Portrayals of Women in Transnational Arab Television Drama Series

This content analysis of 15 Arabic and 3 Turkish drama serials on transnational Arab television examined the gender portrayals of characters. The analysis of 743 characters found that women were underrepresented, less likely to have recognizable jobs, and more likely than men to be portrayed in sex-typed occupations, activities, and settings. The analysis also revealed that programs with female writers were significantly less gender stereotypical. Moreover, differences were found among the producing Arab countries in terms of the portrayals of women; conservative countries had more sex-typed portrayals than the more liberal Arab countries, whereas Turkish programs had similar portrayals to Arabic programs produced in the liberal Arab states. The general findings are discussed in comparison to U.S. programming, and in relation to selective exposure, identification with characters, and potential effects on Arab viewers' gender role beliefs.     

Format Overlap of the New York Times: A Collection Management Case Study

The issue in academic libraries of format duplication for the same title in print, microfilm, and electronic formats continues to strain library budgets, facilities, and staff. This article reviews the criteria used by a medium-sized academic library for deciding what formats of the New York Times to continue to collect and maintain. A research study was conducted to ascertain the completeness of coverage in both the online and microfilm formats of this title, with the results used as additional decision criteria.     

Characteristics of child abuse in immigrant Korean families and correlates of placement decisions

OBJECTIVE: This study examined the characteristics and patterns of child abuse among immigrant Korean families in Los Angeles and critical variables that contribute to the type of placement made by the child protective services (CPS) system. METHOD: Data were obtained from reviewing and analyzing 170 active Korean case files maintained by the Asian Pacific Unit (APU) of the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services (LAC-DCFS) during July through September, 2001. Logistic regression analysis was employed to examine the odds of children being kept in or removed from the home. RESULTS: Some of the major findings from this study include: (1) immigrant Korean families are more likely to be charged with physical abuse (49.4%) and less likely to be charged with neglect (20.6%) in comparison with all other groups in Los Angeles (13.2% and 27.1%, respectively); (2) the circumstance under which physical abuse occurred most frequently was corporal punishment used by Korean parents with an intention to discipline their children; and (3) the context under which emotional abuse occurred among the Korean families was likely to be children's witnessing domestic violence. In addition, the logistic regression showed that response status, referral source, living arrangement, victim's relationship to perpetrator, and chronicity of abuse were significant in predicting out-of-home placement. CONCLUSIONS: An analysis of Korean child abuse cases reported to child protective service revealed that culture and child rearing practices shaped the patterns of child maltreatment. A culturally sensitive approach is strongly suggested for effective child abuse prevention and intervention services with this group by CPS agencies.     

Real time search on the web: Queries,topics, and economic value

Real time search is an increasingly important area of information seeking on the Web. In this research, we analyze 1,005,296 user interactions with a real time search engine over a 190 day period. Using query log analysis, we investigate searching behavior, categorize search topics, and measure the economic value of this real time search stream. We examine aggregate usage of the search engine, including number of users, queries, and terms. We then classify queries into subject categories using the Google Directory topical hierarchy. We next estimate the economic value of the real time search traffic using the Google AdWords keyword advertising platform. Results shows that 30% of the queries were unique (used only once in the entire dataset), which is low compared to traditional Web searching. Also, 60% of the search traffic comes from the search engine’s application program interface, indicating that real time search is heavily leveraged by other applications. There are many repeated queries over time via these application program interfaces, perhaps indicating both long term interest in a topic and the polling nature of real time queries. Concerning search topics, the most used terms dealt with technology, entertainment, and politics, reflecting both the temporal nature of the queries and, perhaps, an early adopter user-based. However, 36% of the queries indicate some geographical affinity, pointing to a location-based aspect to real time search. In terms of economic value, we calculate this real time search stream to be worth approximately US $33,000,000 (US $33 M) on the online advertising market at the time of the study. We discuss the implications for search engines and content providers as real time content increasingly enters the main stream as an information source.     

Journalism

IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST-III: A REPORT BY THE NATIONAL NEWS COUNCIL, 1979-4983 (National News Council, 805 Third Ave., New York, NY 10022---$10.00, paper)

VIDEOTEX JOURNALISM: TELETEXT, VIEWDATA, AND THE NEWS by David H. Weaver (Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1984---$18.00)

THE NEW BUSINESS JOURNALISM: AN INSIDER'S LOOK AT THE WORKINGS OF AMERICA'S BUSINESS PRESS by Don Gussow (San Diego: Harcourt, Brace Jovanovich, 1984---$14.95)

STRAIGHT STUFF: THE REPORTERS, THE WHITE HOUSE AND THE TRUTH by James Deakin (New York: Morrow, 1984---$17.95)

COVERING CAMPAIGNS: JOURNALISM IN CONGRESSIONAL ELECTIONS by Peter Clarke and ' H. Evans (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University 1983---$17.50)

TERRORISM: THE MEDIA AND THE LAW, edited by Abraham H. Miller (Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.: Transnational Publishers, 1982---$25.00, with paperback available)

THE DISSIDENT PRESS: ALTERNATIVE JOURNALISM IN AMERICAN HISTORY by Lauren Kessler (Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage, 1984---$8.95, paper)

AGENTS OF POWER: THE ROLE OF THE NEWS MEDIA IN HUMAN AFFAIRS by J. Herbert Altschull (New York: Longman, 1984---$29.95)

THE PROCESS OF ELECTRONIC NEWS GATHERING by Frederick Shook (1982, 180 pp.---no price given, paper)

THE BROADCAST NEWS PROCESS by Frederick Shook and Dan Lattimore (1982, 375 pp.---no price given, spiral bound, plus a short “Instructor's Manual”)     

Peer Coaching: Professional Development for Experienced Faculty

The professoriate, as a whole, is growing older and more experienced; yet institutions often overlook the professional development needs of mid-career and senior faculty. This article, based on a review of the literature and the development of a peer coaching project, examines peer coaching as a professional development opportunity for experienced faculty that meets many of their immediate needs and offers a variety of longer-term benefits to their institution. Six recommendations for creating a peer coaching program emerge from the literature and the authors’ experience.

Unpacking the career aspirations of Australian school students: towards an evidence base for university equity initiatives in schools

Demand for higher education in Australia has doubled since 1989, increasing the number of students from diverse social, economic and academic backgrounds. Equity targets have seen a proliferation of programs and interventions aimed at encouraging school students, particularly those from low socio-economic status backgrounds, to participate in higher education. However, little is known about the specific occupational interests of school students upon which targeted strategies might effectively be designed and implemented. This paper examines school students’ aspirations for specific careers that require a university education, in relation to student background and school-related variables. The analysis draws from a study of 6492 students from Years 3 to 12 in 64 New South Wales public schools. We found a complex array of factors relating to interest in different careers. Year level at school, gender and prior achievement were stronger predictors across many careers than factors such as SES, Indigenous status and school location. We argue that rather than taking a one-size-fits-all approach to encouraging participation in higher education, outreach activities should be targeted to take account of student diversity and inequalities that foster differing aspirations.     

Against methodocentrism in educational research

Abstract

This essay defines and critiques ‘methodocentrism’, the belief that predetermined research methods are the determining factor in the validity and importance of educational research. By examining research in science studies and posthumanism, the authors explain how this methodocentrism disenables research from taking account of problems and non-human actants that are presumed to be of no importance or value in existing social science research methodologies, both qualitative and quantitative. Building from a critique of these methods as profoundly anthropocentric, the authors examine three crucial problematics in which methodocentrism functions in educational research: the institutionalization of graduate training, a wide-spread privileging of the visual (part and parcel of empiricism), and the seeming necessity of ‘data’ in social scientific research methodologies. Ultimately, this article does not reject the necessity of particular studies having methods—rigorous, philosophically grounded approaches to problems in the world—but it argues that the belief that methods must be selected from existing options and assembled before approaching the ‘objects’ of study is not only a form of bad science, it is also deeply implicated in anthropocentric and colonialist politics. Instead, what research requires today is a thorough rethinking of the very distinction between subject and object and a renewed questioning of how agency functions in specific research settings.