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As cities have become increasingly motivated to be more sustainable, transport cycling has become integral in these plans. Boston is one such city enthusiastic about bicycle transportation. I take a socio-discursive approach to an investigation of transport cycling integration in Boston, MA. First, I explore the historical processes leading to the appearance of bike lanes on U.S. city streets. Next, I investigate how bike lanes are entwined in cycling safety—both in the discursive and embodied dimensions. What begins as a concern of the physical body leads to ideals of legitimacy and inclusivity, of which the bike lane has become a key symbol and act of these imaginings. Third, I tease out how this logic of cycling safety qua inclusivity becomes one that employs a rightsbased notion of social justice in which legitimacy, and ultimately safety, is garnered through becoming intelligible, or visible, as cycling subjects. Finally, I depart from a liberal democratic notion of social justice and make a case for understanding how bike lanes work through the lens of what Foucault terms “security.” I explore how we can view bikeways discourse as a technology of power that can be mobilized to transform social interaction in the city.

Limiting the terms of members of Congress has become a highsalience issue in contemporary American political discourse, necessitating the attention of the United States Supreme Court to provide constitutional guidance. The forces reviving this debate, dormant since the nation's founding period, merit scrutiny. In addition to reviewing the positions of term limitation advocates and opponents, specific limitation proposals--which lack uniformity as some are chamber-specific, others are life-time bans, etc--also require investigation. The review of relevant judicial precedents will also provide helpful preliminary information useful to analyze U.S. Term Limits vs. Thornton, the term limits case decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in May 1995. Researching this increasingly divisive political issue ought to generate a useful, concise synopsis of the historical and judicial issues underpinning the debate, the discussion itself, and analysis of relevant judicial action. / Department of Political Science

This is a text about a work of art, “The Room”, and about the process that brought it about. The process includes experiments in clay bodies, mixing different elements with the base clay in search of a material both suitable to work with in terms of texture and color, but also rich in less tangible qualities, as I mix in elements which carry a set of values of cultural identity. The text follows the path towards development of the final piece during the two-year course of the master program at Konstfack. During these two years, external factors such as dealing with the issues of culture shock, and searching for a place to live, interfere with my way of thinking, leading to unexpected turns in the direction of my artistic process. Searching for an apartment finds me standing in strangers' apartments as they sell their homes, their ways of life and their house rules. These sometimes awkward meetings provide a good starting point in my research of people's habits and habitats. In trying to understand some elements of Swedish culture, I become aware of the fact of my own culture and start thinking about it from an outside perspective. Eventually, the central question of the essay crystallizes: Who will carry on the traditional craft techniques of my home country? Romania is the rare place in Europe where crafts are still being practiced as they have been for hundreds of years, in the villages by crafts persons leading traditional lives. As the villages are emptied of young people, moving into cities, and as Romania as a whole is drained of a large part of its young and ambitious generation, moving to other European countries for jobs and education, a trend that I am of course part of, the traditions that I have taken for granted, growing up with my grandmother in a traditional village, become threatened. The answer to the question is a simple as it is demanding: I have to be part of the future of Romanian crafts. To document them, understand them, and incorporate them in my art. For this purpose, I undertake an investigative research trip. The text presents my findings about the crafts, and about the people working to document and preserve the traditions. The research trip is also presented in the movie “Six days in Romania”, which I include as an appendix to the essay. Over the course of two years, several short-term art projects have been completed within the master program. They are presented in the form of an interview with myself. Looking back at these projects, they become explained as necessary steps in preparation for the final piece, a viewpoint very different from the utter confusion that was the dominating feeling of at least the first year of the course. The interview tries to give insight into the non-linear process that is the creative work. Finally, in a poetic description of the final piece, I let my art speak for itself in a very literal way. In giving voice to the piece, I try to access truths hidden even to myself, in an effort to be as transparent as possible about the value of my efforts.

The intention with this research was to investigate the challenges facing School Governing Bodies (SGBs) in historically disadvantaged schools with regard to their roles and responsibilities. The investigation departed from the premise of prescriptions of the South African Schools Act and other relevant legislation. From the literature review, it became clear that school governance would not be an easy task for schools, based on the precedence set by the apartheid school governance system. Indeed, it was found that SGBs in previously disadvantaged schools experienced numerous challenges. Decentralisation, stakeholder participation in school governance, SGB membership, determination of school policies requiring specialised knowledge and expertise, and policy-making and implementation were found to encapsulate most of the challenges facing SGBs in their roles and responsibilities. This research, being qualitative and phenomenological, used interviews to focus on some definitive school governance roles and responsibilities. Findings largely confirmed earlier research findings and included challenges such as a poor understanding of the school governance role of promoting the best interests of the school by school governors, the execution of roles and responsibilities being inhibited by poor training and poor capacity building, parent governors lacking knowledge and school governance skills, school governance functions requiring specialised knowledge and skills, a lack of trust, and the influence of suspicion and poor teamwork among school governors. The main recommendation relates to the review of the Schools Act in terms of specialised functions and who should perform them, and increasing the terms of office of school governors to derive maximum benefit from continuity before new members are elected and another cycle of capacity-building is needed. It is further recommended that the roles and responsibilities of school governors be well explained to stakeholders, even before nominations and elections are conducted, so that potential governors know exactly what is expected, and that continuous capacity-building becomes a regular feature at school level, including a school cluster-based programme addressing local school governance challenges. / Thesis (M.Ed.)--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2009.

The intention with this research was to investigate the challenges facing School Governing Bodies (SGBs) in historically disadvantaged schools with regard to their roles and responsibilities. The investigation departed from the premise of prescriptions of the South African Schools Act and other relevant legislation. From the literature review, it became clear that school governance would not be an easy task for schools, based on the precedence set by the apartheid school governance system. Indeed, it was found that SGBs in previously disadvantaged schools experienced numerous challenges. Decentralisation, stakeholder participation in school governance, SGB membership, determination of school policies requiring specialised knowledge and expertise, and policy-making and implementation were found to encapsulate most of the challenges facing SGBs in their roles and responsibilities. This research, being qualitative and phenomenological, used interviews to focus on some definitive school governance roles and responsibilities. Findings largely confirmed earlier research findings and included challenges such as a poor understanding of the school governance role of promoting the best interests of the school by school governors, the execution of roles and responsibilities being inhibited by poor training and poor capacity building, parent governors lacking knowledge and school governance skills, school governance functions requiring specialised knowledge and skills, a lack of trust, and the influence of suspicion and poor teamwork among school governors. The main recommendation relates to the review of the Schools Act in terms of specialised functions and who should perform them, and increasing the terms of office of school governors to derive maximum benefit from continuity before new members are elected and another cycle of capacity-building is needed. It is further recommended that the roles and responsibilities of school governors be well explained to stakeholders, even before nominations and elections are conducted, so that potential governors know exactly what is expected, and that continuous capacity-building becomes a regular feature at school level, including a school cluster-based programme addressing local school governance challenges. / Thesis (M.Ed.)--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2009.

This research study analyses the construction of meaning surrounding the embalmed corpse in contemporary England. It documents a process of social change in which Legal, Medical and Religious discourses concerning the dead, once dominant and unchallenged, now co-exist, if somewhat uneasily, with modern constructions of death and the possibility of an after life. The meaning of the embalmed corpse is considered to be constructed by different elements which are presented historically. Initially religious discourses governed the meaning of the body, which was preserved for religious reasons. 17th century surgeon-embalmers requisitioned the corpse for reasons of status assertion, presenting their arguments in medical terms. Contemporary hygiene issues, in tandem with legal issues, today have a powerful impact on the corpse, which is usually experienced by mourners in the context of contemporary consumer culture, after the process of embalming has occurred. The decline of religious practices also mean that the contemporary corpse has assumed a far greater significance than in the past. From the perspective of the sociology of the body, based on the seminal work of Turner, this thesis discusses how changing experiences of live bodies are inextricably linked with changing experience of dead bodies in contemporary societies. This is accomplished through an interpretation of the different meaning attributed to embalmed corpses, together with an appreciation of the work of Hertz and Van Gennep, both of whom identified, in pre-literate societies, the centrality and embeddedness of the treatment of the corpse to funeral rituals. The thesis reports some empirical investigations of embalming-related issues which provide an analysis of contemporary meanings of the corpse and cast light upon the contemporary structure of the English funeral world. Embalmers expect to produce a culturally acceptable ‘death disguise’ for the benefit of mourners whose encounters with the corpse are surprisingly numerous in contemporary death-denying society. Culturally acceptable death images appear to focus upon the dead being in a condition of 'liminal repose', where the illusion of rest is constructed. Embalmers and funeral directors comprise occupations that are quite distinct, although working with the dead in different parts of the same process. Highlighting the significance of corpse appearance, whereby it is rendered 'normal', has also highlighted the socio-cultural process whereby this transformation occurs. As the dead are carefully re-presented, this has hidden the 'true' condition of the dead and therefore also hidden the covert technicians, embalmers, who accomplish this transformation. Embalming therefore appears a hidden aspect of the social construction of the dead, as death is now estranged from the popular context.