Typescript. / Bibliography: leaves [203]-219. / Microfiche. / viii, 219 leaves ill

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008. / Committee Chair: Elizabeth D. Mynatt; Committee Member: Jay D. Bolter; Committee Member: Rebecca E. Grinter; Committee Member: W. Keith Edwards; Committee Member: Wendy A. Kellogg

Societal trends have changed more in the last decade than they have in the last century. This is particularly prevalent in the education environment. Concepts such as Lifelong Learning (the continued learning/educating of an individual throughout his/her lifetime), New Competencies (technology that is now part of almost every skill in the workplace) and Telecommuting (more people working from home rather than traditional offices) have become common-place today (Twigg, 1996, pp. 1-2). Education delivery needs to provide for these societal changes in order to ensure competent individuals pass on to the next level of education and ultimately to the work force. With key trends in technology such as Digitization, Maturation and Disintermediation becoming common in the workplace, education delivery must address the ―Digital Divide. (Twigg, 1996, pp. 2-3). Historically, schools in South Africa have used traditional teaching methods that have stayed the same for the last century. Educational institutions in South Africa, in particular, the previously disadvantaged schools of the Eastern Cape, face various challenges such as the dwindling ability to collect school fees from parents of scholars and declining financial support from the government. In Chapter Seven of the Draft White Paper on e-Education, which was gazetted on 26 August, 2004, the DoE, as part of its implementation strategies, urged the private sector to respond by implementing ICT initiatives nationwide. Phase 1 of the strategy advocated that ―Institutions are connected, access the internet and communicate electronically. (Department of Education, 2004, pp. 37-40). This dissertation shows that it is feasible to create a communications’ network among South African schools. It is believed that such a network can add great value to the education system in South Africa. The potential for this network to address the gap in the Digital Divide is enormous. This dissertation examines various ICT communications’ technologies and isolates wireless communications’ technology as best suited for this purpose, due to the speeds offered by the technology and the cost structure associated with it. A case study examines a pilot installation of the network and endeavours to prove the concept.

The purpose of this research was to identify factors that impact on tablet PC usage in low-income communities. In order to determine and identify these factors a main research question and sub-research questions were formulated. The primary research question of this study was "What factors impact on tablet PC usage in low-income communities?" This main research question was answered by creating three sub-research questions followed by triangulating the results from these questions. The first sub-research question was aimed at determining whether prior exposure to touch screen technology impacts the user experience. In order to reach this objective an extensive literature review was conducted on the tablet PC landscape in South Africa. This literature review, coupled with the case study helped answer this first research question. The second sub-research question was concerned with determining whether existing user experience guidelines are relevant to South African users. A thorough literature review was conducted on user experience guidelines and related studies. This literature review, together with the results from the case study helped answer this second research question. The third sub-research question involved identifying specific factors which help improve the user experience of tablet PC users in a specific context. This research question was addressed in the case study. Each sub-research question provided results which were analysed in order to answer the main research question. The factors which impact on tablet PC usage were thus identified and recommendations were proposed.

This paper argues that since media or technologies are extensions or abstractions of ourselves, the technologies that we performatively produce simultaneously function to (re)produce us. Technologies are highly social spaces which have the performative power to (re)produce the very 'materiality' of that thing we call 'reality.' The performative powers of technologies manifest as the powerfully (re)productive meaningmaking paradigms and regulatory controls in operation in a given culture. After considering the predominant paradigms performed through typographic and computing technologies, this paper investigates 'gender' as a performative site of social interface (re)produced in relation to these predominating technological paradigms. This paper further argues that in the context of the cyborg, 'gender' is exposed to be a map with no territory: in a world increasingly exposed as simulation, the material reality of 'gender' is power's effect. Finally, this paper considers the theatre in relation to typographic and computing paradigms, arguing that 'play' and the imagination, in world that is all representation, are crucial sites of social practice. Indeed, 'performativity' provides a means for understanding the agency, subjectivity, materiality, and politics of construction (re)produced through this, our simulated world. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

It is the thesis of this study, that although Ayres’s theory of progress is damaging to his sociological theory as a whole, his theory of the basic dichotomy of social action, that of technology and ceremonialism, deserves greater credit than it has received and is profoundly significant sociologically.

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Orientador: Lea Maria Leme Strini Velho / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Geociências / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-14T21:47:32Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Bennertz_Rafael_M.pdf: 2805980 bytes, checksum: ffab014e26eb6fa1dd7ed36e7a751260 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009 / Resumo: Esta dissertação tem como objetivo geral contribuir para a compreensão do desenvolvimento da tecnologia do uso do álcool combustível no Brasil. Para tanto apresenta, no primeiro capítulo, uma extensa revisão teórica sobre os Estudos Sociais da Ciência e da Tecnologia, ênfase especial é dada à algumas das principais abordagens teóricas da Sociologia da Ciência e da Tecnologia. São discutidas: a Escola de Edimburgo, o Programa Empírico do Relativismo e os Estudos de Laboratório. São destacadas ainda algumas abordagens Sociológicas e Históricas sobre a Tecnologia, tais como a Construção Social da Tecnologia, os estudos sobre a emergência dos Sistemas Tecnológicos, e a Teoria Atore-rede (TAR). Guiado pelas propostas da TAR, e sustentado por dados primários, como entrevistas, e secundários como documentos, revistas, fotos e estudos específicos sobre o caso do Proálcool, o segundo capítulo descreve o caso do desenvolvimento da tecnologia de uso do álcool combustível. Neste sentido, apresenta as tentativas históricas de substituição da gasolina por álcool no Brasil, evidencia que já existiam controvérsias sobre o uso da gasolina ou do álcool e aponta a crise do petróleo de 1973 como a força propulsora que deu novas forças às tentativas de substituição da gasolina como combustível para automóveis particulares. Na seqüência, é problematizada a existência de alternativas ao uso do petróleo como, por exemplo, a possibilidade de uso de outras formas de transporte. Tendo estas reflexões por base, a pesquisa busca seguir os cientistas e os técnicos nas suas atividades estratégicas de promoção do álcool combustível enquanto objeto capaz de encerrar as controvérsias relativas ao combustível a ser utilizado no Brasil da década de 1970. O segundo capítulo se encerra com uma breve reflexão sobre como o referencial analítico ajudou a compreender a construção deste coletivo habitado por objetos técnicos e sociais. O texto conclui com uma síntese do trabalho, retomando os objetivos específicos, que foram trabalhados em cada capítulo, desenha conclusões a partir da análise do caso com base no referencial teórico e aponta para recomendações e possibilidade de aprofundamento da pesquisa. / Abstract: This dissertation has as objective to contribute to the understanding of the development of the technology for alcohol fuel consumption in Brazil. To do so it presents, in the first chapter, an extensive revision about the Social Studies of Science and Technology, a special emphasis is given on the comprehension of some school of thoughts in the sociology of science and Technology. Those are The Edinburg School, The Empirical Program of Relativism and The Laboratory Studies. Some approaches from the sociology and the history of technology as The Social Construction of Technology, Large Technological Systems and Actor-Network Theory (ANT) are emphasized as well. Under the guidance of ANT and with support from primary data as interviews, as well as from secondary data like documents, magazines, pictures and specific studies about the Proálcool case the second chapter describes the case of the development of the technology of alcohol fuel consumption. In doing so it presents the historical attempts to replace gas for alcohol fuel in Brazil, highlights the existence of controversies about the usage of gas or alcohol fuel and points the global petrol crises in 1973 as the main driving force which brought new energy to the attempts to the replacement of Gas as fuel for privately owned automobiles. In the sequence, the existence of alternatives to the usage of petro-fuel like the possibility to use other means of transportation is issued. Based on these conjectures the research tries to follow the scientists and technicians at their strategic activities to promote alcohol fuel as an object capable of closing the controversies about which fuel should be used in Brazil in the 1970's. The second chapter finishes with a brief consideration about how the analytical frame work helped to understand the construction of this collectivity populated by technical and social objects. The text concludes with a synthesis of the work, reassesses the precise objectives from each chapter, draws some conclusions from the case study and offers some hints on how to extend the research. / Mestrado / Mestre em Política Científica e Tecnológica

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Science in Information Technology in Education