On May 25th, 2008, Jim Groom, a professor and instructional technology specialist, coined the term Edupunk in a blog post as a reactionary response and critique of the cooptation and commodification of Web 2.0 tools by learning management system Blackboard. Edupunk gained widespread attention, and opened up discussion and debate on questions of education and pedagogy. Using Edupunk as a starting point of discussion, this thesis looks at the potentiality of moments and their impacts on world making. Drawing from the work of Ernst Van Alphen and affect theory, this thesis argues that moments "think." When we experience something (be it, visual art, text, video, or ordinary life), we feel its affects and think through the questions that it poses. Through affect, moments influence (individual and collective) change both through the potential trajectories of where they may lead us, and their connections to other moments that contribute to world making.

On May 25th, 2008, Jim Groom, a professor and instructional technology specialist, coined the term Edupunk in a blog post as a reactionary response and critique of the cooptation and commodification of Web 2.0 tools by learning management system Blackboard. Edupunk gained widespread attention, and opened up discussion and debate on questions of education and pedagogy. Using Edupunk as a starting point of discussion, this thesis looks at the potentiality of moments and their impacts on world making. Drawing from the work of Ernst Van Alphen and affect theory, this thesis argues that moments "think." When we experience something (be it, visual art, text, video, or ordinary life), we feel its affects and think through the questions that it poses. Through affect, moments influence (individual and collective) change both through the potential trajectories of where they may lead us, and their connections to other moments that contribute to world making.

Background and Rationale: Falls are among the most common problems faced by elderly persons. While the physical risk factors for falls are well established, the psychosocial aspects have been largely neglected. Moreover, studies exploring the responses to falls from the individuals’ perspectives in an immigrant population are virtually non-existent. The older Chinese immigrant population is substantial and growing in the Greater Toronto Area. The cultural and immigrant-related factors that influence their responses to and recovery after a fall are important considerations as health and social care professionals develop falls prevention strategies, and provide services and care. This dissertation explored the nature of immediate and subsequent responses of community-dwelling older Chinese immigrants after falling. Method: Focussed Ethnography, as guided by elements from Critical Social Theory, was used as the research methodology. Eighteen informants over 70 years of age, living in the community who had experienced a recent fall were interviewed using a semi-structured guide developed after a detailed literature review. Thematic analysis of transcribed interviews was conducted. Results: Four major themes related to responses to falling were drawn forth from the interview data: 1) Help-seeking decisions immediately after the fall, 2) Psychological impact of the fall, 3) Care and support networks, and 4) Learning from the fall. Discussion: The psychosocial responses supported a “blended” explanatory model of illness. Respondents appeared to adhere to both Western medical models and traditional Chinese explanatory model depending on the severity of the fall injuries. Also, the roots of Chinese culture in the blended traditions and philosophies of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism appear to be the foundation for many of the beliefs and attitudes expressed in this study, and these beliefs and attitudes in turn influence how Chinese fallers experience falling. The wide range of psychosocial responses also illustrated the complexity of the Andersen’s Behavioural model for health services use and its potential to explain the different types of services an older Chinese immigrant may need post-fall. Conclusions: Findings from this study provided key, previously unexplored insights into the cultural and immigrant-related factors that influence the psychosocial experience, vulnerability and care-seeking behaviours of older Chinese immigrants following a fall.

Based on interviews and ethnographic fieldwork, this dissertation shows how the Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario (OCC) – whose object is to speak for the dead to protect the living – is shaped by risk management priorities. It illustrates how the OCC, like many contemporary organizations, has altered its operations and decision making to manage threats to its reputation. The result of these moves has been the privatization of public safety decision making with bereaved families, the general public, and even front line coroners, increasingly excluded from speaking for the dead. This is to say, policy recommendations that shape how life in Ontario is lived tend to be generated in private sessions by OCC managers. While much of this can be attributed to the OCC’s focus on reputational risk management, there are other important factors affecting the privatization of public safety. Drawing on research in the sociology of culture, the dissertation finds that the OCC’s experience of risk management is moderated by other, layered institutional structures. These ‘institutional structures’ are analytic constructs with moral and methodological dimensions that inform the way work in the OCC is carried out. The dissertation demonstrates that the moral priorities and method preferences of doctors, lawyers, managers, families, and modern governments are layered over and under risk management. These layers augment or diminish risk management’s impact on the way death is determined and public safety regimes are developed. In addition to offering a window on death investigators and their work, the dissertation proposes a theoretical toolset for better understanding how contemporary organizations are organized and run.

Based on interviews and ethnographic fieldwork, this dissertation shows how the Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario (OCC) – whose object is to speak for the dead to protect the living – is shaped by risk management priorities. It illustrates how the OCC, like many contemporary organizations, has altered its operations and decision making to manage threats to its reputation. The result of these moves has been the privatization of public safety decision making with bereaved families, the general public, and even front line coroners, increasingly excluded from speaking for the dead. This is to say, policy recommendations that shape how life in Ontario is lived tend to be generated in private sessions by OCC managers. While much of this can be attributed to the OCC’s focus on reputational risk management, there are other important factors affecting the privatization of public safety. Drawing on research in the sociology of culture, the dissertation finds that the OCC’s experience of risk management is moderated by other, layered institutional structures. These ‘institutional structures’ are analytic constructs with moral and methodological dimensions that inform the way work in the OCC is carried out. The dissertation demonstrates that the moral priorities and method preferences of doctors, lawyers, managers, families, and modern governments are layered over and under risk management. These layers augment or diminish risk management’s impact on the way death is determined and public safety regimes are developed. In addition to offering a window on death investigators and their work, the dissertation proposes a theoretical toolset for better understanding how contemporary organizations are organized and run.

Background and Rationale: Falls are among the most common problems faced by elderly persons. While the physical risk factors for falls are well established, the psychosocial aspects have been largely neglected. Moreover, studies exploring the responses to falls from the individuals’ perspectives in an immigrant population are virtually non-existent. The older Chinese immigrant population is substantial and growing in the Greater Toronto Area. The cultural and immigrant-related factors that influence their responses to and recovery after a fall are important considerations as health and social care professionals develop falls prevention strategies, and provide services and care. This dissertation explored the nature of immediate and subsequent responses of community-dwelling older Chinese immigrants after falling. Method: Focussed Ethnography, as guided by elements from Critical Social Theory, was used as the research methodology. Eighteen informants over 70 years of age, living in the community who had experienced a recent fall were interviewed using a semi-structured guide developed after a detailed literature review. Thematic analysis of transcribed interviews was conducted. Results: Four major themes related to responses to falling were drawn forth from the interview data: 1) Help-seeking decisions immediately after the fall, 2) Psychological impact of the fall, 3) Care and support networks, and 4) Learning from the fall. Discussion: The psychosocial responses supported a “blended” explanatory model of illness. Respondents appeared to adhere to both Western medical models and traditional Chinese explanatory model depending on the severity of the fall injuries. Also, the roots of Chinese culture in the blended traditions and philosophies of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism appear to be the foundation for many of the beliefs and attitudes expressed in this study, and these beliefs and attitudes in turn influence how Chinese fallers experience falling. The wide range of psychosocial responses also illustrated the complexity of the Andersen’s Behavioural model for health services use and its potential to explain the different types of services an older Chinese immigrant may need post-fall. Conclusions: Findings from this study provided key, previously unexplored insights into the cultural and immigrant-related factors that influence the psychosocial experience, vulnerability and care-seeking behaviours of older Chinese immigrants following a fall.

Canada supports developmental efforts in Ghana through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA). This dissertation investigates how Canada partners with Ghana to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for education by 2015. The study focuses on achieving equity and access to education in Ghana, and examines how far Ghana’s policy and Canada’s aims and objectives (through CIDA) for adressing these developmental issues converge or diverge. The principal methodology for accomplishing this study includes literature review and a content analysis of CIDA programmes and documents related to education in Ghana. The study concludes that CIDA programmes and operations in education in Ghana have a clear focus on issues relating to equity and access to education, and complement governmental efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals for Education in Ghana. The thesis ends with recommendation for further study on using spirituality and indigenous knowledges to enhance and provide holistic education in Ghana.

Canada supports developmental efforts in Ghana through the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA). This dissertation investigates how Canada partners with Ghana to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for education by 2015. The study focuses on achieving equity and access to education in Ghana, and examines how far Ghana’s policy and Canada’s aims and objectives (through CIDA) for adressing these developmental issues converge or diverge. The principal methodology for accomplishing this study includes literature review and a content analysis of CIDA programmes and documents related to education in Ghana. The study concludes that CIDA programmes and operations in education in Ghana have a clear focus on issues relating to equity and access to education, and complement governmental efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals for Education in Ghana. The thesis ends with recommendation for further study on using spirituality and indigenous knowledges to enhance and provide holistic education in Ghana.

This dissertation traces the historical transformation of the Canada-UK commodity chain for wheat-bread as a lens on processes of local and global change in agrofood relations. During the 1990s, the Canadian Wheat Board (Canada’s monopoly wheat seller) and Warburtons, a British bakery, pioneered an innovative identity-preserved sourcing relationship that ties contracted prairie farmers to consumers of premium bread in the UK. Emblematic of the increasing importance of quality claims, traceability, and private standards in the reorganization of agrifood supply chains, I argue that the changes of the 1990s cannot be understood outside of historical legacies giving shape to unique institutions for regulating agrofood relations on the Canadian prairies and in the UK food sector. I trace the rise, fall, and re-invention of the Canada-UK commodity chain across successive food regimes, examining the changing significance of wheat- bread, inter-state relations between Canada, the UK, and the US, and public and private forms of agrofood regulation over time. In particular, I focus on the way in which changing food regime relations transformed the CWB, understood as the nexus of institutions tying prairie farmers into global circuits of accumulation. When in the 1990s, the CWB and Warburtons responded to structural crises in their respective industries by re-inventing the Canada-UK wheat trade, the result was significant organizational and industry change. On the prairies, the CWB has shown how – contrary to expectations -- centralized marketing and quality control may help prairie farmers adapt to the demands of end-users in the emerging ‘economy of qualities’. In the UK, Warburtons has led the ‘premiumisation’ of the bread sector, traditionally defined by consumer taste for cheap bread, over the last 15 years. The significance of the shift towards quality chains in the wheat-bread sector is analyzed in light of conflicts over the proposed introduction of genetically engineered (GE) wheat to the Canadian prairies.

In order to better understand the specific mechanisms that may hinder high educational achievement among Latino students, this study explored the impact of parental working hours on parental involvement and school outcomes across three generations of Mexican-American youth. Results from a longitudinal data set revealed that constrained parental availability, related to increased working hours, had an impact on the amount of parental involvement for third generation students, but not on their academic outcomes. For first-generation students, parental monitoring (a form of parental involvement) was a significant positive predictor for grade 8 and 10 reading scores as well as high school completion among second-generation students. Results from this study suggest that increased parental monitoring may be beneficial for higher academic outcomes for first and second generation students. Future research will need to investigate what types of parental involvement may influence third generation students.