This Commentary critically appraises my body of work over 15 years, the starting and end points being an exploration of the news values underlying the selection of news carried out 15 years apart, via various case study research articles that examine the type and quality of news that audiences receive. This body of work interrogates – from a range of perspectives – the ways in which some voices are privileged in the press, others are marginalised, while still others are absent in the news. I explore these issues from the perspective of the selection of news, through news values and source selection; how journalists develop those values and use sources to shape the news; the manner in which labour disputes are reported and trade union officials and members are legitimised or delegitimised; the extent to which celebrities are adopted and promoted in the news; how the views and achievements of women politicians are reported; and whether women have made headway in sports news, both in terms of the coverage of women athletes and in sports writing. The Commentary contextualises this body of work within both critical theoretical perspectives and rapid cultural, technical and social changes to situate the nine publications submitted for the degree to make clear the coherent nature of my inquiries. In this research I have maintained a contemporary analytical approach that suggests that the processes by which sources are chosen and news is selected undermines the plurality of voices in the press; that previous understandings of news values are outdated and that news values change over time and need to be revisited; that independent reporting is limited and a great deal of news relies on press subsidies with vested interests; and that ideological factors are frequently being played out in the news we receive. All of these findings have negative implications for the range and quality of our news. My findings have contributed to national and international debates about the news media, including an All-Party Parliamentary Report into Women in Parliament, challenged taken-for granted views about the news we receive and questioned the quality and bias of our news. The research has been disseminated nationally and internationally at leading conferences and in international journals and books, and in press articles, and is widely cited.

The core aim of this research study is to analyse the effects of experiential learning pedagogy on students, received during work based student placements. This study identifies and examines the perceptions held by higher education (HE) stakeholders, regarding the effects of experiential learning work placements on students. My research is situated in Bourdieusian concepts, which include ‘habitus’, ‘field’, and ‘cultural reproduction’ (Bourdieu, 1977b, p72; 1986a, p60; 1977a, p487). My research found employability is an agency in its own right. Employability had a doxa (a societally embedded opinion) (Bourdieu, 1977b, p169) effect on my research study. Most of the research responses were given in employability terms. The majority of research participants clearly indicated other aspects of experiential learning, e.g. students developing self-efficacy were a secondary consideration. Preparedness for work was the key priority. My research found, all HE stakeholders have been influenced to ‘ideologically reproduce’ the employability agenda, in order to ‘fit in’ with the current HE landscape (Bourdieu, 1977a, p490; Bourdieu, 1990, p53; Brady, 2012, p346). This research study found that Holdsworth and Quinn’s (2012, p386) ‘reproductive’ or ‘deconstructive’ concepts present in their ‘Student Volunteering’ study, were replicated by students on unpaid experiential learning work placements, with either a ‘Third Sector’ organisation or a statutory agency. This study also identified hitherto undiscovered causal factors, absent in Holdsworth and Quinn’s (2012) study. These are additional social actors, which significantly influence whether students become ‘reproductive’ or ‘deconstructive’ during experiential learning work placements. This research found the ‘wider society’ is an existential agency, which has a strategic governance role representing society as a whole. The ‘wider society’ has a societal remit to coordinate delivery of all society’s needs, which includes social care provision and environmental management. Trained people are required to deliver this societal remit, so the ‘wider society’ is an experiential learning higher education stakeholder.

Within cultures, some narratives of everyday life are elevated to positions of canonicity, whereby they are tacitly accepted as common-sense accounts of everyday shared realities. Such narratives can often perpetuate norms, rituals and values which sustain perceptions of sameness and otherness at intra and inter-group levels. My interest in this theme developed out of my personal experiences growing up in a Protestant community in rural Northern Ireland during the Troubles; a period of sectarian conflict officially lasting from 1969 to 1998. Through cultural forms such as traditions, school curricula, folklore and family, narratives circulated which sustained powerful sectarian representations of ‘Us’ and ‘Them’. Such dominant narrative forms had the power to silence other narratives which challenged their authenticity as universal folk theories explaining why the social worlds people lived in were organised as they seemed to be. Although this work has its roots in my life history, it was not possible for me to pursue a doctoral study exploring these issues in Northern Ireland. Therefore, I worked with a group of primary school teachers because I considered their lives to be rich in dominant, secret and resistance narratives. This study sits across a range of disciplinary areas where concepts of narrative inform the means, the object and the product of the inquiry. Theories articulating the narrative construction of everyday realities and the value of narrative pedagogies were key in framing the pedagogic and methodological focus of the study. I drew on the work of Jerome Bruner to develop a theoretical framework within which to articulate the aims and focus of this study. I looked to scholars such as Ivor Goodson to develop a conceptual understanding of how a narrative pedagogy might be mobilised as part of inquiries exploring people’s everyday lived experiences. Working with these sources and empirical studies discussing the creation of counter storytelling spaces, I pursued the key pedagogic principle of narrative disruption. I did so to prompt the teachers to consider constructing alternative narratives about their lived experiences in response to narrative forms presented to them as dominant representations of teachers’ lives. The study took place in a primary school, which I have given the pseudonym Midview Primary School, in the Midlands of England. Over a five-week period, the teachers participated in weekly sessions, scaffolding their capabilities to use different digital resources to create alternative narrative representations of key incidents from their lives. I generated data through participant observations, post-session feedback questionnaires, participants’ final narratives, mind maps and semi-structured interviews. Through a reflective analysis of the data, one which accounted for my position in the inquiry, I found that while the participants valued having a space in which to talk about their lives as teachers, they were reluctant to challenge narratives presented to them as dominant representations of their lives. The inquiry space became an echo chamber where dominant narrative themes of oppression, self-sacrifice, stoicism, and altruism were reproduced to guard against perceived external interference from performative bodies. I discuss how social dynamics within the group, residual traces of the work day and my positionality as someone known to the group made the creation of alternative narratives difficult. The thesis ends with a critical reflection aimed at articulating how outcomes from this study will inform future similar studies. By way of proposing a revised pedagogic rationale, I have imagined how this might look in a Northern Irish context, seeking to challenge canonical narratives sustaining sectarian division. This ‘imagining’ takes the form of two narratives: one depicting an account of the study using the original approach I took with the teachers and the other representing experiences based on a revised approach informed by the outcomes of this study.

This thesis is about how people living in a typical urban working-class community located in South Wales get on with each other. Reflecting upon the empirical data collected over three years of ethnographic fieldwork, it tells the story of ‘Ashmill’ and the relationships which have developed among generations of residents. The focus is on ‘Blackacre’, a council estate geographically situated at the heart of Ashmill, its residents tending to be regarded as ‘rough’ and ‘antisocial’ by residents of the surrounding neighbourhood. The thesis presents an intensive case study of the community figuration of Ashmill, and makes theoretical-empirical contributions which may have resonance with similar communities. Council estates, as a result of deliberate policies and their unplanned consequences, have come to be seen as ‘residualised’ places for ‘problem’ people, who are frequently stigmatised as ‘chavs’: [C]ouncil [H]oused [A]nd [V]iolent. This thesis considers how this came to be, indicating the long-term, processual, relational, and transformational character of the problem which is investigated in this thesis using a figurational-sociological framing, specifically through the analytical lens of Elias and Scotson’s (1994) established-outsider model. Analysed figurationally, the stigmatisation of Blackacre and its residents as ‘rough’ and ‘antisocial’ can be understood as the outcome of long-term processes in which interdependent residential groups have become trapped in a power dynamic. A double-bind situation develops, involving feelings mutual fear and resentment between some residential groups, whilst also creating affective bonding among others. The established-outsider model is elaborated and adapted using ‘relative deprivation theory’ as developed by Lea and Young (1984). This more directly connects relational phenomena producing feelings of resentment between working-class residents with the generation of crime and violence. This thesis, therefore, presents an example of ‘sociological criminology’, synthesising figurational sociology and left realist criminology with the aim of adding to the corpus of reality congruent social scientific knowledge on collective processes of status honour and stigma.

This thesis investigates how ‘leaderless’ social movements are coordinated and sustained by their members. Drawing on an empirical study of the London Occupy protests, it emphasises the socially-constructed nature of ‘leaderlessness’, arguing that the London Occupy movement can be understood as an ensemble of symbolic meanings, practical accomplishments and communicative political actions that allowed activists to mobilise and develop a broad-ranging repertoire of protest. The thesis examines how divergent but interrelated modalities, including occupation of physical and virtual space, appropriation of both ‘new’ and ‘old’ media and dramaturgical use of physical artefacts (most notably the Guy Fawkes mask), were deployed in ways that instantiated a series of highly-charged political ‘spectacles’, challenging the dominance of the capitalist economic order. This thesis also considers whether the Occupy movement represents a new template for twenty-first-century political activism. Whilst the movement can be seen as distinctively new, in the sense that it operates ‘virtually’ and without a fixed political programme or formal structure, similar political actions can be traced back to the protest movements of the 1960s and to eighteenth- and nineteenth-century struggles.

Following several decades of suppression under authoritarian military rule, Myanmar’s civil society has played an important role in shaping the process and the impact of recent political reforms. Constitutional and legislative change favourable for civil society has been accompanied by an expansion of initiatives by international development agencies to build the capabilities of civic actors and to strengthen their influence in governance and policy making. Together, these are claimed to have enhanced the freedom, security and opportunity, or the space, for civil society to build from its rich history of social and political action and better mobilise for future protection and fulfilment of political and human rights objectives. This thesis argues that normative change in civil society can only be fully assessed, explained and understood through analysis which critiques rather than repeats conceptualisations of civil society as an autonomous zone of freedom, and the state as an apparatus of coercion. Notions of an ‘expanding space’ or an ‘improved enabling environment’ conceal structural and cultural forces which affect the collective agency and normative orientation of civic actors by shaping the political terrain on which they act, enabling and constraining actors’ form and political objectives. I analyse these changes in Myanmar using critical realism and the thought of Antonio Gramsci, and show how the reorganisation of state power and contractual, legal and ethical relations between state and civil society have led to the emergence of an institution of organisation. Tendencies towards professionalisation, formalisation and depoliticisation arise as legitimate activity comes to centre around the hegemonic form of the non-governmental organisation (NGO), with significant implications for the radical transformative potential of both civil society and human rights. Case studies reveal how the impact of these institutional forces varies according to contingencies in circumstance, resistance and the qualities and histories of actors.

This thesis explores the perceptions of frequent users towards service quality in public sports centres in Northern England. In light of the increasing competition for members between highly specialised fitness facilities and multipurpose facilities with a broad range of services, the main focus of the thesis is placed on the users of fitness services in the sports centres, i.e. users of fitness suites and fitness classes. In order to address the gap in the previous literature in terms of measuring service quality in these two separate fitness contexts, the adapted model by Ko and Pastore (2005) was applied within the quantitative mono-method research design of this study. To ensure that the instrument is relevant and appropriate for use in the business operating environment, a pilot study and a series of consultation with practitioners took place, as a part of the model’s development. To measure and compare quality perceptions between two groups of frequent users, data was collected via an online survey from a random sample of customers in fourteen public sports centres managed by Kirklees Active Leisure (KAL) Trust, based in the North of England. The purpose of the survey was to capture customers' evaluations of service quality, by inviting them to score the importance and performance of service quality attributes. The survey received a total of 680 responses, out of which 522 respondents self-reported being frequent users of fitness suites, fitness classes, or both. The data was analysed with the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS); this included importance-performance analysis, quantitative comparison of scores and explanation of satisfaction scores for each of the two groups of users. The findings of the study revealed the exceptional importance of the physical environment quality for both contexts of fitness suites and fitness classes. The empirical data showed that personal achievement was equally important for the users of both fitness suites and fitness classes and this attribute was, relatively speaking, underperforming in both settings. The greatest differences in quality perceptions between the two groups were found in the areas of sociability and inter-client interaction. Sociability was not seen as a desirable outcome by users of fitness suites, yet this may differ depending on the type of facility and customers' motivations. The study found evidence that individuals who participated frequently in both fitness settings tend to give a higher score on performance of certain service attributes. Finally, the study established that evaluations of perceived service quality by the two user groups contribute to their overall satisfaction differently and, therefore, they need to be considered as users of two distinct fitness settings. Overall, this thesis extends existing research by providing classification of areas related to perceived service quality in the fitness services and utilises an industry-specific model for measuring service quality perceptions of customers in the fitness industry.

In the last two decades, Internet gambling (IG) has emerged as a medium in which to gamble. This research aimed to increase understanding of IG by examining routes in and out of problem IG, and also investigating similarities and differences between men and women, players of different IG activities (betting, poker, casino, lottery), and problem and non-problem gamblers (PGs, NPGs). A mixed-method approach was used. Initially, 62 UK Internet gamblers (31 male, 31 female; 32 NPG, 30 PG) participated in semi-structured interviews analysed using the Grounded Theory Method (Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Key findings were translated into hypotheses which were tested in a bespoke online survey, completed by 266 UK Internet gamblers (204 male, 62 female; 182 NPG, 58 PG). Qualitative findings indicated multiple influences for initiating IG, and factor analysis of the quantitative data indicated six initiating factors; utility of IG, value for money, social introduction, alternative social environment, competitiveness and needing something to do. Men were more influenced than women by value for money and utility of IG. Bettors were more influenced by utility than players from other gambling domains, casino players by the attraction of an alternative social environment online, and poker players, by competitiveness and needing something to do. PGs were more influenced than NPGs by an alternative social environment, competitiveness and needing something to do. A ‘vulnerability-compensation effect’ was noted, where vulnerabilities in daily life could be compensated for by engagement with Internet gambling. Continuing, increasing and decreasing IG involvement was influenced by seven categories of events and motivations; financial interests and concerns, enjoyable leisure activity, skill development, life events, emotions and escape, social influence, utility of IG features and time. Convenience had the biggest impact on increasing IG involvement across all gamblers. Men were more influenced than women to increase IG by skill development, women were more influenced by life events, emotions and escape. Poker players were influenced more than players in other domains by skill development. PGs were more influenced than NPGs to increase due to finances, and life events, emotions and escape. Motivations for starting, continuing, escalating and reducing gambling involvement included two new behavioural drivers for IG not specifically captured in existing gambling motivation research; the utility of IG features, and time, as in the opportunities and constraints on available time. Motivations were different across key gambler variables, and their effects changed over a gambler’s journey. Participants indicated that life events, emotions and escape had a strong impact on gambling behaviour, and also suggested safe play and resilience to harm could be developed as protective factors. Both of these issues, along with the impact on time as a possible problem IG marker, have potential to influence social responsibility strategies. From qualitative and quantitative findings, an integrated IG model was created, which suggests problem IG results from a series of escalations influenced by the seven categories of continuation events. The model potentially offers a vehicle for systematic testing and comparison of factors influencing stability and change of IG involvement.

No description available.

This study explores the use of CALL in teaching vocabulary in the classroom. Hence, It is possible to hypothesise that CALL programme enhances vocabulary acquisition of tertiary level students in Turkey. Specifically, it aims to answer the question: 'To what extent do CALL applications affect vocabulary acquisition of tertiary level students in Turkey, specifically in the Samsun region?' This question arises from issues around the pedagogy of vocabulary acquisition that I have encountered in teaching English as a Foreign Language, and my desire to find answers. To find fuller answers, I formulated the following sub-questions. RQ 2. Does CALL instruction have an observable pedagogical effect in the vocabulary acquisition and learning of EFL learners? RQ 3. What appear to be the benefits of and issues around CALL in vocabulary learning and acquisition? RQ 4. In the light of the above, what pedagogical strategies for teaching vocabulary would seem to fit best with use of CALL? The study used a mixed-method approach, involving seventy students considered to the have same level of vocabulary knowledge, who were randomly divided into two classes and exposed to two different learning conditions; i.e. traditional and CALL. The intervention group (35 students) was exposed to digital and online materials, where they were required to finish tasks inside and outside the classroom. For quantitative purposes, both groups were evaluated on a vocabulary test before and after the intervention and their scores were compared. Results showed that the intervention group scored significantly higher than the control group on the post-test. For qualitative purposes, aquestionnaire was conducted with the experimental group to explore students' attitude to CALL. In addition, I conducted classroom observations during the interventions. On analysis, the study indicated that the intervention group were better motivated and that they responded better to digital vocabulary learning tasks. Findings also revealed a pedagogical dimension; i.e. simply following instructions provided by digital materials cannot provide conditions for what can be termed 'high quality teaching' (Harris, 1998). It is my belief that such teaching, in the context of vocabulary acquisition, demands that students notice and effectively process the target lexical items (Robinson, 1995). Using Robinson's theoretical concept of 'noticing', together with the work of Warschauer and Healey (1998) who claim that the 'fun factor' is the key element of students' motivation (Mark Warschauer & Healey, 1998), I conclude that the use of CALL alone, although it may increase motivation, is insufficient for vocabulary learning and acquisition in my own teaching context. Pedagogical strategies where vocabulary can be learned in such a way that it can be said to have been 'acquired' by the student, demand that teachers know and understand how to integrate digital material in the language learning classroom.