Learners of chemistry experience problems with the understanding of chemical reactions. One of the causes of this difficulty to understand chemical reactions seems to be that learners do not visualise them, or they do not know how to visualise them. The study aims at probing the learners' perceptions of visual models of sub-microscopic entities (atoms, ions, and molecules), to identify problems they encounter when trying to visualise and to understand chemical reactions. The empirical survey was conducted amongst 100 physical science Grade 11 learners from four high schools in the Bojanala West region near Rustenburg in the North-West Province, South Africa. The investigation was done by means of a questionnaire. The results of the questionnaire were used to identify alternative conceptions and problems that hampered learners' visualisation process. The results indicated that learners had problems with visualisation of the structure and the interaction of basic entities such as atoms, ions and molecules in chemical reactions. This had a negative effect on their understanding of chemical reactions and chemistry. / Thesis (M.Ed.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.

Actif de 1740 à 1786, année de sa mort, Yūḥannā al Armanī al-Qudsī fut l’un des plus prolifiques peintres d’icônes que l’Égypte ottomane ait pu connaître. Bénéficiant d’un renouveau politique et économique, les chrétiens d’Égypte ont pu restaurer et mettre en valeur leur patrimoine religieux, notamment en faisant réaliser de nombreuses icônes pour décorer les églises. Yūḥannā al Armanī et son proche collègue Ibrāhīm al-Nāsiḫ répondirent à cet appel en développant de grands ateliers prêts à répondre à ces commandes. Le résultat est si spectaculaire que, encore aujourd’hui, il est difficile de ne pas visiter une église copte du Caire sans voir un panneau réalisé par l’un ou l’autre de ces hommes. La réunion d’un corpus de plus de quatre cents icônes permet désormais d’envisager l’ampleur du travail qui résulta de ce tandem. Le style des peintres est également ce qui fait la grande originalité de cette production. Souvent indéfinissable, comme le remarquait déjà en son temps A. J. Butler à la fin du XIXe siècle, celui-ci illustre les multiples sources qui ont été utilisées. On y trouve à la fois, pêle-mêle, des inspirations des traditions chrétiennes locales, des évocations de tissus ottomans ou des compositions issues de tableaux européens. Cette particularité tient dans un fait bien concret. Yūḥannā al Armanī, comme son nom l’indique, est issu d’une famille arménienne. Bien qu’étant né en Égypte et ayant épousé une Égyptienne copte, il n’en demeure pas moins très attaché à ses racines, aussi bien par son lieu d’habitation au Caire – proche de l’église arménienne – que par la sociabilité qu’il développe. Afin de mieux cerner ce peintre atypique et son œuvre, il convient de cerner les réseaux qui existent au Caire dans la seconde moitié du XVIIIe siècle. Ses sources d’inspiration ont ainsi pu notamment être découvertes au détour d’ouvrages liturgiques imprimés en Europe ou à la Nouvelle-Djoulfa et retrouvés dans la bibliothèque des pères franciscains du Mūski au Caire. Comprendre l’art de Yūḥannā al Armanī permet ainsi de mieux cerner la diffusion des iconographies chrétiennes en Afrique et au Proche-Orient, voguant, au gré des courants de la mer Méditerranée. Son œuvre montre qu’il n’est pas simplement entre Orient et Occident, il est au croisement de circulations complexes qui font éclater cette problématique. / Active from 1740 to 1786, the year of his death, Yūḥannā al Armanī al-Qudsī was one of the most prolific icon painters that Ottoman Egypt has ever known. Benefiting from a political and economic renewal, the Christians of Egypt have been able to restore and enhance their religious heritage, in particular by having many icons made to decorate churches. Yūḥannā al Armanī and his close colleague Ibrāhīm al-Nāsiḫ responded to this call by developing large workshops ready to respond to these orders. The result is so spectacular that, even today, it is difficult not to visit a Coptic church in Cairo without seeing a panel made by one or the other of these men. The gathering of a corpus of more than four hundred icons now makes it possible to consider the extent of the work that resulted from this tandem. The style of the painters is also what makes this production so original. Often undefinable, as already noted in his time A. J. Butler at the end of the 19th century, this one illustrates the many sources that have been used. There are both, jumbled together, inspirations from local Christian traditions, evocations of Ottoman fabrics or compositions from European paintings. This particularity is based on a very concrete fact. Yūḥannā al Armanī, as its name suggests, comes from an Armenian family. Although he was born in Egypt and married a Coptic Egyptian, he remains very attached to his roots, both by his place of residence in Cairo - close to the Armenian church - and by the sociability he develops. In order to better understand this atypical painter and his work, it is necessary to understand the networks that existed in Cairo in the second half of the 18th century. His sources of inspiration have been discovered in liturgical works printed in Europe or New Julfa and found in the Franciscan's Library at Mūski in Cairo. Understanding the art of Yūḥannā al Armanī thus makes it possible to better understand the diffusion of Christian iconographies in Africa and the Near East, sailing, according to the currents of the Mediterranean Sea. His work shows that he is not simply between East and West, he is at the crossroads of complex circulations that make this problem explode.

The central material studied in this thesis is a representative group of the earliest surviving Christian icons from the collection of St Catherine’s Monastery in Sinai, all dated to the sixth or seventh centuries. These are discussed specifically in relation to their possible sources within the preceding Greco-Roman tradition of portraiture. While each of these sources is important to a full understanding of the Sinai icons’ visual languages, original functions and meanings, they have not previously been analysed alongside each other in a single study. By doing so, the aim is to reconstruct a more complete artistic context for the icons’ production, as well as to arrive at a fuller understanding of the historical, social and religious factors that would have conditioned their reception. Three categories of portrait-image are critically considered as possible sources for the Sinai icons in terms of technique, style, iconography and function: Roman imperial portraiture (from the first to the sixth centuries); the funerary portraiture of Roman Egypt (first to third centuries); and the corpus of sacred pinakes or ‘pagan icons’ produced in the Fayum region of Egypt (mainly second century). Following the Introduction in which recent scholarly literature on the topic is critically assessed and definitions of key terms are given, the opening chapter presents a detailed visual analysis of each of the eight selected Sinai icons. Questions of dating and geographical attribution are addressed, with previous proposals either revised or confirmed. In Chapter Two, Roman imperial portraiture is discussed, principally in terms of its meanings and functions, and comparisons are made with early portraits of Christ. Questions of the construction of likeness, and the complex relationship between a portrait (whether of an emperor or of Christ) and its prototype, are addressed. It is argued that while early Christian portraits did adopt various elements of imperial iconography to convey a message of universal authority, at the same time they performed functions which were not shared by imperial portraits – for example, participating in intercessory and anagogical prayer. Chapter Three analyses the techniques and styles used in the corpus of Romano- Egyptian ‘mummy-portraits’, with correspondences and differences highlighted between these and the early Sinai icons, and also discusses the question of whether portrait-mummies performed a devotional function comparable to that of early Christian icons. To this end, importance is again given to the question of the relationship between a portrait-mummy and its prototype (the soul of the deceased), as well as questions of audience, display and reception. On the basis of this discussion it is argued that the portraits participated in a reciprocal ‘exchange of gazes’ with their intended viewers, and that this is likely to have been a key factor in the reception of some of the Sinai icons as well. Chapter Four discusses the smaller extant corpus of painted panels depicting pagan deities, produced in the Fayum concurrently with the portrait-mummies. Some striking correspondences in terms of physical construction, technique and style are drawn between these and the early Sinai icons, and literary evidence is adduced to elucidate the role of the artist’s phantasia, or faculty of visualisation, in the construction of the likenesses of both pagan deities and Christian saints. In sum, it is argued that the formal characteristics of the early Sinai icons can all be derived from the non-Christian portrait-categories discussed above; however, these forms were employed in the service of an expanded range of devotional functions in a Christian context. In particular, the early Sinai icons invited a new mode of reception, characterised by an interpersonal, prayerful exchange with an icon’s prototype(s), which the portrait-image both stimulated and channelled.

The following qualitative research study examined visual and thematic depictions of mental disorder in mainstream American film from 1988 to 2010. The research was an extension of an earlier investigation on portrayals of psychological disability in Hollywood movies (Levers, 1988, 2001). The theoretical and historical grounding for the project included Sander Gilman's (1982) scholarship on madness in the pictorial arts, the history and treatment of mental disorder over the course of time, social constructionism and the media, and research on media depictions of mental illness. The author employed two content analysis instruments (Levers, 1988, 2001) to record the appearance of icons, stereotypes, and positive portrayals of mental illness in 14 feature-length American films, which contain scenes of psychiatric hospitalization. Each film became a case study, and for each case, the author included content analysis findings, plot and character summaries, and discussion on mental disorder representation through images, speech, and themes. The multiple cases culminated in a filmography, which can be a resource for individuals interested in, and concerned about, the nature in which mental disorder is portrayed in popular, contemporary movies. The results from this study indicate that iconic and stereotypical representations of mental disorder have remained consistent since Levers' (1988, 2001) inquiries. The author identified 60 of 61 icons listed on the Icons of Madness viewing rubric (Levers, 1988, 2001) and all stereotypes and positive portrayals on the Thematic Portrayals of Mental Disorder viewing rubric (Levers, 1988, 2001). More specifically, the four most commonly depicted icons and the top five stereotypes were the same in both the present and Levers' (1988, 2001) studies. The one notable difference between these and Levers' (1988, 2001) results was the increased frequency of positive portrayals of mental illness; more positive portrayals occurred in this investigation as compared to Levers' earlier research. New icons, stereotypes, and positive portrayals of mental disorder not originally listed on the viewing rubrics were identified, too. The author discusses the present findings in light of future research possibilities, counselor education, and client advocacy. / School of Education; / Counselor Education and Supervision (ExCES) / PhD; / Dissertation;

Adam Jolly May 7th, 2004 67 pages Directed by: Dr. Nancy Roberts, Dr. David Lenoir, and Dr. Lloyd Davies Department of English Western Kentucky University This thesis, consisting of three short stories, proposes to explore ubiquitous motifs by exhibition of symbolic, mythological conceptions and personalities relating mutually with the everyday and the exceptional in a plausible way. These stories are intended to include effectual inquiry and still be inventive and entertaining. Source materials for this thesis range from Norse mythology to Homer to the Charlie Daniels Band.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Manitoba, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references.

No description available.

Learners of chemistry experience problems with the understanding of chemical reactions. One of the causes of this difficulty to understand chemical reactions seems to be that learners do not visualise them, or they do not know how to visualise them. The study aims at probing the learners' perceptions of visual models of sub-microscopic entities (atoms, ions, and molecules), to identify problems they encounter when trying to visualise and to understand chemical reactions. The empirical survey was conducted amongst 100 physical science Grade 11 learners from four high schools in the Bojanala West region near Rustenburg in the North-West Province, South Africa. The investigation was done by means of a questionnaire. The results of the questionnaire were used to identify alternative conceptions and problems that hampered learners' visualisation process. The results indicated that learners had problems with visualisation of the structure and the interaction of basic entities such as atoms, ions and molecules in chemical reactions. This had a negative effect on their understanding of chemical reactions and chemistry. / Thesis (M.Ed.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.

Thesis (Th. M.)--Holy Cross Orthodox School of Theology, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 91-100).

Thesis (B.Div.)--St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, 1970. / Bibliography: leaf 31.