This study explored the discursive subject positions that 18 parents, teachers and administrators involved with children identified as experiencing learning difficulties in a Queensland regional primary school between September 2003 and August 2004 drew upon to explain the causes of those children’s learning difficulties. The study used a post-structuralist adaptation of positioning theory and social constructionism and a discourse analytic method to analyse relevant policy documents and participants’ semi-structured interview transcripts to interrogate what models were being used to explain a student's inability to access the curriculum. Despite the existence of alternative explanatory frameworks that functioned as relatively undeveloped resistant counternarratives, the study demonstrated the medical model’s overwhelming dominance in both Education Queensland policy statements and the participants’ subject positions. This dominance shapes and informs the adult stakeholders’ subjectivities and renders the child docile and potentially irrational.

Social pressure for sustainability has become a significant factor in Australian business. Made popular by a variety of diverse social movements that employ various tactics, sustainability is increasingly being debated in boardrooms and work areas of both large and small businesses. In this research, sustainability issues are treated as a set of a wider range of obligatory and externally imposed (OEI) issues that are increasingly confronting contemporary business. Of interest to this research is how senior managers deal with sustainability issues. While some businesses excel in dealing with OEI issues, others prevaricate. This research focuses on those businesses that appear to excel in resolving sustainability issues to explore how senior managers deal with sustainability issues. Such understanding is essential for contemporary practising senior managers, as it provides guidance for management behaviour that will enable sustainability and other OEI issues to be dealt with. The author's effort to understand how senior managers deal with sustainability issues has led to the first business context application of Harré's positioning theory. A social constructionist approach, positioning theory is concerned with ordinary conversations, and presumes that these are the building blocks of all other discursive phenomena. The resulting theory builds on positioning theory and provides a point of departure to conduct related research on other organizations that excel in dealing with OEI issues and those that prevaricate. With positioning theory it has been shown that, in dealing with sustainability issues, senior managers engage in a range of positioning of themselves and others. In doing so, power and knowledge have been considered in the light of Foucault's unique and penetrating concepts. This has led to the proposed augmentation of positioning theory to include a concept of social flux, which is put forward as an indication of social order or culture. Through this development, it has shown how senior managers confront opposition and reinforce support to enable them to achieve and preserve sustainability objectives. In practical terms, senior managers alter four components of the social order to align the culture with the issues that need to be dealt with. These components - rights, duties, morals and actions - are parameters that senior managers tune or level when they deal with sustainability issues. When the social order is appropriately tuned or levelled, it is aligned with the issues that need to be dealt with. That alignment enables issues to be resolved in a way appropriate for the organization.

<p>The purpose of this thesis is to describe and analyse the role of logistics in the strategy of the firm. Leading to this purpose are empirical observations of firms that manage to grow under sustained profitability, by the means of logistics.</p><p>The clothing retailers H&M and Inditex manage to pursue strategies of growth under sustained profitability. Both H&M and Inditex acknowledge that logistics is used in achieving these strategic goals. The competitive environments are similar for the two retailers. However, the strategy content, i.e. the what of strategy, differs greatly between H&M and its Spanish competitor. H&M focuses on economies of scale in their operations to allow for low logistics costs and a cost-efficient geographical expansion. Inditex focuses on flexibility and speed, being able to quickly respond to changes in demand, which calls for a more agile logistics platform.</p><p>From this background, two cases are studied as regards the role of logistics in the strategy. The case companies Ahlsell and Bergman & Beving, two wholesalers of industrial goods, display growth under sustained profitability and have an outspoken focus on logistics in their strategies. The cases are described in terms of the content and the context of logistics in the strategy of the firm. The content is the what of strategy whereas the context is the where of strategy. The context is further divided into inner and outer context, where inner context is the firm and outer context is its environment.</p><p>The theoretical basis of this research is found in logistics and in strategy: Logistics research on the relation between logistics and strategy from a logistics perspective, and strategy theory ranging from the resource-based view of the firm, or the inside-out perspective, to positioning theory, or the outside-in perspective. A pattern-matching methodology is used to establish an appropriate description of the logistics content and context in the strategy of the firm. In the content-dimension, the opposing views of the resource-based view and positioning theory are tested on the cases. In the context-dimension, the cases and their environment are described with a stance taken in the contingency approach to the organisation of logistics.</p><p>The research shows that the role of logistics in the strategy of the firms in the scope of this study is most appropriately described using a resource-based view of the firm. Further, the two firms under study serve as examples of two different ways to use logistics in the strategy:</p><p>- Bergman & Beving manages to integrate a decentralised group of product companies in one logistics platform.</p><p>- Ahlsell achieves synergies in acquisitions by moving logistics and administration of the acquired firms into their centralised logistics platform.</p><p>The cases also serve as examples of that the logistics solutions need not be optimal in terms of the lowest cost and the highest service level to be used successfully in the strategy of the firm to reach growth under sustained profitability. The firms in the scope of this research act in similar outer contexts but interpret these contexts in different ways depending on their manner to use logistics in the strategy. The research shows that similar outer contexts can be approached successfully with strategies with different logistics content.</p><p>The logistics organisations in the firms in the scope of this thesis display robustness towards changes in the outer context of the firm, i.e. the logistics organisations can encounter considerable changes in the environment without altering their position in the firm. It is concluded that in order to make the role of logistics in the strategy more comprehensible, a bridge between the abstract strategy theory and the role of logistics needs to be established. A possibility to attain this can be found in the application of a business model framework to the relation between logistics and strategy, which is suggested as an area for further research.</p> / ISRN/Report code: LiU-Tek-Lic 2005:34

This article elucidates the professional dialogue between student teacher and supervisor and it´s conditions as a supervising method in professional academic education. The aim of the study is to discuss how students articulate the conditions of the professional dialogue and the positioning of themselves and supervisors are made. The student taped discussions were analysed. Inspired by positioning theory we analysed the students discussions in order to interpret and elevate patterns showing the conditions concerning the professional dialogues for the students teacher education. The main findings are the students positioning themselves as listener and the supervisor is positioned as communicator of rights, obligations and oughtness. The communicator is positioned to a great number of responsibilities in the professional dialogues and the listener is positioned themselves passive. The professional experienced knowledge and the scientific knowledge will integrate in professional dialogues to challenge the students in their future profession. The contents, form and function of the professional dialogue are situated the students workplace. The conditions of the professional dialogue may vary due to the specific terms that the supervisor have.

Den här kvalitativa studien utgår ifrån ett socialkonstruktionistiskt perspektiv.Positioneringsteorin används för att analysera den producerade empirin. Två pedagoger och fembarn i åldrarna två till tre år på en förskola i västra Sverige har deltagit i studien. Videofilmninghar använts som metod för att producera empirin. Syftet med studien är att studera pedagogernasförhållningssätt gentemot de yngsta barnen i åldrarna två till tre vid bildskapande. Syftet är ocksåatt studera de positioner som pedagoger och barn intar och tilldelas under aktivitetens gång. Vårfrågeställning har varit: Hur gestaltar sig samspelet mellan pedagog-pedagog och pedagog-barnunder bildskapande? Resultatet visar att pedagogernas subjektspositioner bidrog till hur barnentog sig an bildaktiviteterna samt positionerna som de blev tilldelade. En bidragande faktor ibildaktiviteterna var också huruvida barnen positionerade sig själva och de andra barnen samtpedagogerna. Det sociala samspelet skiftade under aktiviteternas gång beroende på vilkasubjektspositioner som var aktuella. Men det förekom ompositionering vid flera tillfällen utifrånvad situationen krävde. De båda pedagogerna intog vitt skilda subjektspositioner underaktiviteterna. / This qualitative study is based on a social constructionist perspective. Positioning theory is used to analyze the produced empirical data. Two preschool teachers and five children two to threeyears old at a nursery school in western Sweden have participated in the study. Video recordinghas been used as a method to produce the empirical data. The purpose of the study is to study theeducators approach towards the youngest children aged two to three during activities in thecreative arts. The aim is also to study the positions educators and children adopt and assignduring the activity. Our research question was: How is the interaction between teacher-teacherand teacher-child during creative arts portrayed? The result shows that teachers' attitudescontributed to the way the children took on the art activities and the positions which they wereassigned. It also contributed to how the children responded. A contributing factor in the artactivities were also whether the children positioned themselves and the other children andteachers, or were positioned themselves. Social interaction shifted during the activity dependingon the subject positions that were active at the time. During the activities there wererepositioning several times based on what the situation demanded. The two teachers took verydifferent subject positions during the activities.

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Using social positioning theory and the concept of the liminoid, the objectives of this qualitative research project were three-fold: 1) investigate how social positioning affects the information behaviour of volunteer tourists; 2) determine what effects cultural confusion (aka culture shock), physical location, gender, technical skill, and previous intercultural education and/or experiences have on the information behaviour of volunteer tourists; and finally, 3) suggest how non-governmental organizations can use the research findings to assist volunteer tourists to successfully undertake their placements. These questions were explored through observation and semi-structured interviews with fifteen volunteer tourists in Thailand. Previous travel experience proved to be a significant predictor of participants information behaviour. Volunteer tourists reported more consciousness of the embodiment of information and the concept of face than they did at home. The results emphasize the importance of developing a theory of liminoidal information behaviour, in order to explore how people in the liminoid a place between cultures where identities are often suspended interact with information.

Ce travail comporte un aperçu de la théorie des positionnements, la construction d’une méthodologie adaptée à l’analyse des interactions, et l’application de cette méthodologie aux interactions de classe.Celle-ci est réalisée à partir de transcriptions d’enregistrements audio-vidéo de 15 heures de leçons en mathématiques et en physique/sciences en Angleterre et en France. Les élèves avaient entre 11 et 12 ans. Ces transcriptions sont divisées en épisodes, c’est-à-dire en unités cohérentes quant à leur thème et à leur enjeu. Puis, chaque épisode est codé selon les comportements observés pour le professeur. Les catégories de comportement trouvées pour l’interaction plénière de classe sont comparables à celles trouvées par d’autres travaux de recherche sur le travail en groupe. Une analyse réalisée afin de déterminer les types de comportement (considérés en tant que droits et devoirs) qui apparaissent simultanément indique que deux droits apparaissent souvent simultanément : poser une question scientifique et valider une proposition. Ceci est cohérent avec les résultats d’autres travaux de recherche, qui indiquent la prédominance des séquences IRE/IRF.Une étude de la fréquence de ces comportements met en évidence la rareté d’affirmations indépendantes par le professeur. Une analyse des épisodes qui contiennent de telles affirmations indique que le professeur n’introduit de nouveaux éléments en se reposant sur sa propre autorité que dans des cas particuliers : (a) suite à l’erreur d’un élève, auquel cas l’affirmation se limite à expliquer l’erreur, (b) suite à la question d’un élève, ou (c) suite à l’affirmation non invitée d’un élève. Les contenus introduits de cette manière semblent être considérés légitimes plus longtemps que ceux qui sont introduits en faisant référence à une source officielle.Les conséquences de ces résultats sont abordées : il semble désormais nécessaire de considérer l’agence des élèves lors de futurs travaux de recherche ; et il est possible qu’un style d’enseignement magistral puisse bénéficier à l’apprentissage. / This work consists in a theoretical overview of positioning theory, the construction of a methodology for interaction analysis, and its application to classroom interaction.The latter part is based on transcripts from audio-video recordings of 15 hours of lessons in mathematics and physics or science in England and in France, with children aged between 11 and 12. These transcripts were divided up into episodes, units displaying coherence in theme and purpose; and each episode was coded according to the types of behaviour the teacher displayed in them. The same types of behaviour were found in plenary interaction as those found by previous research into group work. Analysis carried out to highlight co-occurring types of behaviour (seen as rights and duties) only yielded two co-occurring rights – asking a scientific question and validating a statement, consistently with the previously noted prevalence of IRE/IRF sequences.A frequency analysis of the levels of occurrence of individual types of behaviour highlighted the scarcity of unsupported teacher statements. Further analysis of the episodes featuring teacher statements showed that the teacher may only introduce new elements on the basis of their own authority in highly specific circumstances: (a) after a student’s mistake, in which case the teacher’s statement is limited to explaining why the aforementioned mistake is one; (b) after a student’s question or (c) after a student’s unsolicited statement. In the last two cases, the teacher’s statement may go beyond the remit of the question or statement. Content introduced in such a way appears to have a longer-lasting legitimacy than that introduced with the help of official content.Some implications of these results are discussed: the need to take into account student agency in further research; and it is suggested that a lecturing style of teaching might be beneficial for learning.

This study analyzes discussions from online language teacher education to understand how conversations between monolingual and bilingual preservice teachers (PSTs) in the US create and delimit structural constraints on teachers’ agency, (re)positioning teachers’ capacity to act in the instruction of emergent bilingual students (EBs). Employing positioning theory within a critical discursive psychology approach, findings demonstrate how bilingual PSTs pushed back on structural constraints introduced as potential barriers to achieving linguistic pluralism in monolingual teachers’ posts, asserting teachers’ agency by simultaneously positioning themselves and others as capable and responsible for education of EBs. These findings inform theoretical understandings of agency as a discursive construct and offer insights for teacher educators as they conceptualize the role of discursive exchanges in developing PSTs’ understanding of structures and agentive possibilities regarding the equitable education of EBs.

The increase in online course delivery in higher education has implications for students and instructors. In fall 2002, 1.6 million students took at least one online course and this number increased by the fall of 2012 to 6.7 million. The increase in the rate of enrollment in online courses in higher education provides an opportunity to examine the strategies and technologies used in course design and delivery and student engagement in the online culture. Two of the key factors in creating student engagement are the instructor's interaction with students and the course design and delivery itself. An examination of students’ and instructors’ perceptions of what factors contribute to a positive online experience may assist those developing and delivering online courses. The purpose of this quantitative study was to investigate the relationship between the perceptions of online instructors and online students regarding student engagement and course design and delivery. Data collection techniques included the use of a survey with a 5-point Likert-type scale and collection of demographic information. Data were analyzed through a nonexperimental quantitative methodology and further explained through the use of positioning theory. Positioning theory combines cognitive and social psychology to describe how individuals interact through conversation or speech acts (Harre & van Langenhove, 1999). This theory provides a framework for discussion of the findings as to how the first interactions between students and instructors set a tone for student engagement for the duration of the course. The study revealed that there is a strong statistical significance to the number of both student and instructors posting to perceived student engagement. The more students and instructors post in the first 2 weeks the higher the perception of student engagement. This finding allows for the application of the use of positioning theory in how students and instructors relate and experience engagement in the course. Findings also revealed that academic discipline was not statistically significant in regards to instructor and students perception of engagement. Significance was also established between student age and traditional or nontraditional status in their perceived engagement in online classes. Traditional students and also students in the age category of 24 and under reported higher rates of perceived student engagement than nontraditional students and students in the age category of 25 and older. Recommendations for practice are included in the discussion.