Master of Landscape Architecture / Department of Landscape Architecture/Regional and Community Planning / Timothy D. Keane / Camp Adventure, a summer camp for the physically disabled, has obtained a site for the future Camp Adventure Conference and Retreat Center at Perry Lake, Ozawkie, Kansas. The camp serves youth and adults with cerebral palsy and spina bifida. Past rental facilities have been far from adequate for the camp’s basic needs of accessibility and has led the camp to seek a specially designed permanent home. As a counselor for 9 years, I have experienced firsthand the barriers and frustrations with inadequate facilities. Seeking to find solutions to the camp’s specific needs, I found William H. Whyte’s research methods and environmental psychology studies fitting to discover human preference and experiential qualities. To understand the best methods of adaptation, a series of user based research methods have been conducted to gather user input. The campers understand, from daily experience, what it takes to make an element or activity accessible, and their guidance will inform the design of select program elements. User input is not only being gathered from the camp, but from educational sources at Kansas State University, practicing professionals at Ochsner Hare and Hare, and local government representatives. Collaboratively molding the site’s existing form, the campers accessibility needs, and a complex program has created an exciting and challenging project. The program consists of 24 elements and activities, many of which are not traditionally handicap friendly. In-depth design studies and application of the user input has created the form and experience of seven program elements. This book contains literature and precedent studies, user based research results, the master plan for the entire site, and design details of seven program elements. It is to be used by Camp Adventure as a guide to implementation of the camp design. It is the path for Camp Adventure to achieve their dream: a barrier free, fully accessible, adventure; Camp Adventure.

Thesis (MPhil (Sociology and Social Anthropology))--University of Stellenbosch, 2010. / Please refer to full text for abstract

Existing research shows that increasing numbers of young men are dissatisfied with the appearance of their bodies. Research has found that men will use sport and health-related sports acts to conceal these concerns from others. Accordingly, men s body dissatisfactions are documented less frequently because the practices drawn upon to conceal them are perceived as routine forms of masculine behaviour. Rugby union is one of the most popular sports played by young men in England. Historically, the male rugby player is culturally perceived as strong, tough and unemotionally articulate. Existing research draws attention to health issues, such as performance stress and injury that arise through participation in this sport. Research also shows that rugby union players are likely to experience concerns about gaining weight, yet these are disguised within the requirements of training for the sport. Although, there are studies that examine the constitution of masculinities, the experience of pain and injury and career transitions among rugby union players there are no studies, as yet, that examine how rugby union men experience body concerns and manage these experiences through their sport. The research discussed in this thesis examines how a group of rugby union men (25) aged 18-25, of varied racial identity, ethnic and social backgrounds, participating in an elite university rugby union 1st XV team, experience concerns about the appearance and performance of their bodies and the ways in which such concerns develop. It also examines if and how these men used the sport and health-related sports acts, to overcome their concerns and conceal them from others. A theoretical framework, which draws on the concepts of the three theorists: Connell (1995, 2008) Goffman (1959; 1961; 1979) and Bourdieu (1978; 1979; 1984), is developed. As part of this, a new concept has been created from Goffman s dramaturgical approach: that of the intimate dimension. In this dimension intimate relationships occur. It is located away from the front region, (the public), and the back region (semi-public spaces) where less formal relationships occur. It includes the research interview, with a woman researcher, and some other women such as girlfriends, sisters or female friends and also one or two other rugby men with whom the rugby men demonstrated a close bond. Within this dimension the rugby men are more forthcoming about the personal elements of their rugby lives. The theoretical framework is used to examine these men s concerns, how they are developed, experienced and managed. Recognising that cultural assumptions of a tough and less expressive masculinity assigned to this sport can potentially make it difficult for men to express these concerns, a combination of visual research methods and ethnography are used to examine these men s body concerns and their management. This includes collaborative collection of photography and photo-elicitation interviews. The research shows that embodied experiences of discomfort, associated with pain, injury, concerns about height, being overweight or out of shape, and social experiences of exclusion led to the development of the rugby men s body concerns. For these rugby men, their rugby masculinities are influential to the management and concealment of their body concerns. They suppress and conceal their body concerns in the front and back regions of the sport and reveal them in more intimate dimensions. The rugby men s relationships with each other, in the back regions of the sport, were the most influential to this identity, but more importantly, to the management and reinforcement of these concerns. This thesis contributes to filling the gap in existing academic research by examining body concerns and its management amongst rugby union men. It also extends existing research that has found men conceal their body concerns in sport, because it looks at how these men manage these concerns differently in different regions of their sport. Furthermore, a theoretical framework that combines interactionism and phenomenology is used to study sociologically men s body concerns in these different contexts. The combination of visual methods and ethnography goes beyond some of the existing methods used in clinical and sociological research that have examined men's body concerns. They can be used to enhance understanding of clinical forms of body concern and other emotional concerns rugby union men and other sportsmen, of all ages, have about performance, pain and injury. The incorporation of visual methods is potentially widely applicable because they have increasing precedence in sportsmen s lives to analyse performance and to represent them.

While it is now widely accepted that new firms growth is essential for the foundation of economic dynamism, knowledge about this early growth is still scattered. Indeed, very little is known about how new firms grow and develop over time. What types of distinct growth patterns do those firms exhibit? How do these growth patterns and corresponding firms differ from each others in terms of development and strategic choices? To better understand the process of new firm growth, recent entrepreneurship research stresses that there is a strong need for a new conceptual scheme and new longitudinal research methods. This is actually one of the main entrepreneurship research challenges. In this context, our aim is to provide new insights regarding the process of new firm growth. In this research, we develop and test an original methodology allowing the empirical taxonomy of early growth trajectories across multiple sectors, integrating both the multidimensional and dynamic aspects of growth. Our approach applies principal component and cluster analysis to a large sample of firms, using financial and demographic data collected over time to identify in a systematic way distinct growth stages. We use then sequence analysis and a Markov chain approach to extract and compare the trajectories of individual firms over time. This allows the identification of a limited number of typical growth trajectories, which are adopted by the majority of firms in our sample. Finally, internal replication is performed to validate the growth trajectories identified and bivariate analysis is used to examine the link between the identified growth trajectories and the demographic characteristics of the corresponding firms. We have applied our methodology to a sample of 741 Belgian firms created between 1992 and 2002 and which have grown above micro-firm size. Our approach allowed identifying four distinct growth stages and seven typical growth trajectories, which remain valid for the six first years of the majority of the firms in our sample. This taxonomy of early growth trajectories is consistent with individual patterns already identified in the literature and appears not to be sector-dependent. The major contribution of this doctoral thesis is that, based on empirical evidence, early growth appears to be neither a continuous (or life cycle based) nor idiosyncratic (or completely random) process. It can be adequately described through a limited number of typical growth trajectories, valid across sectors. Thus, our research brings insight regarding how new firm evolve over time and therefore contributes to our understanding and appreciation of the heterogeneity of the growth trajectory phenomenon. Next, our research provides also an original methodological approach allowing the systematic analysis of growth trajectories, which deals with key limitations identified in the literature regarding the need for a multidimensional and dynamic study of growth across multiple sectors. Our findings indicate that this novel systematic approach is useful for taxonomy development and therefore contributes to reduce the gap between the complexity of new firm growth process and the standard approaches often mobilised to deal with it. Finally, while our findings provide empirical and methodological support in early development of new firms study, they also provide many implications to entrepreneurial research and practices. Further researches are needed to improve our understanding of the dynamic growth process of new ventures. It should explore which endogenous and exogenous factors might explain why a majority of start-ups follow the seven identified typical growth trajectories. It could be also highly relevant to refine our taxonomy by examining the relationship between innovative and technological sources and growth trajectories, both in high and low technological industries. Finally, we should test the accuracy of the proposed taxonomy across countries as well as beyond the early stage of new firm development.

Pour respecter les droits auteur, la version electronique de cette thèse a été dépouillée de ses documents visuels et audio-visuels. La version intégrale de la thèse a été déposée au Service de la gestion des documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal. / Résumé Cette thèse examine la nature complexe de l'identité dans les jeux vidéo solo. Elle introduit la notion d'identité-hybride, et propose un cadre analytique pour déconstruire la jouabilité à travers les genres afin de distinguer des moments d’émergence d’identité. Alors que la recherche sur l’identité se concentre couramment sur le joueur ou le personnage-joueur (ou les deux), la notion d'identité-hybride est une forme d’identité fluide, parfois éphémère, qui existe entre le joueur et le personnage-joueur. L’identité-hybride se développe au cours du processus de jeu et inclut nécessairement le joueur (expérience, contexte de jeu, etc. ), l’environnement du jeu (le design, les mécaniques, etc.), et la médiation technologique (ordinateur, console, etc.) qui facilite la jouabilité. Afin de cerner les différents aspects du gameplay qui contribuent a l'émergence de différents types d'identité, un cadre multiforme a été conçu pour isoler les interactions spécifiques? qui comprennent les interactions joueur/personnage-joueur, personnage-joueur/personnage non-joueur, joueur/environnement du jeu, personnage-joueur /environnement de jeux, et joueur/joueur. Il a été associé à un cadre secondaire qui comprend l'examen des spécificités du joueur individuel et la médiation technologique qui facilitent le jouabilité. Une analyse systématique d’expériences de jeu et des éléments de design de trois jeux différents; Mirror’s Edge (DICE, 2008), Alone in the Dark (Eden Games, 2008), et Fable 2 (Lionhead Studios, 2008), a été réalisée pour illustrer les différents degrés d’apparition d'identité dans différentes structures de jeu. En comparant les trois analyses, l'utilité de ce cadre pour mettre de l’avant les éléments qui contribuent au (ou peuvent entraver) le développement de l'identité et, plus spécifiquement, l'apparition de l'identité-hybride, est démontrée. Ces trois exemples jettent les bases d'une discussion plus profonde sur la définition, le contexte, et le processus d’identité-hybride dans les jeux vidéo en général. / Abstract This dissertation examines the complex nature of identity in single-player videogames. It introduces the concept of hybrid-identity and proposes an analytical framework to deconstruct gameplay across genres to distinguish moments of identity emergence. While identity research commonly focuses on the player or the player-character (or both), the concept of hybrid-identity is a fluid, at times fleeting form of identity that exists between the player and the player-character. Hybrid-identity develops during the networked process of videogame play and necessarily includes the player (experience, play-context, etc.), the game environment (design, mechanics, etc.), and the mediating technology (computer, console, etc.) that facilitates gameplay. In order to delineate the different aspects of gameplay that contribute to the emergence of different types of identity, a multifaceted framework was devised to isolate specific interactions between the player/player-character, player-character/non-playing character, player/game environment, player-character/game environment, and player/player. This framework was coupled with a secondary frame which includes examining the specificities of the individual player and the mediating technologies that facilitate gameplay. A systematic analysis of gameplay and design elements of three different games; Mirror’s Edge (DICE, 2008), Alone in the Dark (Eden Games, 2008), and Fable 2 (Lionhead Studios, 2008) was performed to illustrate the varying degrees of identity emergence in different game structures. The utility of the framework is demonstrated by comparing the three gameplay analyses and highlighting the elements that contribute to (and possibly hinder) identity development and more specifically, the emergence of hybrid-identity. These three examples form the foundation for a more in-depth discussion on the definition, context, and process of hybrid-identity in videogame play.

Non-violent resistance group therapy is an innovative way of working with parents whose children are violent and out of control. The programme brings about change on a number of levels, some of which were beyond our expectations. This research aims to both look into the clinical practice and to develop a research method which can do it justice. My aim was to research into those areas which are ‘felt’: beyond the known and the written about. In order to do this I take aspects of the research method portraiture (Lawrence-Lightfoot and Hoffmann Davis, 1997) and bring them together with rich description, rich pictures and arts research practices, so as to create a new qualitative inquiry method which I call ‘rich portraiture’. I describe the development of rich portraiture as a research method and show how I applied it to my practice. At the heart of my dissertation is a complex and layered rich portrait which inquires into the particular experiences of the facilitators of and participants in this groupwork programme (Day and Heismann, 2010). Rich portraiture draws on the performative abilities of clinicians: music, poetry, film, quilt making, painting, dance, sculpture, writing. Detailed narrative portraits of participants and facilitators are located in their social and political context and combined with a juxtapositioning of performance and text which moves into that tacit dimension in which we know more than we can tell (Polanyi, 1966). This is ‘performance in use’ (Cho and Trent, 2009, p 1). My preferred performance method is painting. I made artworks which resonated with the lived experiences of the facilitators and parents who participated in the non-violent resistance therapy programme. As additional layers of performance the paintings were shown in venues where they were viewed by audiences at events during which I spoke and showed films of me working. In this thesis I show how participants and facilitators embody the principles of non-violent resistance and how they perform them in the group. This ‘living’ of non-violent resistance creates change in people’s lives on a number of levels, some of them profound. I argue that there is a gap in the research methods which we use to look at our systemic practice. We constantly seek to creatively enhance our clinical practice so we should also be exploring emerging embodied and performative research practices. This would reflect the shift, in our therapeutic work with clients, towards embodiment (Shotter, 2010), the corporeal (Sheets-Johnstone, 2009) affective or performance turn (Denzin, 2003, 2006). My thesis both describes clinical practice in detail and sets out a new research method.

The aim of this bachelor thesis is to investigate how collection development implemented in a changed media landscape affects the professional identity of librarians. The study is based on three questions: Which problems, quandaries or possibilities are librarians experiencing in collection development? What does the idealistic view of collection development look like - and how does it relate to librarians’ actual work? How does all these factors related to collection development affect the profession of librarianship? Former research indicates that collection development is not that uncomplicated, and it discusses all kinds of practical issues. There is though a lack of former research in the relationship between collection development and profession, which is the aim of this investigation taking place in small public libraries in the north of Sweden. To answer our questions six librarians were interviewed in a ”semi-structured” way. In the analysis we applied Roger Säljös construction of the sociocultural theory and related it´s concepts to lines of reasoning in our result. The results and analysis showed that in the current media landscape there are many factors and considerations affecting the collection development process. First there are fundamental documents and policies, written based on the democratic mission of the library and then, because there is a certain ambiguity in the directives, there are the librarians’ interpretations, which sometimes might be based on personal ideologies. All this in combination with failing collection development tools forces the librarians into a certain controlling role.

The reversible oxidation of cysteine by reactive oxygen species (ROS) is both a mechanism for cellular protein signaling as well as a cause of cellular injury and death through the generation of oxidative stress. The study of cysteine oxidation is complicated by the methodology currently available to isolate and enrich oxidized-cysteine containing proteins. We sought to simplify this process by reducing the time needed to process samples and reducing sample loss and contamination risk. We accomplished this by eliminating precipitation steps needed for the protocol by (a) introducing an in-solution NEM-quenching step prior to reduction and (b) replacing soluble dithiothreitol reductant with a series of newly-developed high-capacity polyacrylamide-based solid-phase reductants that could be easily separated from the lysate through centrifugation. These modifications, collectively called resin-assisted reduction and capture (RARC), reduced the time needed to perform the RAC method from 2-3 days to 4-5 hours, while the overall quality and quantity of previously-oxidized cysteines captured was increased. In order to demonstrate the RARC method’s utility in studying complex cellular oxidants, the optimized methodology was used to study cysteine oxidation caused by the redox-active metals arsenic, cadmium, and chromium. As(III), Cr(VI), and Cd(II) were all found to increase cysteine oxidation significantly, with As(III) and Cd(II) inducing more oxidation than Cr(VI) following a 24-hour exposure to cytotoxic concentrations. Label-free proteomic analysis and western blotting of RARC-isolated oxidized proteins found a high degree of commonality between the proteins oxidized by these metals, with cytoskeletal, translational, stress response, and metabolic proteins all being oxidized. Several previously-unreported redox-active cysteines were also identified. These results indicate that cysteine oxidation by As(III), Cr(VI), and Cd(II) may play a significant role in these metals’ cytotoxicity and demonstrates the utility of the RARC method as a strategy for studying reversible cysteine oxidation by oxidants in oxidative signaling and disease. The RARC method is a simplification and improvement upon the current state of the art which decreases the barrier of entry to studying cysteine oxidation, allowing more researchers to study this modification. We predict that the RARC methodology will be critical in expanding our understanding of reactive cysteines in cellular function and disease.

La tesi descrive il processo di ideazione e scrittura di lunga serialità in Italia attraverso l'osservazione etnografica di due scritture di fiction avvenute nel 2007; attraverso l'analisi etnografica si evidenziano le prassi professionali e le dinamiche interpersonali che si stabiliscono durante i processi di ideazione e scrittura, con particolare attenzione ai processi di negoziazione creativa e di differenze generazionali. / Thesis describes the creative and writing process of two fiction series in Italy, through ethnographical observation of two writing processes which took place in 2007; through ethnographical analysis professional habits and interpersonal dynamics are underlined, during creative and writing process; spotlight has been put on creative negotiations processes and generational differences.

This research explored the complexity of language teacher identity from a holistic perspective involving two features: the integration of teachers’ personal and professional experiences, and the application of conscious/rational and intuitive/tacit thought processes. The study examined four ESL teachers’ beliefs, perceptions, and interpretations about the influences of their important personal, educational, and professional experiences on the development of their teacher identity. It also investigated the overall impact of an autobiographical reflective process combined with a guided visualization activity on the re-construction of participants’ perceptions of teacher identity. The interdisciplinary theoretical orientation was grounded in theories and concepts from psychology and educational research, e.g., Personal Construct Theory (Kelly, 1955, 1963), the complementary nature of reason and intuition, and the concept of “perspective transformation” (Mezirow, 1978, 2000). The methodology was heuristic research (Moustakas, 1990, 1994) and methods included reflexive autobiographical journaling, guided visualization, and in-depth interviews. The results confirm that teacher identity is deeply embedded in one’s personal biography. Participants’ beliefs, perceptions, and interpretations nurtured in the family environment strongly influenced their school experiences, career choice, instructional practice, teaching philosophy, and teacher identity. The use of the guided visualization technique, integrated with rational reflection, considerably enhanced the depth and breadth of participants’ self-understanding and personal/professional growth, which is an important methodological contribution of the study for teacher development. The results strongly suggest that it is essential to explore teachers’ personal life experiences in order to gain a holistic understanding of the dominant influences on the development of teacher identity. The study presents a model for designing a longitudinal professional development program offered in a series of workshops to raise teachers’ awareness of the implicit influences on teacher identity and instructional practice through the application of both conscious/rational and intuitive/tacit methods to access their beliefs, perceptions, and interpretations of their life experiences.