Regulating research: The problem of theorizing community on LambdaMOO

This article considers ongoing attempts to regulate or even ban researchon LambdaMOO. Industry, private individuals, and research institutionshave supported MOOs, or multi-user object-oriented worlds. The earlyresearch on MOOs by Pavel Curtis, who was one of the key designers,suggests that these systems are part of a research project and have beenresearched since they were originally designed. However, a group ofMOOers have grown increasingly uncomfortable about the quotation ofcertain texts on web sites and academic journals and the potentiallypanoptic effect of research. Some of these practices have breachedcommunity conventions. Yet, such things as testing, invisibly watching,freely quoting characters, and ignoring certain rules have always beenaspects of the system. The dispute over research ethics and theparticipation of varied researchers within this setting indicate thatdiverse values are represented among MOOers and different expectationsexist about how the MOO might be a community. The term ``community' andthe presumption that online characters are people may have alsoincorrectly informed the research debate by making it seem that onlinesettings provide immediate access onto spaces, bodies, and individuals.Many MOOers may believe that research threatens individuals andcommunity. However, critical histories and analysis are needed in orderto explain the system to new users and encourage alternative forms ofdevelopment. Such work can only be produced if online systems are opento research and critique.     

Social Welfare,the Neo‐conservative Turn and Educational Opportunity

This essay examines the educational opportunities of people in poverty who receive social welfare assistance. The dominant political theory underlying social policy (including education policy) in the United States has evolved from 1960s and 1970s welfare liberalism into 1980s and 1990s style neo‐conservatism—a theory that embraces principles of the market and individual liberty as paramount social values. Against this backdrop, I review two recent books that provide compelling evidence for this turn and I call for increased understanding of the relationship between social welfare policies and higher education opportunities for those in poverty.     

When Herbert met Ken: understanding the 100 languages of creativity

The paper proposes a thought experiment written in the spirit of Tom Stoppard's Travesties in which some major contemporary thinkers on and actors of creativity and culture are brought together in the same imagined space through the conceit of a (faulty) memory play. ‘Actors’ are drawn from the National Advisory Committee on Creative and Cultural Education (NACCCE, 19991, the Gulbenkian Committee (1981) and the Joint Council for Education through Art (1957). The paper suggests a series of hypothetical conversations between educationalists from the 1950s to the 2000s who have been engaged with developing arts and cultural education and creativity in our schools. It aims to establish what we have learnt about the discourses of creativity ‐ and what impact this may have had in our classrooms. It concludes with a speculative trial between a Professor Ken Robinson of 1999, adjudged by a Sir Herbert Read of 1957. Nick Owen is a Liverpool‐based film maker and researcher who has recently completed a PhD scholarship at the University of Hull. The scholarship, funded by Creative Partnerships, focused on developing pedagogies for creativity in contexts in which artists and educators work together.     

Dinosaur discourses: taking stock of gendered learning myths

The persistence of gendered learning myths in educational contexts and the wider imaginary continues to trouble feminist educational researchers and practitioners. The tracing of such myths and the categories they create through authoritative and elite discourses of the past suggests how they have functioned across different fields to preserve a hierarchised binary. Gendered myths seem to be lent authority by some of the more popular claims of contemporary neuroscience as they were by the nascent Victorian psychological sciences. Adopting Le Doeuff's [2003. The Sex of Knowing. Translated by K. Hamer and L. Code. London: Routledge] heuristic of identifying which attributes are absorbed into masculine intellectual legacies and which ‘cast off’ to women allows for a focus on patterns of privileging of learning discourses across the humanities and sciences, and the ways these are constituted in historical and contemporary contexts.     

A Survey of Documentary Materials Available on U.S. Tribal Websites

This survey of official U.S. tribal websites examined sites for documentary materials of importance to each tribe that have been archived online, including such materials as historical essays, photos, videos, maps, newspapers, legal and historical documents, historical images, books, pamphlets, bibliographies, cultural and language materials. The materials found on those websites appear to be intended for the use of both tribal members and the general public. The result of the survey was to show that many of the same types of documentary materials held in tribal archives are also available on official websites, and to produce a current snapshot of the large array of tribal records which have been made openly available, although the length of time each document will be available on each site is unknown.     

Responding to racism at school: Ethnic-racial socialization and the academic engagement of Black and Latinx youth

Guided by the Theory of Racial Socialization in Action (TRSA; Smith-Bynum in press), this study examined observed caregiver-provided ethnic-racial socialization in response to a school-based discriminatory dilemma. Forty-five Black and 36 Latinx caregivers (88% mothers) with low-income and their children (M_age = 11.09, SD = 0.29; 46.3% female) participated in Dallas, Texas from 2018 to 2019. Dyads responded to a hypothetical scenario in which a school counselor makes a discriminatory comment to the child. Results of a factor mixture analysis suggested that caregivers engaged in the dialogue using one of four approaches: Low-engaged, Legacy, Racial Literacy, or High-engaged. Profiles were found to differ significantly by the race/ethnicity and language of caregivers and were associated with youth’s concurrent behavioral engagement (R² = .04).