Next Generations,Catwalks, Random Walks and Arms Races: conceptualising the development of quality assurance schemes

The emergence and development of quality assurance schemes in European countries over the last 15–20 years has inspired many national case studies of the systems and procedures adopted. The methods, contexts, and procedures associated with this policy change are diverse. But although individual countries have set about changing policy in different ways there appear to be some common developmental patterns within the Europe of the Bologna Process. How can these developments be conceptualised? In a first step this paper advances a typology based on the quality assurance literature. In a second step, the paper applies the typology to quality assurance developments in three countries. The third part of the paper discusses the strengths and weaknesses of the modelling approach in the light of the empirical evidence and a political science analysis of policy change. The paper concludes with a discussion on future directions for the comparative study of policy change within the European Higher Education Area on the basis of this conceptualisation of developments in quality assurance policy.     

(Trans)national Advocacy in the Ousting of Milošević: The Otpor Movement's Glocal Recursions

Over the past decade a remarkable number of revolutions worldwide imitated the touchstone youth movement Otpor, which played an influential role in ousting Serbian President Slobodan Milo?evi? in 2000. Given the continual presence of Western organizations and resources in Otpor's uprising, I argue that the movement demonstrates a type of communication termed glocal recursion—a rhetorical strategy that invites social change by imitating global methods of resistance, with slight variations, in local contexts. In addition to its time-based connotations (in which activists ground new messages in old texts), glocal recursion advances a space-based understanding of recursive appeals (with activists creating local messages from global structures). This essay analyzes four aspects of Otpor's glocal recursions, including its technological conditions, structured spontaneity, indigenous adaptations, and dialectical reappropriations. Various implications are drawn for communication research.     

Film Biography

Kenneth L. Geist's Pictures will Talk: The Life and Films of Joseph L. Mankiewicz (New York: Scribner's, 1978---$12.95)

Two new books, one a revision, deal with another important director, Alfred Hitchcock

Donald Spoto's Stanley Kramer: Filmmaker (New York: Putnam, 1978---$12.95)

James Robert Parish, et al., Hollywood Character Actors (New Rochelle, N.Y.: Arlington House, 1978--- $30.00)

Jesse L. Lasky Jr. with Pat Silver, Love Scene: The Story of Lawrence Olivier and Vivien Leigh (New York: Crowell, 1978---$10.95)

Hollywood actress and actor biographies, a round up of recent titles

Danny Peary, ed. Close-Ups: The Movie Star Book--Intimate Profiles of Movie Stars by their Co-Stars, Directors, Screenwriters and Friends (New York: Workman Press, 1978---$8.95 in paper with a hardback also available)     

Film Theory and Criticism

William T. Pilkington and Don Graham, eds., Western Movies (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1979–$13.95/$6.95)

William R. Meyer, The Making of the Great Westerns (New Rochelle, New York: Arlington House, 1979 – $20.00)

Michael Pitts, Famous Movie Detectives (Metuchen, New Jerseys Scarecrow Press, 1979 – $11.95)

Gerald Mast's The Comic Mind (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1979– $7.95 paper)     

General Communications

MASSCOM: MODULES IN MASS COMMUNICATION, (Chicago: Science Research Associates, 1984—series of seven booklets, price not given, paper)

COMPARATIVE BROADCASTING SYSTEMS, by Richard C. Burke (43 pp.)

MASS MEDIA AND POPULAR CULTURE, by Kathleen J. Turner (38 pp.)

MASS MEDIA HISTORY, by Don Pember (57 pp.)

MASS MEDIA AND FUTURE TECHNOLOGIES, by Loy Singleton (43 pp.)

MASS MEDIA LAW, by William L. Rivers (43 pp.)

MASS MEDIA CAREERS, by Joseph Turow (60 pp.)

WRITING TELEVISION CRITICISM, by Bruce E. Gronbeck (44 pp.)

FUNDAMENTALS OF COPY AND LAYOUT, by Albert C. Book and C. Dennis Schick (Chicago: Crain Books, 1984—$14.95)

THE BENEVOLENT DICTATORS: INTERVIEWS WITH ADVERTISING GREATS, by Bart Cummings (Chicago: Crain Books, 1984—$24.95)     

Basic communication fidelity: An extension

The concept of Basic Communication Fidelity represents the degree of congruity between cognitions of two or more individuals following a communication event. Measurement of the concept is expanded beyond source/receiver comparison of cognitions implanted in a communication source in the form of geometric forms to include self‐oriented cognitions generated by an individual communicator in an environment reflecting stability of self‐oriented cognitions over the duration of the interaction. Results increase potential application, precision and explanatory value of the construct.