Conference Contributions /KS K3

Social Choreographies
Kozel, Susan Conference paper in Documentation of the artistic gathering Close encounters : artists on artistic research;2 : Danshögskolan (University College of Dance) Dans : forskning och utveckling; (2007) University of Dance and Circus (Danshögskolan), Stockholm, April 2007	peer-reviewed conference PAPER

Communication and convergent spaces : spatial practices among rural i...
Andersson, Magnus (2012) ECREA 2012: Fourth European Communication Conference, 24-27 October 2012, Istanbul	other

English abstract:

The focus of this paper is rural inhabitants in Sweden and their re-negotiation of rural spaces through mediated practices. This question is primarily based on the idea that individual actors’ chances to negotiate space have increased due to mediatization processes. Practices of different kinds – professional, political, social and cultural – are not to the same extent as earlier tied to particular time-space contexts. In addition to this underlying point of departure, rural inhabitants’ negotiation of space can be related to the prevailing complex and dynamic relationship between the urban and the rural. With a ‘Lefebvrian’ perspective this relationship is a three-fold construction, constituted by (1) (material) localities, (2) (mediated) representations and (3) everyday life (including imaginations) (Lefebvre, 1974/1991; cf. Halfacree, 2007; Jansson and Falkheimer, 2006). When communication is considered in such a framework the following can be stated: (1) the infrastructure of communication (roads, public transports broadband, etc) has increased the bonds between the country and the city. For example, it is very possible to live in either the city or the countryside and work in the ‘other’ area. Commuting and telecommuting (but also ‘urban sprawling’) blur the geographic boundaries. This is then in contrast to (2) media representations, which tend to reproduce the distinction between urbanity and rurality, for example through depictions of ‘hectic and stressful city life’ in contrast to ‘calm rural idylls’. Worth mentioning here is lifestyle media, for example glossy magazines and TV-programmes, which often create paradoxical links between the urban, creative and dynamic nodes and the aestheticized, ‘idyllicized’ and presumed ‘fixed’ countryside (cf. Jansson, 2010). This leads to the empirical focus of this article; (3) everyday life and its imaginations. Based on ethnographical interviews with rural inhabitants in southern Sweden, the paper argues that the inhabitants mediated practices may contribute to convergence of rural and urban spaces – as well as separation between them. Of particular interest in this context are mediated practices related to salaried work (telecommuting) and communication practices in support for a local village community – practices, which many times are conducted by the same people. The paper will consider and problematize the spatial aspects of these practices; the consequences for: the individuals and their activity spaces; the local community and its boundaries; and, at last, the general relationship between the urban and the rural.

Academic Writing in a Multi-lingual and Multi-disciplinary Context
Finnegan, Damian; Kauppinen, Asko; Wärnsby, Anna (2011) The Role of the Student Experience in Shaping Academic Writing Development in Higher Education, European Association of Teachers of Academic Writing (EATAW), 29th June – 1st July 2011 University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland	other

English abstract:

Damian Finnegan (damian.finnegan@mah.se) Asko Kauppinen (asko.kauppinen@mah.se) Anna Wärnsby (anna.warnsby@mah.se) Academic Writing in a Multi-lingual and Multidisciplinary Context One crucial challenge of academic writing concerns the increasing heterogenisation of student populations. In many writing classes, we now find “any combination of native-born, international, refugee, permanent resident, and naturalized students,” exhibiting considerable linguistic diversity and multiple levels of English proficiency (Preto-Bay and Hansen, 2006; see also Hall, 2009). At the same time, interest towards academic writing in European higher education is growing, yet resources for teaching do not reflect this. Moreover, the wider student base demands practical application from their writing courses, not theoretical knowledge of language skills (see, for example, Anderson 1983, 2009 on procedural vs. declarative knowledge). To show how these problems can be addressed, we discuss the course Academic Writing in English offered at Malmö University, Sweden, which currently enrolls approximately 300 students per year. The course design is explicitly based on the general model of information processing, which assumes that “complex behavior builds on simple processes” (McLaughlin and Heredia, 1996, p. 213). The focus of all learning activities is on acquisition of procedural knowledge geared towards comprehension and production. One distinctive feature of this course is the very tight integration of electronic resources and other teaching material. This provides student populations various types of continuous feedback and highly individualised learning paths. In this paper, we present and evaluate empirical data pertaining to students’ experience of the content, structure and resources in this course. We also discuss the preliminary results obtained through tests administered before, during and after the course. References Anderson, J. R. 2009. Cognitive Psychology and Its Implications. 7th edition. New York: Worth Publishers. Anderson, J. R. 1983. The Architecture of Cognition. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Hall, Jonathan. 2009. “WAC/WID in the Next America: Redefining Professional Identity in the Age of the Multilingual Majority.” The WAC Journal. Vol. 20, November. 33-49. McLaughlin, B. and Hereda, J. L. C. 1996. “Information-processing Approaches to Research on Second Language Acquisition and Use.” In Ritchie, W. C. and Bhatia, T. K. (eds.), Handbook of Second Language Acquisition. San Diego: Academic Press, 213-228. Preto-Bay, Ana Maria and Kristine Hansen. 2006. “Preparing for the Tipping Point: Designing Writing Programs to Meet the Needs of the Changing Population.” WPA: Writing Program Administration, Vol. 30, Nos. 1-2, Fall. 37-57.

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