Library development in Armenia: Problems and progress since the dissolution of the USSR

Abstract

The paper provides a situation report on the state of libraries and information services, publishing and bookselling in Armenia. It briefly describes their development, outlines the international development assistance that they have received during the last twenty years, describes their current situation, and indicates some of their future needs.     

Motion Pictures

George Rehrauer's Cinema Booklist: Supplement Two (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1977– $15.00), a 482 page update to the main volume (1972–see 4:1:9)

Bab-bars Anne Price and Theodore Price, Federico Felini: An Annotated International Bibliography (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1978—$11.00).

Dennis R. Bohnenkamp and Sam L. Grogg Jr., eds. The American Film Institute Guide to College Courses in Film and Television (Princeton, N.J.: Peterson's Guides, 1978—$9.75, paper)

Ian C. Jarvie's Movies as Social Criticism: Aspects of their Social Psychology (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1978—$10.00)

Robert Stanley's The Celluloid Empire: A History of the American Motion Picture Industry (New York: Hastings House, 1978—$15.75/7.95)

Richard Koszarski, ed. Hollywood Directors 1941-1976 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977—$4.95, paper)

Andre Bazin's Orson Welles: A Critical View (New York: Harper & Row, 1978— $10.00)

James Naremore's The Magic World of Orson Welles (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978—$15.95)

Paul Michael's The Academy Awards: 50th Anniversary Edition (New York: Crown, 1978— $14.95)

James Beveridge's John Grierson, Film Master (New York: Macmillan, 1978— $17.95)

John McCabe's Charlie Chaplin (New York: Doubleday, 1978—$10.00)

Leonard Maltin's The Great Movie Comedians, From Charlie Chaplin to Woody Allen (New York: Crown, 1978—$10.95)

S. C. Earley An Introduction to American Movies (New York: New American Library Mentor Books, 1978—$2.25, paper)

Ron Haydock's Deerstalker! Holmes and Watson on Screen (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1978—$12.50)

Matthew J. Bruccoli, ed., F.Scott Fitzgerald's Screenplay for Three Comrades (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1978—$10.00/3.95)     

Theorizing Community as Discourse in Community Informatics: “Resistant Identities” and Contested Technologies

Community informatics (CI) is a form of activism that involves the application of information and communication technologies in pursuit of community development within localities. This article draws on discourse theory (DT) to re-evaluate activists’ self-interpretations that rely on community, and to make sense of the political struggles at the heart of CI. It is argued that activists’ community discourse constructs, through articulation, locally “resistant” collective identities and an associated collective agency capable of appropriating technology in pursuit of unfulfilled social demands. However DT also suggests that the socially progressive nature of CI is not guaranteed by recourse to the social ideal of community.     

Review and criticism

Ask Ziggy: Some Brief Advice for Would‐Be Textbook Writers

Prime Time Preachers: The Rising Power of Televangelismy. Jeffrey K. Hadden and Charles E. Swann (Reading, Mass: Addison‐Wesley, 1981).

Culture, Communication, and Dependency: The Tradition of H.A. Innisy, ed. William H. Melody, Liora Salter and Paul Heyer (Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing Corporation, 1981).

On The Shoulders of a Giant

Research Methods in Mass Communication, ed. Guido H. Stempel, III and Bruce H. Westely (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice‐Hall, Inc., 1981).

Mass Communication and Everyday Life: A Perspective on Theory and Effects, Dennis K. Davis and Stanley J. Baran (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1981)

Television Awareness Training: The Viewer's Guide for Family and Community, ed. Ben Logan (Nashville: Abingdon Publishing Company, 1979).     

Grappling with teaching design and technology: a beginning teacher's experiences

This paper reports on an investigation into the first time implementation of a technology education unit of work by a beginning primary school teacher. The researchers monitored the teacher's implementation of the unit across a 6 week period using an interpretivist research approach. A variety of data sources were drawn upon including teacher and student interviews, video and audio recordings of small group and whole-class interactions, and student-developed artefacts. Providing appropriate learning activities to assist students to develop understanding about patterns and shapes incorporated into buildings and other structures to enhance strength and stability was a challenge faced by the beginning teacher. However, she drew support from a teaching resource, which provided guidance and structure for the teaching of technology concepts and processes related to strength and stability of structures and materials. The resource helped her to develop learning activities that were appropriate to the topic and to the needs of the students in her class. Implications of the study relate to the needs of teachers grappling with teaching design and technology for the first time and the support that they can gain from predetermined planning and teaching models and well-developed teaching resources.     

The impact of an intervention on children's reading and spelling ability in low-income schools in India

The aim of this study using a quasi-experimental design was to investigate whether utilising synthetic phonics in schools catering for low-income families in India would increase reading and spelling attainment in English. Over 500 children in 20 schools took part in the 6-month programme. Just over half of the children experienced lessons organised around the synthetic phonics materials, whilst the other children continued with their normal English lessons. The findings show that there were statistically significant differences between the intervention and control groups in the improvements of the children in their test scores in reading and spelling.     

The relative quality and cost-effectiveness of private and public schools for low-income families: a case study in a developing country

The “mushrooming” of private schools for low-income families has been widely noted in the literature; however, very little is known about the quality of these schools. This research explored the relative quality of private unaided (recognised and unrecognised) and government schools in low-income areas of Hyderabad, India. A preliminary census to locate unrecognised private schools – not on official lists – was conducted. Data were collected on achievement and background variables for 3,910 pupils from a stratified random sample of schools. Using multilevel modelling shows that pupils in private unrecognised and recognised schools, when controlled for age, pupil's IQ, and class average IQ, achieve higher scores in mathematics and English than equivalent pupils in government schools. There is no significant difference between private and government schools in pupil achievement in Urdu. The achievement advantage for private schools did not arise because of greater resources available, at least in terms of per pupil teacher salaries.