Korean wave.The survey conducted asked the interviewees to select an item of the Korean wave that interested them the most. The results showed a little more than 53 percent of 6,447 respondents picked K-pop. This was followed by TV dramas with 33 percent, films with six percent and others with seven percent. By age group, 49 percent of the respondents were in their twenties, followed by those in their thirties at 18 percent, teenagers at 17 percent and those in their forties at eight percent.The survey showed that, nowadays the Korean wave has been spread not only in Asia but also around entire world: from Asia to Europe, from America to Oceania and it is continuing to spread worldwide, where it is being consumed by an increase in global audiences. More importantly, most of the attracted people are in their 20s and teenagers who are enthusiastically consuming the images and messages offered by the Korean wave. Korean Wave in Vietnam Since the government of Vietnam and South Korea established an official diplomatic relationship, the Vietnamese audiences have more chances to enjoy Korean dramas.Especially, during the final years of 20th century, many Korean television series were introduced in Vietnam through the exchange culture programs or promotional products offered from huge economic Korean groups. These films like â€Å"Yellow Daisy† (1997), â€Å"First Love† (1999), â €Å"Winter Sonata† (2002), â€Å"Jewel in the Palace† (2003), brought a fresh feeling to the Vietnamese audiences and were also the first step of the Korean wave beginning in Vietnam.Moreover, this stage also saw a rapid development of information technology and mass media that made this wave closer to the audiences, especially the youth between 13 and 22 years old who were attracted easily more than other age groups. In the recent years, taking advantage of dramas’ fame, the Korean wave has been expanding to Korean music and fashion that has become an overwhelming cultural tendencies up to now. Three Main Aspects of Korean Wave on Young Generation Korean DramasDuring the last five years of 20th century, the Vietnamese dramas became boring because they were influenced strongly by the traditional viewpoints in society. In contrast, at this time, the first appearance of the Korean dramas with romantic love, complication in family relationship help the Vietnamese a udiences be more satisfied with their entertainment needs. In addition, with the similarities in culture as well as the development of the mass media, Korean dramas have been accepted easily and have become more popular in Vietnam.From the finding of our survey about the favorite movies, which was researched from 75 young people belonging to the 13-21 year olds in Ho Chi Minh City, the data was described by the pie chart below: [pic] As the chart shows, more than 30% of the interviewees pick Korean drama as their favorite film that also occupies the largest part in the chart. Following that, Chinese drama and European & American movies account for 23% and 25% respectively. The two last sectors are Vietnamese drama and the others with the figures being 11% and 10% respectively.From the information above, it can be clearly observed that Korean drama is now dominating major attention of young Vietnamese audiences and it leaves strong influences on their lives. One of the most important reasons making the youth interested in Korean dramas is the beautiful appearance with the familiar formula being the handsome boys and beautiful girls with their perfect make-up. In addition, most of the characters always dress in fashionable clothes with hairstyles that not only attract the young generation to the content of the film but also create the fashion waves in reality.Another side, Korean dramas are generally consistent with the psychology of young people. To be more specific, instead of some love stories with unhappy endings, the recent Korean films such as: â€Å"Boys over flowers†, â€Å"Dream High†, â€Å"You’re Beautiful† focus on the honest emotions of high school students with many funny and interesting details but not less romantic. Finally, an important point of Korean television series is the introduction of Korean culture, especially cuisines. According to Huang â€Å"Kim Chi, one of the traditional Korean foods, has become a [sic] accompaniment of the acceptance of Korean TV dramas† (2009, p. 26). In this way, these films lead young viewers to the content of the films as well as make the curious about them. Korean Music After the significant success of dramas, the Korean wave has continued expanding its influences on the young Vietnamese generation by the appearance of Korean music, also known K-pop as Shin Hyunjoon (2009) states â€Å"As the danceable rhythm and catchy melody performed by good-looking singers and groups swept across East- and Southeast Asia, Korean pop music has become one of the main components of the so-called Korean Wave† (para. 2).According to our finding in a survey of 75 young people in Ho Chi Minh City, it can be clearly seen that the interest level in Korean music occupied a minority of the total interviewees. [pic] As regards details, 35% of young respondents picked K-pop as their favorite music. This was followed by European & American music with 27%, Vietnamese music with 21%, Japanese music with 11% and others with 6%. The results above shows that K-pop dominates the music market of the Vietnamese youth due to some reason below: Firstly, Korean songs always satisfy the tastes of young audiences with their dynamic melodies.In addition, with the joyful voices and ear-catching rhythms, these songs overcome the barriers of language in order to become closer to young listeners. Secondly, Korean songs also attract young people’s attention to their perfect images. To be more detailed, handsome boys and beautiful girls who have professional dancing skills perform most of the music videos. Besides, these clips are carefully combined with the effects from the colorful lights to create the bright picture. That is also the reason why the song Gangnam Style by PSY becomes famous and creates a new Korean wave up to now.According to the BBC, PSY became the first South Korean artist to hit number one on the UK music charts and his song became the first Korean song to reach No. 1 on YouTube (October 31st ,2012) Finally, an important element contributing to the success of Korean songs is the content or message from the video clip. Actually, these stories affect the Vietnamese music market because they may be so colorful and full of energy or may be so sad with a lot of tears by some love stories which the main actor or actress gets cancer.Take the Single â€Å"Chuyen Nhu Chua Bat Dau† of well-known singer â€Å"My Tam† as an example of this. This song is also a sad story following the Korean style and it touches the hearts of the youth lightly. My Tam is very smart when choosing this song to register with Youtube and she became the first Vietnamese to be an official partner of YouTube (Tuoitrenews, August 2nd, 2012) Korean Fashion Fashion, which affects everybody’s lives by getting them involved in something has become an inevitable part of young people.Gradually, Korean fashion is one of the strongest elements , which affects remarkably to the youth. According to survey about the fashion styles from the poll of the youth, Korean fashion was the most popular style, accounting for 93% of the overall interviewees. It was followed by Vietnamese fashion with 34%. Obviously, overcoming the culture barriers in modern society, the upward trend of Korean fashion has penetrated deeply into the lives of many young Vietnamese. A reality has shown that â€Å"in the streets of Ho Chi MinhCity and Hanoi, fashion conscious young Vietnamese have adopted the darker makeup colors, thinly shaved eyebrows, body-hugging clothes, and square-toed shoes of Seoul fashion† (The Russia Journal, Jan. 25th 2002, p. 33). [pic] Besides, the youth seem to  be more fashionable and want to please each other, â€Å"stars of such dramas have become shining idols in those nations and fans there emulate the fashion, hairstyle or makeup of Korean stars† (â€Å"Hyundai heavy industries report on pop culture†, 2004).To clarify, most of young people love the Korean fashion style due to its popularity and current fashion trend. Moreover, another reason that convinces the level of explaining the fashion choices is that the Korean fashion style suits their styles and helps them express their personalities. In addition, Korean fashion has many similarities with Vietnamese fashion with 40% and 28%, respectively. Subsequently, 10% of young people are interested in the Korean fashion style because they want to be like their Korean idols. [pic] The Positive and Negative Influences of Korean WaveObviously, these analyses above indicate that nowadays, the Korean wave leaves significant impacts on the Vietnamese people in general as well as the young generation in particular including both positive and negative aspects. Positive Influences Through admiring the Korean stars in dramas and music as well as for their fashion styles, Vietnamese youth can not only satisfy their own entertainment needs but also learn beautiful and fashionable dressing styles, smart and educated behaviors from their Korean idols in the films. Another positive effect is a number of Korean stars will be able to ecome shining mirrors for the Vietnamese youth due to their efforts in both entertainment and education. Take Kim Tae Hee, a beautiful actress is famous not only for her professional performance but also her admirable academic achievements, as an illustration of this. She always topped the class with a perfect G. P. A during the period of high school. After graduating, Kim Tae Hee continued her studies at Seoul University, the most prestigious University in Korea. Negative Influences The Korean wave has spread rapidly throughout Vietnam without selecting to be suitable for the Vietnamese tradition.This means that through this wave, the majority of young generation gradually forget Vietnamese culture. In recent years, many young couples prefer wearing â€Å"Hanbok†, the Korean traditiona l dress in their weddings, to â€Å"Ao dai†, the Vietnamese traditional dress, for example. In addition, they also try to memorize the information about their favorite stars rather than the celebrities of our country Another significant drawback that should be noted is that a group of young people have an excessive devotion to their idols, which exceeds the acceptable limits of Vietnamese culture.Moreover, a large number of young people spend too much time and money on dressing up and applying make- up like the Korean style, and hunting for clothes, which are rather similar to their idols. The consequence is the appearance of inappropriate fashion styles and hairstyles everywhere, especially in the big cities. Opportunities from Korean Wave in business The Korean wave brings positive images that become a transporter of other Korean products such as technologies, fashions, cosmetics, tourism and entertainment services.Based on the influences of the Korean wave, Vietnamese ente rprises can apply some effective strategies in Vietnam. The first strategy is the collaboration with Korean stars for marketing and development of the products in Vietnam, using Korean idols as models for advertising products, for example Lee Min Ho playing a role in advertising Lotte Pie and Jang Dong Gun modeling for Close Up toothpaste. By holding some events in Vietnam and connecting stars’ images with product concepts, producers can increase the demand and interest of Korean fans, then they can increase the consumption and revenue.The SoundFest Music Festival on April 14th, 2012 was a very successful event sponsored by Samsung and Coca Cola. Instead of buying tickets at a high price to satisfy their passion for seeing Big Bang – a well-known South Korean pop band, fans also had chances to go to the festival free if they won the promotional prize from Samsung and Coca Cola. Korean fans found a code under Coca Cola bottle caps or sent the IMEI number of Samsung phon es to get the tickets. Besides increasing the revenue, producers also upgraded their image and value in their market.The second strategy is that companies can take full advantages of this wave to trade on fashion and cosmetic products because the image of Korean actors and singers significantly affected the youth’s consumption tendencies. The local distributors can import Korean fashion and cosmetic products to put up for sale in the Vietnam market. Besides that, they should also consider designing and producing fashion products with the Korean style so that they can match the youth’s taste. The third strategy is to develop tourism packages designed for Korean fans.Tour packages that combine concerts, shopping and sightseeing help tourist not only understand the Korean entertainment industry well, but also can visit the wonderful places and studios in the dramas, such as the snow mountain in Sonata Winter and the palaces in Dae Jang Geum. The reality has shown that Vie travel Company cooperated with Korean Air to make the Korean tour package in August 2012, which combines some special activities on music festival and travelling tour. This is a shinning signal for cooperation between Korea and Vietnam in tourist industry.The forth strategy is designing restaurant and coffee shop with Korean styles. Although the prices at the restaurant are expensive, the youth willingly spend their money on enjoying special Korean food. The youth can find Korean entertainment, such as movies and music discs, posters of famous singers and actors and the lasted fashion magazines, in these coffee shops. This is also a place to exchange cultural things, the Korean fans can share information and open a club for practicing the Korean language.The Korean wave may bring many opportunities to Vietnamese enterprises so that if they can catch the chance and understand the wave well, they can have wise strategies to develop their businesses in the future. Conclusion The result of our survey of 75 young people in Ho Chi Minh City about the influences of the Korean wave on Vietnamese youth proves again that the Korean wave not only spreads around the world but also has a direct impact on Vietnamese youth, especially from three elements: drama, music and fashion.Besides that, we can also find out the concrete psychology and interests of the Vietnamese youth for business strategies. Therefore, the Vietnamese policy makers are able to make reasonable policies to encourage the development of the Vietnamese entertainment industry. This creates the dynamic to propagandize Vietnamese art and culture around the world to bring more profits for the Vietnamese entertainment industry. On the other hand, the Vietnamese entertainment industry can benchmark the Korean wave to reach around the world so that we are able to create a same phenomenon in the near future.

Knowledge For Social Work Essay

Social work education in Britain has undergone repeated and fundamental restructuring in the past decade. In the early 1990s the professional qualification, the Certificate in Qualifying Social Work (CQSW), was replaced by the Diploma in Social Work (DipSW), a shift which required significant curriculum changes. Now social work education is undergoing another major change, with the DipSW being replaced by an undergraduate degree. However, despite changes to practice and academic training requirements, there are some constants, some requirements which do not alter. One of these is the demand for social work students to demonstrate that they can ‘apply theory to practice’ as part of qualifying requirements. This requirement, presented casually alongside a long list of further requirements, characteristically fails to grasp that understanding the relationship between theory and practice has long been a source of debate within social science. In many respects, the recent debate in Britain (see Trevillion, 2000) continues, and draws upon, consistent themes in social theory over the relative merits or otherwise of positivist paradigms, with their underlying assumptions of a social world that can be revealed through the application of correct techniques. The early debates in social theory were structured by a widespread belief in the power of scientific and secular-philosophical knowledge to provide for the direction and improvement of natural and social life. The ‘age of reason’ provided a context of optimism in the possibilities for a collective life informed by justice and representing the march of progress. Though the optimism generally attributed to the Enlightenment was tempered by ambivalence on the part of some theorists, or rejected by others, the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were dominated by philosophical and theoretical interventions which, in general, supposed that knowledge could provide a foundation for political and social progress. This supposition could only be held by assuming that the world could be conceived of as an object, containing an underlying unity, progressing in a logical way, and peopled by subjects whose access to rational thought would liberate them collectively from the superstitions of pre-modern life. The underlying mechanisms of historical progress, the necessary regularities in social life, were held to be available to discovery by the sciences and philosophies, so that such knowledge attained a key role in the achievement of social progress (Penna, et al, 1999). Although the ‘age of reason’ was also characterized by profound ambivalence concerning the possibilities for rational progress, the social sciences displayed a deep belief in the possibilities of knowledge to understand the social world and therefore guide the development of rationally organized structures, institutions and interventions. Thus the objective of knowledge-generation has been the establishment of a foundational knowledge, derived from the exclusive truth-producing capacity of science, that can inform social action. Foundational principles have been based upon two important assumptions: that theory involved a distinction between mind and world, between the subject and object of knowledge, and that language functioned as a neutral medium for the mind to mirror or represent the world (Seidman 1994: 3). This historical intellectual legacy, together with a need for professional status dependent on a proper ‘knowledge-base’, drives demands that professional practice demonstrate the application of theory to practice. I want to suggest here that this demand betrays a lack of understanding of what theory is and what it can do and, at best, leaves students confused, whilst at worst it leads to cruel or ineffective practices in agencies. Here I outline the historical context that has led to a particular understanding of theory as a guide to action, point to some perils of its application in practice, and suggest a different method of dealing with theory on social work degree schemes. What is Theory? What we call ‘theory’ can be understood as a form of social action that gives direction and meaning to what we do. To be human is to search for meaning, and all of us hold theories about how and why particular things happen or do not happen. Some of these theories are little more than vague hypotheses about what will happen if we act in a certain way in a certain situation and what we might expect from others. But many of the theories we hold are more complex and express our understandings of, for example, how organizations work, of how people become offenders, or why the distribution of resources is as it is. In this sense theories are generalizations about what exists in the world and how the components of that world fit together into patterns. In this sense also theories are ‘abstractions’ in as much as they generalize across actual situations our expectations and suppositions about the reasons why certain patterns exist (O’Brien and Penna, 1998). In the same way that we use theory in our everyday lives, we also draw upon various theories as part of the ways we act in the world, so understandings of the ‘social’ dimension of social work are also built upon different theoretical foundations. As O’Brien and Penna (1998) point out, theories about the validity of data and research procedures, theories about what motivates individual behaviour, theories about what will happen if we intervene in particular situations in x way rather than y way, become embedded in social, economic and criminal justice policies developed, implemented and managed by different social groups. Theories about the proper relationship between the individual and the state, men and women, homosexual and heterosexual, inform policy and practice frameworks so that the frameworks that legally bound social work, as well as practice priorities and interventions, differ substantially from country to country. Theory about social life is either used or promoted in particular policy and welfare frameworks in order to make them more ‘effective’ or ‘appropriate’, and is invariably embedded in the social programs that ensue from them. In this way theories make up the premises and assumptions that guide the formulation of particular policies and practices in the first place, as well as their later implementation. Such premises are essentially theoretical: they are ‘imaginary’ in the sense that the conditions they describe, the logics of action and the structures of provision on which they focus are not proven, definite realities. This use of theory in the ways described above developed from the intellectual sea-change of the eighteenth century European Enlightenment. Prior to the Enlightenment, social organization was understood through theological worldviews, and government of the population justified largely according to divine right and religious edict: the Sovereign ruled over a subject population because he or she was divinely ordained to so. However, from the middle of the seventeenth century onwards a shift in intellectual thinking occurred which was to have major implications for the development of European societies. This historical period – The Enlightenment – marks a time when people start to be understood as self-creating, rather than as products of divine creation. A philosophical shift, questioning theological understandings of the human world and establishing the legitimacy of scientific explanations of the natural world, results eventually in a humanist understanding of social or ganization. The Enlightenment sees the establishment of new philosophical systems for understanding both the natural and human worlds and the development of rational responses to social problems. The Enlightenment promises progress and represents a faith in science as a progressive force which can understand, and hence solve, problems in the natural and social worlds. In this intellectual movement, new ways of thinking overlay those they were in the process of replacing, so that the cosmic transcendence of religious thought was replaced by the universalism of philosophy, and the methods and principles of the natural sciences. It was assumed that a theory could be developed that would substitute for the truth of religion. Eighteenth and nineteenth century social thought was focused, in the social sciences, on the search for one theory that could explain the social world and hence provide a guide to action – a theory that could be used in practice – famously captured by the term praxis. However, as the twentieth century developed, this conception of theory came under increasing attack, and this attack is one which has many implications for the use of theory in social work education and practice. Part 2 Some Problems With Theory Several events in Europe contributed to a questioning of the application of theory to practice. The establishment of a communist society based upon the premises of Marxist theory was one such event. As the mass exterminations, abuses of power and repressions of the communist state came to widespread notice, so did the rationales underlying them. The communist leadership, following particular strands of Marxist theory, imposed upon populations conditions which, in theory, were necessary for the development of a communist society. Those individuals who did not fit the predictions of theory, or questioned the premises upon which action was based, were considered ‘deviant’ and sent for ‘retraining’ in labour camps when they were not killed. The endless compulsory ‘self-criticism’ that members of various Marxist groups carried out was aimed at making individual behaviour conform to the tenets of theory. Yet when many thousands of individuals failed to conform, it was their behaviour that came under scrutiny, rather than the premises and assumptions of the theory, resulting in tragedy for thousands. The second tragedy was the application of theory to practice by Germany’s Nazi leadership. These two examples provide perhaps the most extreme illustrations of the application of theory to practice, but the history of social welfare is littered with more mundane examples that nevertheless cause great misery to those subject to theory application. We have seen the eugenics movement in the early twentieth century whose influence contributed to the institutionalisation (and worse) of people with learning difficulties, the widespread use in the mid-twentieth century of lobotomies in treating people with mental health problems and, to take two examples from this author’s practice career, the use of psychodynamic and behaviour modification theory in practice. I observed the use of psychodynamic theory in practice in the social work department of an acute unit in a psychiatric hospital. A senior social worker specialized in dealing with depressed female lone-parents. Reading through dozens of case-notes (meant to aid my practice) I was struck by the way that these women’s depression was attributed to various failures in their early psycho-sexual development, whilst their practical circumstances – victims of domestic violence, poor housing, lack of money – were completely ignored. Needless to say, these women failed to improve, but the point to note here is that this failure was not attributed to the faulty premises of the theory and the way in which it was being applied, but to the women’s innate psychopathology. My second example is taken from two years in a residential home for children with learning disabilities. Here a behaviour modification regime was implemented by management with no critical appreciation of debates in psychology about what it means to be human, what motivates behaviour and how behaviour should be understood. Those children who did not respond to ‘positive reinforcement’ (the majority) were labelled and punished, whilst the underlying problems of the theory itself left unexamined. In short, in both these cases, where service-users failed to fulfil predicted outcomes derived from particular theoretical paradigms, the response displayed a notably similar characteristic as in the examples from totalitarian societies – the users were pathologised, rather than theoretical premises examined.An objection could be made here that these examples merely demonstrate a-typical historical circumstances or incompetent practitioners. However, whether at the level of whole societies, whole social groups, or numerous disparate individuals, a backlash against the conjoining of knowledge and power has been manifest in many locations, including: the overthrow of communism in the Soviet Union, the critical interrogation of ‘totalising’ discourses, the decline in membership of organised, hierarchical political movements, the widespread development of ‘rights-based ’ and user movements, and a suspicion of ‘expert’ practice and bureaucraci es. In social theory, the last three decades or so has seen a particularly sustained interrogation of the status of Enlightenment theory. Under the impact of post-structuralism, particularly that associated with Foucault and Derrida , an unpackaging of the assumptions and premises of theory construction has severely undermined the ‘theory as truth and guide to practice’ position. This is not to say such challenges to Enlightenment theory did not exist before, for a long tradition of hermeneutic and phenomenological thought had posed alternative understandings of human and social action. Post-structuralism, however, has mounted a comprehensive and thorough critique of the epistemological basis of structuralism and realism. In the current examination of Enlightenment thought, Derrida ‘deconstructed’ major traditions in western social thought, showing how accounts of human knowledge depended on the use of key textual devices for obscuring problematic philosophical categories, or for revealing and endorsing particular interpretations and meanings of social and political progress. The construction of any text lends itself to several meanings and interpretations, such that it is impossible to arrive at any one fixed, ‘true’ account. Foucault, on the other hand, examined the epistemology underpinning the Enlightenment belief in the replacement of an institutionalised theological belief system with one which emphasised Reason and the limitless capacity of human knowledge. Enlightenment philosophy suggests that what occurs in the world is subject to entirely knowable and explainable laws that can be discovered and used in the progress of human society and human mastery over the natural and social world. Foucault’s contribution to the unpicking of this position was to show, through examinations of historical understandings of punishment and sexuality, that there are other ways of understanding this history which suggest a very different interpretation of the Enlightenment and its effects on social life, and demonstrate that many truths and experiences of social life co-exist that make it impossible to provide an overarching account that explains everything. At the same time, science constantly shifts its parameters, so that what may be ‘true’ at one historical moment is rendered false later. This brief outline cannot do justice to the sophistication and breadth of the critique of Enlightenment theory, critiques which have resulted in major debates over how we can know our world and what valid knowledge claims can be made (c.f., Lemert, 1999). Even where the foundations of poststructuralist epistemology are rejected there is a much greater appreciation of the problems associated with universalism and linear structures, two of the major props of Enlightenment theory. The permeation of these critiques is perhaps most evident in mainstream emphases on ‘difference’ and social constructivism, ‘difference’ and postmodernism, (c.f.,Briskman, 2001), and a general rejection in many disciplines of overarching, grand theory (Leonard, 1997). Here attention shifts to the assumptions embedded in theory and the way in which these assumptions become embedded in projects of nation-building, in legal and organisational structures, and in policy initiatives. Goldberg’s (1993, 2002) work on ‘race’ and racialization traces this process of embedding through an examination of the ways in which Enlightenment thought depended upon a racialized subject of social action and object of social theory. The pervasiveness of this discourse entrenches and normalizes symbolic representations and values both culturally and materially within the institutions of modern life (c.f., Goldberg, 1993: 8). The social sciences are ‘deeply implicated’ in the building of a racist culture and in the ‘hegemony of symbolic violence’ underpinning social systems (Goldberg, 1993: 12, 9). Roediger (1994) examines a similar process in American history and nation-building, pointing to a normalization of ‘Whiteness’ in the construction of conceptual and political subjects. This legacy enters social work in various ways (see Taylor, 1993), but appreciating the role of theory as cultural artefact, as a cultural product, produced in, and reproducing, social assumptions of normativity and relations of domination and subordination, can be similarly achieved in relation to gendered and sexualized categories, for example. This leads us to a situation in which theory itself can be understood as a key resource in forging a ‘modern’ consciousness, and socio-political spheres shot through with asymmetries of power (Penna and O’Brien, 1996/7), where exploitation and oppression operate through complex and unstable socio-economic mechanisms (O’Brien and Penna, 1996). Not only can the ‘social’ upon which we work not be known in its entirety, not be predicted, not be subject to fool-proof risk assessment, evaluation and so on, but theory production has arguably been a contributory mechanism in the creation of precisely many of those socially problematic circumstances that social work sets out to address. In short, Parton (2000:452) hits the nail on the head in claiming that we need to learn to live with ‘uncertainty, confusion and doubt’. Where then, does that leave theory in social work, if we accept this position? I want to turn briefly, and finally, to some suggestions of the use of theory in social work education. Using Theory At the beginning of this piece I suggested that we all use theory in our everyday lives. Given that this is so, and that theory permeates every aspect of academic work, policy implementation and practice initiatives, even when it is tacit and unacknowledged, I would propose that social work students and, ultimately, service-users, would be better served if students were taught how theory-construction takes place and how to unpackage and critically examine theoretical edifices, accounts and the components through which they are constructed. The task for social work students would be not the mechanistic injunction to ‘apply theory to practice’ but rather to consider how adequate the application of theory to practice might be in X or Y case. To do this, they would have to be taught not so much along ‘who-says-what’ lines, but rather in terms of how theorising as an activity works and how different theories are constructed. Theory building is an exercise in logic, moving from initial assumptions and premises to conclusions, through an argument linked by one or more claims. Taking these components apart can be taught as a skill (see, for example, Phelan and Reynolds, 1996; Thompson, 1996) rather than through the more philosophically based, social theory courses provided in many other disciplines. Tackling theory in a skills-based way has several advantages: it demystifies theory and enables students to see that, with practice, they can take a theory apart and reconstruct it in much the same way as a plumber or mechanic might tackle a job; it leads to a critical scrutiny of practice proposals derived from (often unstated) theoretical premises and to confidence in rejecting the inappropriate; and, when the theory fails to deliver, it leads to critical scrutiny of the theory rather than the person on the receiving end of it. This is not a plea for eclecticism, but for much more modest expectations of the theory-practice relationship than are currently formally embedded in many social work training programmes. I say ‘formally’ because many people have a suspicion of theory but, in my view, for the wrong reasons. Most theories offer insights into the ‘social’ sphere that is the ‘work’ of social workers but, ultimately, a theory is only as good as its critics. This paper considers the demand for social work students in Britain to demonstrate that they can ‘apply theory to practice’ as part of qualifying requirements. It suggests that this demand betrays a lack of understanding of what theory is and what it can do and, at best, leaves students confused, whilst at worst it leads to cruel or ineffective practices in agencies. Understanding the relationship between theory and practice has long been a source of debate and, in many respects, the recent debate continues, and draws upon, consistent themes in social theory over the relative merits or otherwise of positivist paradigms with their underlying assumptions of a social world that can be revealed through the application of correct techniques. The early debates in social theory were structured by a widespread belief in the power of scientific and secular-philosophical knowledge to provide for the direction and improvement of natural and social life. The ‘age of reason’ provided a context of optimism in the possibilities for a collective life informed by justice and representing the march of progress. This paper outlines the historical context that has led to a particular understanding of theory as a guide to action, points to some perils of its application in practice, and suggests a different method of dealing with theory on social work degree schemes. Evidence-based practice in teaching and teacher education What is it? What is the rationale? What is the criticism? Where to go now? Christer Brusling, Oslo University College, Centre for Study of the Professions. Invited paper to a workshop at the conference Professional Development of Teachers in a Lifelong Perspective: Teacher Education, Knowledge Production and Institutional Reform. Centre for Higher Education Greater Copenhagen in collaboration with OECD, Copenhagen, November, 17-18. 2005. What is it? Where does it come from? What is the rationale? This movement, if I may call it that, seems to have originated in the British educational context, and with a lecture given by David Hargreaves to the Teacher Training Agency in 1996. Unfortunately I have been unable to get a copy of it in Norway – there is none in Norwegian libraries1. Lacking this original source I will rely on what comes forward in second-hand sources, in published criticisms in mainly British journals, and in later articles by Hargreaves, where he answers his critics. Philip Davies (1999) from University of Oxford, â€Å"the other place† from Hargreaves’ That doesn’t mean that the movement hasn’t reached Norway. A recent NOK 100 million proposal for educational research in partnership with schools show that at least the former conservative government knew about it, mainly through Demos, a British â€Å"independent think tank† (demos.co.uk) Agora nr. 8 – tidsskrift for forskning, udvikling og idà ©udveksling i professioner www.cvustork.dk/agora 88 perspective, writes favourably about evidence-based education in an article named â€Å"What is evidence-based education?†. He says that it operates on two levels, the first being â€Å"to utilize existing evidence from worldwide research and literature on education and related subjects†, the second â€Å"to establish sound evidence where existing evidence is lacking or of a questionable, uncertain, or weak nature† (p.109). The first level is described thus: Educationalists at all levels need to be able to: †¢ pose an answerable question about education; †¢ know where and how to find evidence systematically and comprehensively using the electronic (computer-based) and non-electronic (print) media; †¢ retrieve and read such evidence competently and undertake critical appraisal and analysis of that evidence according to agreed professional and scientific standards; †¢ organise and grade the power of this evidence; and †¢ determine its relevance to their educational needs and environments2. (Davies 1999, p.109). Davies acknowledges the debt of the education sector to medicine and other health professions, which predated education with fi ve to ten years in the implementation of the idea of evidence-based practices. According to Davies, it is derived from the University of Oxford Master’s programme in Evidence Based Health Care. argreaves explicitly argues for evidence-based teaching by pointing to the success of the idea in medicine, and by the similarity of the work of doctors and teachers: Practicing doctors and teachers are applied professionals, practical people making interventions in the lives of their clients in order to promote worthwhile ends – health or learning. Doctors and teachers are similar in that they make 2 Note that evidence-based education in this defi nition curiously enough comes out as a pure intellectual exercise, lacking the fi nal application to practice. Agora nr. 8 – tidsskrift for forskning, udvikling og idà ©udveksling i professioner www.cvustork.dk/agora 89 decisions involving complex judgements. Many doctors draw upon research about the effects of their practice to inform and improve their decisions; most teachers do not, and this is a difference. (Hargreaves 1997, p. ) One reason to turn to evidence-based education is that doing so would make education less vulnerable to â€Å"political ideology, conventional wisdom, folklore, and wishful thinking†, not to mention â€Å"trendy teaching methods based on activity-based, student-centred, self-directed learning and problem solving† (Davies 1999, p. 109). But what constitutes evidence? For Hargreaves (1997) evidence is evidence about â€Å"what works†. The dictionary says that evidence is â€Å"something that furnishes proof† (m-w.com). To be able to provide proof of the â€Å"working† you need to measure the outcome of the teaching activity in question, and you need a procedure of relating the measured outcomes to the activity to make the relation an evidence3. Hargreaves doesn’t see much of a problem with how outcomes are constructed, but is adamant about what ought to be the preferred procedure, the RCT, the randomized control trial, often called â€Å"the golden standard†4. Davies (1999), on the other hand, is more permissive of a variety of procedures, thus voicing a broader conception of educational outcomes. In addition to RCT, he mentions survey and correlational methods, regression analysis and analysis of variance. He allows for inquiries that seek to describe the meanings different people attach to different teaching activities, and the broader and long-term consequences of them, e.g. on â€Å"students’ and parents’ sense of self and their sense of social worth and identity† (p. 115). Analyses of naturally occurring teaching interactions, conversation and discourse are In keeping with the parallel with medicine, I would say that not only expected and beneficial outcomes should be measured but also non-expected and possibly harmful ones. Hargreaves here echoes the standard text of research methodology from 1963, Campbell & Stanley, Experimental and Quasi-experimental Designs for Research: â€Å"[We are] committed to the experiment: as the only means for settling disputes regarding educational practice, as the only way of verifying educational improvements, and as the only way of establishing a cumulative tradition†. Cited by Howe (2005), p.308. Agora nr. 8 – tidsskrift for forskning, udvikling og idà ©udveksling i professioner www.cvustork.dk/agora 90 also mentioned as worth-while in this context. He further wants to ask normative questions within the evidence-based teaching paradigm: â€Å"whether or not it is right or warrantable to undertake a particular educational activity or health care intervention† (p.115). Davies’ (1999) omission of the necessary last element in evidence-based practice, i.e. how the purported evidence is to be put to use in practice, avoids a difficult and much discussed problem. Hargreaves (1999b) is of course right in pointing out that this problem is different if practice refers to policy making, as in the phrase evidence-based policy, or to teaching in classrooms, as in the phrase evidence-based teaching. The use of evidence in policy making is about deciding on â€Å"large issues concerned with levels and types of resource allocation – decisions which are difficult to undo† while the use of evidence in teaching â€Å"refer to the relatively small-scale professional practices of teachers in schools and classrooms, which can usually be easily revised† (Hargreaves 1999b, p. 245). In both circumstances enter a lot of considerations apart from â€Å"evidence†. Answering critique from Hammersley (1997) Hargreaves (1999b) admits that context sensitive â€Å"’practical wisdom’ pervades (both) expert medical and educational practice. There is some hard science deep in the knowledge-base of doctors, but the closer a doctor gets to an individual patient, the stronger the elements of judgement or of practical wisdom that also enters into the decision. Teachers acquire ‘practical wisdom’ too; but, in comparison with doctors, they have little accepted scientifi c knowledge to insert into their decision-making.† He claims that the infra structure of knowledge available to teachers is far less developed than that available to doctors, and that teachers seem to be less effi cient than doctors in fi nding the scientifi c knowledge there is. He argues that one reason for this is that the knowledge base in medicine is cumulative while that in education is not, but ought to become. This leads to Davies (1999) second level of concerns about evidence-based teaching: â€Å"to establish sound evidence where existing evidence is lacking or of a questionable, uncertain, or weak nature†. Hargreaves’ lecture in 1996 to the Teacher Training Agency stated that teachers only to a small extent base their practice on (hard) scientific evidence, but he didn’t blame teachers but researchers for failing to produce such evidence, especially produced by RCT procedures. With the  £12,000,000 funding for developing evidence-based policy and practice by research he hoped researchers would be encouraged to respond appropriately (Hargreaves 1999a). In another journal article the same year, titled â€Å"The Knowledge Creating School†, he urges teachers themselves to produce the knowledge they need. To sum up: Evidence-based teaching is a concept borrowed from the health sciences and recommended for teachers (you might add: by new-public-management-governments and elite researchers). You may get the impression that it’s use implies a critique of teachers for not including research-based evidence in deliberations on how to teach, but mainly it is a critique of educational researchers for not providing the needed cumulative research-base, built on research of the randomized control trial (RCT) kind. The rationale is that once such research has taken off and its results have been efficiently disseminated, evidence-based, or evidence informed, teaching will become more frequent. Critique of the notion of evidence-based practice Hammersley (1999) challenges Hargreaves’ on three accounts: his description of educational research as non-cumulative, his prescription on how research could contribute to practice, and his argument that education should learn from medicine, which he considers a parallel to education. Hammersley shares the view that educational research could become more cumulative, but researching ‘what works’ has not proved successful in this respect, despite sustained attempts: â€Å"much educational research in the first two-thirds of the twentieth century was devoted to investigation of effective teaching; and one of the reasons for the changes in educational research over the past 20 years is precisely the failure of this work to produce conclusive, cumulative fi ndings† (p.144). But he also reminds us that there are different meanings of the concept â€Å"cumulative†. There are obvious â€Å"problems involved in identifying distinct and standardised ‘treatments’ in education†, Hammersley exemplifi es by the â€Å"problems faced by researchers seeking to distinguish teaching styles†. What about the problems in operationalising the concept of learning? What should be done about the disagreements about what students should learn? What about the problems of how to measure â€Å"the most important kinds of learning†? Hammersley asks if it is possible even in principle to do so. A preoccupation with what is easily measured may very well have profound effect on teaching, narrowing objectives accordingly. To establish fixed, universal causal patterns in teaching seems equally difficult, if not impossible. What might be aspired to is â€Å"local, context-sensitive patterns in which interpretation and decision on the part of teachers and students play an important role. Unlike in most areas of medicine, in education the ‘treatments’ consist of symbolic interaction, with all the scope for multiple interpretations and responses which that implies†. Hammersley thinks that â€Å"the production of information of high practical relevance usually depends on a great deal of knowledge that does not have such relevance†¦for science to be able to contribute knowledge that is relevant to practice, a division of labour is required: a great deal of coordinated work is necessary tackling smaller, more manageable problems that do not have immediate pay-off†. Hargreaves is described as having a â€Å"narrowly instrumental view of practical relevance†, promoting an ‘engineering model’ of the relationship between research and practice. An engineering model assumes that most teaching problems are technical, which is not likely. On the contrary they seem in most cases to be ‘practical’, that is involving making judgements in complex situations, exercising discretion, not following rules. The analogy with medicine is criticised for not taking into account that the practice of medicine is more towards the engineering side of a continuum which at the other side has the practical. Even within medicine the notion of evidence-based practice has been criticised for downplaying practical judgement in clinical situations, that â€Å"the focus of clinical practice is subtly shifted away from the care of individuals toward the care of populations, and the complex nature of sound clinical judgement is not fully appreciated† (Tonelli 2000). Hammersley cites a medical researcher who raises the same critique towards medical research as Hargreaves does to educational research: it is methodological weak, use inappropriate designs, unrepresentative and small samples, incorrect methods of analysis, and faulty interpretations. The blame is put on practitioners doing research without adequate research training, a fact that doesn’t actually support Hargreaves’ recommendation that more teacher research should lead to a stronger body of knowledge with practical relevance. Hammersley concludes his critique: â€Å"The diagnosis (of the current state of educational research) is mistaken and, taken as a whole: the prescription is likely to be lethal†. In the North American context an equally forceful critique of the arguments for research for evidence-based practice has been voiced by Howe (2005). His critique is organised under the headings â€Å"experimentism5 and scientifi c method†, and â€Å"experimentism and values†. The object of his analysis is a National Research Council report, Scientifi c Research in Education (2002), which he means represent a more moderate form of experimentism than other infl uential publications advocating research for evidence-based practice. In short he states that this report: †¢ unconvincingly characterizes the conduct of research as hierarchical, both temporally and logically (p. 309); †¢ offers little defense of its call for a renewed emphasis on randomised experiments against well-known criticisms regarding the issue of external validity (generalisability from research contexts to other contexts) (p.309); †¢ does not take into account Cronbach’s observation that generalizations decay, The word †experimentism† is used by Howe to refer to scientifi c research advocating the randomised control trial as the â€Å"best† research method. thus making the goal of a cumulative education science fundamentally unattainable; †¢ does not take into account that human intentionality signifi cantly complicates how to understand causal explanation in social research; †¢ places outcomes outside educational research, by focusing on means; †¢ places not-manipulable variables, like socio-economic stratifi cation, outside the limits of educational research by insisting on RCT as the method of choice, thus making educational research â€Å"a political innocent exercise†. Howe (2005) turns to Toulmin (2001) to fi nd an alternative to experimentism – an alternative that is without the short-comings described above: Activities for which social research is often seen as a tool for improvement – medicine and education, for instance – call for intentional behaviour on the part of practitioners in the form of craft-based practical judgement. Stephen Toulmin observes that when performed well, these judgements must respond in a â€Å"timely† manner to the unique and unanticipated actions of other persons, as well as to their different ways of seeing things. According to Toulmin, research informing such practices should exemplify a model that is â€Å"clinical† and â€Å"democratic† rather than â€Å"applied† and â€Å"elite† (Howe 2005, p. 317). Teachers’ relationship to research Do teachers experience a lack of research results when planning to teach? How do teachers relate to educational research? Do teachers fi nd some research genres more relevant and practically useful than others? Does teachers’ practice-based research contribute to a knowledge base of teaching? None of these questions are raised in the early discussions on evidence-based teaching, but specific answers to them seem to enter as premises to prescriptions. I would think that the answer to the first question is no. A common place view of teachers’ planning is that it is based on textbooks and concerned with amounts of â€Å"covering†, using standard methods of classroom instruction: a short introduction by the teacher, independent pupil work with textbook exercises, question-and-answer-patterns, summing up by the teacher in class. Twenty years ago research on teachers’ planning was frequent, today it seems to be an almost closed field of study. Perhaps the expectations of the paradigm of evidence-based teaching on teachers to include research results in their deliberations on how to teach may lead to its re-opening. Do teachers find some research genres more relevant and practically useful than others? Kennedy (1999) observes that: Many genre advocates refer to teachers to justify their arguments, claiming that teachers need more authoritative knowledge (so we should conduct experiments), more dynamic portraits that reveal multiple truths (so we should write narratives), or more richly detailed accounts (so we should do ethnographies). (Kennedy 1999, p.511) Case studies and ethnographies, she continues, have long been justified by: †¦contentions that educational events are governed not by universal laws of cause and effect but, instead, by human interactions and by multiple concurrent and interacting influences; that the meanings of these events can be understood only within their context; that detailed descriptions of the full range of these interactions and dynamics are the only way to accurately represent these events and their meanings; that the kind of complex dynamic knowledge represented in case studies and ethnographies is more like the kind of knowledge ordinary people use to store their experiences; and that such detailed and multifaceted descriptions enable audiences to see similarities and differences between the research setting and their own situations, thus enabling generalizations by analogy rather than by statistical extrapolation. (Kennedy 1999, p.54) She sets out to investigate if teachers find some research genres more persuasive, more relevant, and more influential on own practice, than others, and if so, what features of each genre contribute to these evaluations. 100 teachers were interviewed after having read five articles describing research of different genres. Results show that the three evaluative criteria were highly correlated, but also that reasons for valuing them varied across genres. Experiments appeared to be highly valued, but so were non-experimental comparisons and narratives. Case studies appeared more influential than surveys. Independent of genre research studies proved to be particularly useful if they â€Å"helped teachers understand the relationship between teaching and learning† (Kennedy 1999, p.528). Kennedy concludes that a majority of teachers found most of the articles persuasive and relevant, but for different reasons. The genre contentions with which she started were not empirically verified. The TTA itself designed a questionnaire on teachers’ perspectives on educational research, and distributed it as attachments to journals of two teacher organisations, one for primary teachers, the other for secondary teachers. Everton, Galton & Pell (2000) report on the findings. As an unknown number of subscribers were â€Å"corporate members for local education authorities and industrial companies† they were unable to specify teachers’ response percentages. It was however estimated that the first group only returned 15% of the questionnaires, the second possibly a little more. In the second group most, i.e. 84%, were filled out by school leaders. All in all: the manner this investigation was carried out does not justify its analysis in terms of â€Å"teachers’ perspectives†. Does teachers’ practice-based research contribute to a knowledge base of teaching? As a result of Hargreaves 1996 lecture to the Teacher Training Agency the British government allocated  £54000 to the funding of teacher research projects. In an evaluation of the resulting reports Foster (1999) found that â€Å"a significant minority of the projects appeared to be practical: concerned with the improvement of teaching, learning or educational achievement, rather than the production of knowledge† (p. 383). He found â€Å"that only in a minority of the reports are factual claims well established†¦ as a result, it is difficult to see these as much more than opinion based on pre-existing views of good practice† (p. 393). Foster concludes that critical scrutiny of findings from teacher research before dissemination is crucial, but is afraid that â€Å"the view of knowledge production and dissemination which underpins this TTA scheme sees little role for such scrutiny. The priorities are rapid production and immediate dissemination to practitioners† (p. 395). To sum up: There is research evidence that teachers see the RCT research genre as relevant and useful to practice, but no more so than many other research genres. There is research evidence that teachers’ practice-based research does not contribute substantially to a body of knowledge on teaching, not to mention a cumulative one. Concluding remarks In line with the observation that there is more to teachers’ decision making than following authoritative evidence-based rules for practice, the discourse have changed from talking dichotomously about evidence-based/not evidence-based teaching to talking about evidence-informed teaching (Hargreaves 1999b) or the extent to which teaching is evidence-based (Davies 1999). It is interesting to note that while waiting (?) for research-produced evidence on â€Å"what works†, in teaching and in teacher education, British teacher education has become teacher training, managed by the Training & Development Agency for Schools. Its publication â€Å"Qualifying to teach. Professional standards for qualified teacher status and requirements for initial teacher training† lists skills, competencies and understandings would-be teachers must acquire (TDA 2005). Hagger & McIntyre (2000) complains that â€Å"these lists have been accompanied neither by any rationale for the items listed nor by any explanation of the conception of teaching expertise which underlies the lists† (p. 485). Not surprisingly, I found that in this publication the word ‘training’ appears 51 times, the word ‘education’ 15 times (most of these in naming school subjects or institutions), the words ‘research’, and ‘theory’ did not appear at all. My conclusion is that there are serious problems, philosophical, historical, and political problems, with the notion of evidence-based practice transferred to teaching and teacher education, at least in its original interpretation. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). (1999). Omnibus Survey. Rockville, Maryland Hill, K., & Romich, B. (2002). AAC evidence-based clinical practice: A model for success. AAC Institute Press, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 1-6. McKibbon, K.A., Wilczynski, N., Hayward, R.S., Walker-Dilks, Cynthia, & Haynes, R.B. (1995). The medical literature as a resource for evidence based care. Working Paper from the Health Information Research Unit, Mc,Master University, Ontario, Canada. Sackett, D.L., Rosenberg, W.MC, Gray, J.M., Haynes, R.B., Richardson, W.S. (1996). Evidence-based medicine: What it is and what it isn’t. British Medical Journal. 321: 71-2 American Educational Research Association (2005). Research Points. http://www. aera.net/publications/?id=314 (downloaded 15.11.2005) British Medical Journals Publishing Group (2005). Clinical Evidence. http://www. clinicalevidence.com/ceweb/conditions/index.jsp (downloaded 15.11.2005). Campbell Collaboration (2005). The Education Coordinating Group. http://www. cahs.colostate.edu/r-dcenter/CCECG/home.asp (downloaded 15.11.2005). Davies, P. (1999). What is evidence-based education? British Journal of Educational Studies, 47, 2, 108-121. Everton, T., Galton, M. & Pell, T. (2000). Foster, P. (1999). ‘Never mind the quality, feel the impact’: a methodological assessment of teacher research sponsored by the Teacher Training Agency. British Journal of Educational Studies, 47, 4, 380-398. Hagger, h. & McIntyre, D. (2000). What can research tell us about teacher education? Oxford Review of Education, 26, 3-4, 483-494. Hammersley, M. (1997). Educational research and teaching: A response to David Hargreaves’ TTA lecture. British Educationl Research Journal, 23, 2, 141-162. Hargreaves, D. (1996). Teaching as a research-based profession: possibilities and prospects. London: Teacher Training Agency. Hargreaves, D. (1997). In defence of research for evidence-based teaching: A rejoinder to Martyn Hammersley. British Educational Research Journal, 23, 4, 405- 419. Hargreaves, D. (1999a). The knowledge-creating school. British Journal of Educational Studies, 47, 2, 122-144. Hargreaves, D. (1999b). Revitalizing educational research: lessons from the past and proposals for the future. Cambridge Journal of Education, 29, 2, 239-249. Howe, K.R. (2005). The education science question: A symposium. Educational Theory, 55, 3, 235-321. Kennedy, M. (1999). A test of some contentions about educational research. American Educational Research Journal, 36, 3, 511-541. Tonelli, M.R. (1998). The philosophical limits of evidence-based medicine. Academic Medicine, 73, 12, 1234-1240. Training & Development Agency for Schools (2005). Qualifying to teach. Professional standards for qualifi ed teacher status and requirements for initial teacher Agora nr. 8 – tidsskrift for forskning, udvikling og idà ©udveksling i professioner www.cvustork.dk/agora 100 training. Department for education and skills, London (downloaded 15 November, 2005, from www.tda.gov.uk). Briskman, L. (2001) ‘A Moral Crisis for Social Work: Critical Practice & Codes of Ethics’ in Critical Social Work, vol2, no1. pp1-9 Golberg, D.T. (2002) The Racial State. Blackwell. Oxford/Massachusetts Golberg, D.T. (1993) Racist Culture. Philosophy and the Politics of Meaning. Blackwell. Oxford/Massachusetts Lemert, C. (1999) ‘A World of Differences: What if it’s So? How will we know?’ in O’Brien, M., Penna, S. and Hay, C. (eds) Theorising Modernity. Reflexivity, Environment and Identity in Giddens’ Social Theory. Longman. London and New York. pp179-206 Leonard, P. (1997) Postmodern Welfare: Reconstructing an Emancipatory Project, Sage, London O’Brien, M and Penna, S. (1998) Theorising Welfare. Enlightenment and Modern Society. Sage, London O’Brien, M and Penna, S. (1996) ‘Postmodern Theory and Politics: Perspectives on Citizenship and Social Justice’ in Innovation, vol 9, no 2, pp185-203 Parton, N. (2000) ‘Some Thoughts on the Relationship between Theory and Practice in and for Social Work’, Brt. Jnl of Social Work, 30, 449-463 Penna, S., O’Brien, M. and Hay, C. (1999) ‘Introduction’ in O’Brien, M., Penna, S. and Hay, C. (eds) Theorising Modernity. Reflexivity, Environment and Identity in Giddens’ Social Theory. Longman. London and New York Penna, S. and O’Brien, M. (1996/7) ‘Inequality, transformation and Political Agency: reflections on Theresa Ebert’s red feminismn’ in Rethinking Marxism, vol 9, no 3, pp95-102 Phelan, P. and Reynolds, P. (1996) Argument and Evidence. Critical analysis for the social sciences. Routledge, London. Roedeger, D. (1994) Towards the Abolition of Whiteness. Verso, London, New York. Seidman, S. (1994) The Post-modern Turn. New Perspectives on Social Theory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Taylor, G. (1993) ‘Challenges from the Margins’ in Clarke, J. (ed) A Crisis in Care? Challenges to Social Work. Sage, London. Thomson, A. (1996) Critical Reasoning. A practical introduction. Routledge, London. Trevillion, S. (2000) ‘Social Work Research: What Kind of Knowledge/Knowledges? An Introduction to the Papers’, Brt. Jnl of Social Work, 30, 429-432 Sue Penna, Ph.D. can be contacted via e-mail at: S.Penna@lancaster.ac.uk

Contextual studies Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Contextual studies - Case Study Example I. Introduction (160 words) Costume and set design is an element of a movie production that tries to make a film seem real. Here the costumes and sets from two movies will be analyzed, for their ability to move the viewer backward and forward in time, making different worlds detailed, authentic, and ultimately, more believable. The movies that will be analyzed in each section are the movies The Hours and Peggy Sue Got Married. Costuming and set design can completely revolutionize the way a movie appears. If one has, as a director, sweeping visuals and detailed props, it makes an environment come alive with wonder. Costuming, especially in period pieces, definitely enhances the quality of a movie, because the people acting in the movie are much more likely to feel that they are part of a genuinely-created world, but that it doesn’t feel that it is created. It feels genuine, both to the performing artist creating the piece, as well as to the viewer. II. A Detailed World (400 wor ds) The details in the movie The Hours are chillingly accurate, from the decor in Virginia Woolf’s English house to the clothes that she wears, as well as the sets designed for the characters at the other levels in the movie. Similarly, in Peggy Sue Got Married, Peggy Sue’s â€Å"blast to the past† back to the ‘60s before her and her husband got married has some very good sets and costuming. Details in sets and costuming make a movie seem more real, to be sure. Details such as the particular hat that Virginia Woolf wore in The Hours and her furnishings in her house are definitely throwbacks to 19th-century England. In The Hours, Mrs. Brown (Richard’s mother) wears clothing that has an air of the ‘50s about it. Her household appliances and decor of her house are all post-war-inspired. The contemporary apparel that Meryl Streep wears in her appearance as Clarissa Vaughn (a friend of Richard’s) in The Hours, reflects the dress and style of a 21st-century woman living in Manhattan in New York. So do the furnishings in her own flat also reflect a modernistic tone with a homey and soft—versus aloof and austere—look. Her flat looks lived-in and accessible. In Peggy Sue Got Married, we are vaulted from Peggy Sue’s late 20th-century birthday party which has a cake on the set that is shaped in the form of a large letter â€Å"X,† symbolizing, subconsciously, that she has gotten divorced. This is a key prop that is used to set the scene of the movie. The fact that Peggy Sue wakes up as a high school student at her parents’ house is frought with reminders from the ‘60s. Peggy Sue wakes up in the nurse’s office after supposedly fainting while giving blood. Peggy Sue’s house is typical of a house in the ‘60s, with its architecture and appearance. Peggy Sue’s clothing is typical of a ‘60s female high school student—complete with a hoop skirt and a l etterman sweater. Some of the details in this movie--such as Peggy Sue’s future husband Charlie’s car, an old Mustang with flared sides, and the motorcycle ridden by poet-beatnik, black leather jacket-wearing Michael, whom Peggy Sue rides off with for an evening date—only enhance the quality of the movie, and make one feel the genuineness of the movie with its surroundings. Thus, this movie becomes more ‘real,’ as it were. III. An Authentic World (420 words) The worlds in both The Hours and Peggy Sue Got Married are authentic. This is because, in the movie The Hours, costuming and set design both contribute to the genuineness of the movie by having clothing and period pieces that evoke those particular time periods. The same is true of Peggy Sue Got Married. In The Hours, the flowered apron that Mrs. Brown wears, along with the decor of her ‘

NCR Country Club and Different Sampling Design Decisions Essay - 1

NCR Country Club and Different Sampling Design Decisions - Essay Example As a result, the organization had 886 additional survey results. The decision to include spouses was correct since they have a significant impact on the lifestyle and consumer choices of their partners. In addition, the inclusion of nonmembers and employees ensures that the organization gets a global understanding of the issue. In addition, the sampling strategy focused on key aspects of its consumer base. The research involved people who lived in the community, the neighboring areas and outside its area. In addition, it focused on the gender of the participants. The analysis of the collected data showed that the research had succeeded in involving all the key elements of its customers. As a result, the information revealed by the process could be implemented appropriately. Furthermore, it ensures that NCR Country Club has a strong understanding of its market. In addition, it is evident that the researchers considered demographic factors in their sampling strategy. The reference to young consumers shows that the data could be broken down into age groups and other demographic factors. The approach is important because demographic factors have a significant impact on consumer behavior (La, 2005). As a result, the organization will be able to determine how it should handle different types of clients. Consequently, it is clear that all the sampling decisions in this process were handled correctly. In as much as the questionnaire is well designed, it still has some shortcomings. For instance, the questionnaire has not included open-ended questions. All the questions are closed. Although the approach ensures that the participants are focused on the aim of the question, it denies them the opportunity to express themselves. The participants may have important insights that could have helped the organization. The lack of open-ended questions shows that the organization does not care about the feelings of its consumers.  

To prepare a marketing communications plan to launch a new brand Essay

To prepare a marketing communications plan to launch a new brand (Yumee) into the UK market - Essay Example The report provides a comprehensive marketing communication plan for the new product â€Å"Yummee† a fresh fruit juice to be launched in to the UK market. A market analysis along with target market segments is discussed prior to setting marketing objectives. The marketing communication plan is linked to these overall marketing objectives to ensure a fully integrated marketing communication strategy. The Exotic Juice Company Ltd (TEJCL) is in the second position in the UK’s fresh fruit juice and fruit based drinks such as smoothies market behind the market leader, Innocence. The company has earned a reputation for product quality over the past hundred years of its existence and have a brand image, which is of â€Å"value for money† contrary to the high-end premium priced Innocence products. With their product portfolio currently carting orange, grapefruit and pineapple based products, the company wishes to expand their range with introduction of products, which targets the growing segment of health conscious consumers. After intensive investments in product development and market research, the company is ready to launch â€Å"Yummee† a product made of Yumberry, a â€Å"super fruit† from Australia, which is a rare and precious berry that provides a deep red colored juice and is purported to carry healthy benefits. For a company to be successful in business, it needs to respond to the changes in the market place by developing and implementing business strategies, that takes in to account the dynamic micro and macro business environment (Abell 1980, Thomson & Strickland 2003). The report provides a market analysis of the Fresh Fruit Juice market in UK and also assess the new product, Yummee’s strengths and weaknesses in relation to environmental conditions. . A SWOT analysis can be used in drawing conclusions on how a company can best align its resource base to take advantage of the business opportunities while safeguarding

Argument of Value Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Argument of Value - Essay Example But, as the movie tries to portray, it never takes itself seriously. All the fun does not get lost owing to the apparent upheavals in the lives of the characters. There is a definitive degree of fresh air in the treatment of the main characters. From the very beginning, the viewer is drawn into the intricacies of the characters, their joys and life. Even in the deepest melancholy, there are streaks of hope and happiness. In that sense, this movie has veered away from the staple comedy movies which lack poignant humor, but cover it up with condescending laughter. The movie exposes the tumultuous underbelly of human emotions with a fine serving of humor. This movie is perched between a razor sharp psychological drama on one hand and comedy on another. The film has a very upbeat title, which suggests the likeliness of having a generic bent towards the creation of a happy atmosphere: that is not very serious. It has all the ingredients of a nice movie, with the creation of sequences that exude positive spirit. A hero who is full of faults, a heroine with very doubtful credentials, the Christmas streets, the snow flaked roads are a constant reminder of the impending festivities. Throw on top of that, a dance competition and a football game, the movie tries to cover all the bases for a happy Hollywood film. ... Robert De Niro has played a delicious role as the father, who is torn among different problems. He runs an illegal gambling racket out of his parlour. He has a very supportive mother, who keeps him company. However, he is supposed to stay away from his wife and has to visit a doctor. All of the characters are obsessed with something in their lives, with sports being a big obsession. There is a tradition of disruptive violence, as the crowd identifies the game with their identity. The father of the hero has been banned from appearing in the matches due to the bouts of rage, which were experienced while viewing the match. One of the central characters in the movie is a young widow called as Tiffany. She is a good looking woman who lives in the garage of her parent’s home. She is preparing for a dancing competition, with the help of the hero. They bond over a dinner and she agrees to help him reunite him with his wife. The strength of the film lies in the differential treatment b eing given to the generic comic situations. Although, there is a lot of pain in the lives of the characters, there is sense of joy that runs throughout the fabric of the film. There are a number of scenes that would be very difficult even in real lives, but the handling of the situations has rendered the scenes funny. Some of the examples of such scenes; as the fighting in the diner that spreads onto the street: and also among the crowd wearing the Halloween dress. The film goes over the edge at times, but never fails to maintain the humorous simplicity in the storyline. The narrative is contextual and also very relevant due to the essential foresight being provided into the human heart. The design of the story has been calibrated with a lot of alacrity, so as to incite the maximum level of

Gender Roles Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Gender Roles - Essay Example On Fridays, Muslim congregations set children, woman and men in distinct groups. While at home, men are regarded as the heads of households, and they are the ones that lead the prayers (Okkenhaug & Flaskerud, 2005). Within a marriage context, mothers are highly appreciated, and the greatest achievement for a woman is motherhood. While in the family, a believer is not permitted to treat his wife in a harsh manner, even if he does not like her. Today, most scholars stipulate that husbands are supposed to treat their wives based on societal norms, and emphasize on mutual agreement while making family decisions (Moghadam, 2003). In the Middle East context, the role that each gender plays is guided by religion and culture, which creates room for a cruel tradition. The factors that contribute to the oppression of women in India consist of religious, economic, education and the various geographical locations in the country (Chakrapani & Kumar, 2002). Women are associated with low social status, though most of the practices that Hindus engage in are dedicated to them. However, most of the laws in India do not treat woman fairly like men (Nanda, 2009). Therefore, it is evident that the diverse roles that genders play are associated with the different cultural practices and the geographical location of a particular society. The history of women has not been well documented prior to 1500 because the word â€Å"man† stood for both men and women. As a result it was believed by most student scholars that history only comprised of men. In Middle East, just like men women revolved around the normal activities of war, diplomacy and industry. According to the Middle East history, there are some activities that women have played a greater role than men (Okkenhaug & Flaskerud, 2005). These activities include: healthcare, childbearing, cloths production, arts and religion. In the current society, women are engaged in vast activities that they were not