Arts and Humanities in Higher Education recent issues

Editorial: Impact: More Violence and Exploitation for the Arts and Humanities

Phipps, A. — 2009-09-23

' Making a World that is Worth Living In': Humanities teaching and the formation of practical reasoning

Walker, M. — 2009-09-23

This article considers humanities teaching as a vital space where students might develop their capability as ‘practical reasoners’. The importance of this for self-development, but also for society and democratic life, is considered, while the economic purposes which currently dominate higher education are critiqued. An example is taken from the teaching of history to show how lecturers teach and students learn secular intellectual practices under pedagogical arrangements of communicative reasoning and ontological becoming.

Continuing Professional Development in Higher Education: The role of the scholarship of teaching and learning

Elton, L. — 2009-09-23

It is argued that Humboldt’s original definition of ‘scholarship’ (Wissenschaft), as well as Humboldt’s concept of the purpose of a university, continue to be relevant — with appropriate adaptations. They should be extended to include not only a unity between the practice of teaching and learning and research into teaching and learning, but also an overall unity of teaching and research, i.e. disciplinary as well as generic teaching and learning, together with disciplinary research and research into teaching and learning: all in the service of scholarship (Wissenschaft). This should be accompanied by appropriate academic staff development and training, framed on the basis of evaluated experience and going well beyond Humboldt, leading to a postgraduate qualification.

Influences on the Teaching of Arabic and Islamic Studies in UK Higher Education: Connections and disconnections

Bernasek, L., Canning, J. — 2009-09-23

Middle Eastern Studies, modern foreign languages and Islamic Studies have been recognized by the UK government as strategically important subjects in higher education. Motivated by government concerns about lack of knowledge about the Middle East and the radicalization of British Muslims, this designation has complex implications for the teaching and learning of Arabic language and Islamic Studies. Factors influencing the teaching of these disciplines in the UK are characterized by connections and disconnections which are historical, political, geographical and motivational.

Toward a Productive and Creative Curriculum in Architecture

Wang, T. — 2009-09-23

A model of curriculum development that enables students of architecture in the developing nation of Taiwan to draw on their own life experiences in formulating their own architectural education is proposed. Such an ideology recognizes that while education certainly includes the acquisition of the technical skills needed to ply one’s trade, its more important aspect is the development of the ability to learn throughout life and to apply those skills creatively as social, economic, and cultural contexts change. An architecture curriculum that accomplishes this end will draw on existing designs and encourage input from a wide variety of disciplines and cultures, especially including the humanities and social sciences. In particular, it will recognize the philosophical tradition of epistemology and the epistemological tradition of constructivism. Moreover, such an architectural curriculum will shift its focus of study from the modern tradition of aesthetics to the postmodern concern for environmental ethics. For both practical and cultural reasons, these changes will not be easy, but they are necessary.

Creativity and Conflict: How theory and practice shape student identities in design education

Tynan, J., New, C. — 2009-09-23

By exploring the role of student identities in shaping attitudes to learning, this study asks how design students draw on experience to work across theory and practice. It explores how a specific group of design undergraduate students in a UK university perform on two distinct learning experiences on their course: work placement and dissertation. In particular, it considers the context for learning: the value placed on practice and scholarship; the role of social identity; links between art and design education. Using Bourdieu’s concept of ‘habitus’ the discussion considers the role of experience and motivation in learning in design education, and questions how useful historical divisions drawn between theory and practice are to student learning in design education. By questioning the value of internal disciplinary conflicts to student learning, it asks how we distinguish between vital pedagogic processes and divisive practices in higher education.

Academy and the Real World: Developing realistic notions of career in the performing arts

Bennett, D. — 2009-09-23

Performing arts courses within the university sector retain a necessarily strong practical focus as they prepare graduates for work within a highly competitive environment. However, the reality for graduates is a world in which performance is only one component of the myriad activities required to build a sustainable career. This article reports findings from two studies which investigated work patterns, education and professional development of practising and intending musicians and dance artists. Data gathered using a questionnaire, focus groups and interviews reveal disparity between undergraduate curricula, the career expectations of students and the realities of professional practice. Alignment between the results of the music and dance studies suggests the potential for the collaborative delivery of both initial and lifelong education. The findings are discussed within the context of protean careers, and the article advocates the potential for practising artist academics to engage students in career development and the formation of their professional identities.

Musical Styles as Communities of Practice Challenges for learning, teaching and assessment of music in higher education

Hewitt, A. — 2009-09-23

The last three decades have been marked by significant expansion of music education within higher education, the outcomes of which can be seen in the increased numbers of students studying music and in the diversity of activity and purpose within music courses. This article interrogates the relationship between stylistic diversity and music provision, specifically in relation to teaching and assessment, and considers music styles as examples of ‘communities of practice’ into which students may be inducted through formal and informal means.

Understanding the Transition from School to University in Music and Music Technology

Winterson, J., Russ, M. — 2009-09-23

This article considers the transition from school to university in Music and Music Technology, continuing the discussion of transitional issues which began in Volume 2 of Arts and Humanities in Higher Education. The focus of the article is a survey of undergraduates, examining areas that were key to their first experience of studying for a degree, such as entry qualifications, course choice, career prospects, difficult aspects of the course and aspects they felt well-prepared for. These data were supplemented with teacher and lecturer interviews and a university staff questionnaire. The findings demonstrate that student perceptions of undergraduate music study are sometimes at odds with those of the university staff. In the light of the changing nature, interests and needs of these students, it is timely to rethink both what it is intended to achieve and how this is going to be assessed.

Alien Environments or Supportive Writing Communities?: Pursuing writing groups in academe

Pasternak, D. L., Longwell-Grice, H., Shea, K. A., Hanson, L. K. — 2009-09-23

This article addresses the impetus for joining and maintaining writing groups in academe. The authors consider the motivations and purposes for organizing and forming such groups. Revealing the complexities of writing both as profession and in pursuit of the profession, they analyze their experiences as collaborative writers. They examine the delicate negotiations that accompany the organization and maintenance of writing groups. Their dialogue places writing groups into a sociocultural teaching and learning model with a constructivist epistemology, making concrete concerns expressed in the professional debate about publishing in higher education and sustaining learning.

Supervision Satirized: Fictional narratives of student--supervisor relationships

Kelly, F. — 2009-09-23

This article seeks to further dialogue between the disciplines of English literature and Higher Education by offering a different approach to examining the practice of graduate supervision — a comparison of three fictional narratives: two recently published novels and one ongoing online comic strip. It considers what these narratives reveal about the ways in which supervision is represented in cultural practices at this time. What kind of self or individual subject characterizes the research student and supervisor in these representations, and what kind of relationship between supervisor and student is portrayed? Examining representations of supervision offers a mirror, however distorted, of a pedagogical practice, enabling both students and supervisors to reflect on their roles in the supervisory relationship.

Editorial: Introduction

Fitzpatrick, D. — 2009-05-20

Gender and the Classics Curriculum: A Survey

Blundell, S. — 2009-05-20

A survey was carried out in 2006 of all the UK universities where Classics and Ancient History degrees are taught at undergraduate level. The results reveal that nearly half of these courses include at least one dedicated gender module, and that the great majority also have gender embedded in the content of modules dealing with other topics. Issues of prime concern to the author are that dedicated gender modules attract only a small minority of male students, that masculinity is still not treated very widely, and that the continued dominance of genre-led modules militates against the teaching of the `real life' issues of gender, as opposed to its discourse.

Classical Curriculum Design

George, J. W. — 2009-05-20

The article identifies some key findings in pedagogical research over recent decades, placing them within a framework of logical curriculum development and current practice in quality assurance and enhancement. Throughout, the ideas and comments are related to the practice of teaching classics in university.

The `Research--Teaching Nexus' and the Learning--Teaching Relationship: Who's in charge?

Rowe, C., Okell, E. — 2009-05-20

This article engages, from the point of view of the higher education (HE) department and practitioner, with the realities, and explores the rhetoric, of the `research—teaching nexus' with reference to the role of research and research skills, in the context of the student experience in higher education. The ultimate questions are: How serious should we be about responding to this rhetoric? Would it mean significantly changing the way we currently do things? Who decides such questions? What control do practitioners have? In so doing, the article focuses on examples of `the student as researcher' as an educational goal relating to employ-ability, the Extended Project that will result from 14—19 curriculum reform and the undergraduate dissertation. It also provides rule-of-thumb definitions for the technical language that is evolving in this area.

Latin in Transition

Lister, B. — 2009-05-20

This article examines the challenges and demands — particularly those relating to the reading of Latin texts in the original — faced by Classics students in England in their first year of university study. Arguing that the examination system in schools encourages rote learning of texts rather than the development of reading skills, the article outlines an approach adopted with first-year students at the University of Cambridge to help them develop the reading strategies, especially the predictive skills, needed to move from laborious translation and memorization to confident, fluent reading of Latin texts. After setting this approach in a wider context the article concludes with a brief consideration of lessons to be learnt from a project in Belgium to introduce the `linear' approach to reading Latin.

Accidence and Acronyms: Deploying electronic assessment in support of classical language teaching in a university context

Ashdowne, R. — 2009-05-20

This article describes the process of design and implementation of GALACTICA (`Greek And Latin Accidence Consolidation Training, Internet-Centred Assessment') in support of the University of Oxford's Classics Faculty language consolidation classes. The context and aims of the previous paper-based `assessment' system are considered (being unusual in a university setting) and their significance for the move to an electronic system are addressed: student motivation for revision of basic grammar was the prime aim, and this is retained and enhanced with the electronic system while valuable class time is freed up for language instruction. Technical issues relating to assessment in classical languages and in the Oxford setup are highlighted and their resolution outlined, while questions regarding potential problems (with cheating etc.) are also dealt with.

Editor's Postscript: Thoughts for the Future

Fitzpatrick, D., Hardwick, L. — 2009-05-20

Editorial: Violence and Exploitation in the Humanities?

Phipps, A. — 2009-01-22

SoTL and National Difference: Musings from three historians from three countries

Brawley, S., Kelly, T. M., Timmins, G. — 2009-01-22

What role does/should national difference play in our understanding of the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) as a concept and a practice? Three historians from Australia, the UK and the USA muse on this important issue. Informed by their engagement with the literature and the field, they argue that national difference is an observable phenomenon within SoTL but that each national response has been shaped by the broader transnational/international engagements of recent years.

The Humanities and the Recovery of the Real World

Jacobs, J. — 2009-01-22

This article identifies a common intellectual project of the disciplines that constitute the Humanities. It does not define the humanities but characterizes some of the main features of the distinctive and essential kind of learning uniquely attainable by their study. The humanities enable us to attain an understanding of normativity in the broadest sense; humanistic study leads to a textured, penetrating comprehension of diverse valuative matters and concerns. Moreover, study in the humanities enables us to recognize and appreciate valuative realism . This is the view that valuative matters are appropriate objects of comprehension and that values are not simply projected in an expressivist or subjectivist manner. Valuative realism does not depend upon, and should not be assimilated into, knowledge that emulates the methods of the sciences. Humane studies develop a genuine understanding of diverse kinds of significance and educate people in the concepts and discourse to articulate it.

Visual Culture, Art History and the Humanities

Castaneda, I. — 2009-01-22

This essay will discuss the need for the humanities to address visual culture studies as part of its interdisciplinary mission in today's university. Although mostly unnoticed in recent debates in the humanities over historical and theoretical frameworks, the relatively new field of visual culture has emerged as a corrective to a growing disciplinary territorialism on the part of art history. A study of the theoretical purview of visual culture reveals that it in truth encompasses a continuation of art history's initial interdisciplinary humanist project of cultural critique initiated by Aby Warburg and Erwin Panofsky. This article will argue that art history's inability to fully appreciate visual culture's relevance in today's research and pedagogical settings has given the humanities the opportunity to address a field which is rooted in the humanities' project of interdisciplinary inquiry.

Old Lamps for New: Mnemonic techniques and the thesis

Carter, S. — 2009-01-22

The mnemonic techniques of the past, like mind maps, metaphors, and narrative theory, offer research students, especially doctoral candidates, another cognitive support. These techniques pre-date computers (and possibly literacy), so shift cognitive organization from the page or the computer screen to the mind. This article compares early memory theory and the process of research thinking. Three useful pointers to the thesis writer emerge from mnemonics: the use of concrete images to conceptualize the abstract; the use of mental architecture to conceive of structure; and recognition that the cognitive structuring process is ontologically significant. It is hoped that in an age of electronics a reminder of the capacity of the human mind to establish an architectural filing system may be encouraging to doctoral students engaged with structuring their theses.

Face-to-Face Versus Online Tutoring Support in Humanities Courses in Distance Education

Richardson, J. T.E. — 2009-01-22

The experiences of students taking the same courses in the humanities by distance learning were compared when tutorial support was provided conventionally (using limited face-to-face sessions with some contact by telephone and email) or online (using a combination of computer-mediated conferencing and email). The Course Experience Questionnaire and the Revised Approaches to Studying Inventory were administered in a postal survey to 1264 students taking two different courses with the UK Open University. There were no significant differences between the students who received face-to-face tuition and those who received online tuition either in their perceptions of the academic quality of their courses or in the approaches to studying that they adopted on those courses. Provided that tutors and students receive appropriate training and support, course designers in the humanities can be confident about introducing online forms of tutorial support in campus-based or distance education.

Imagining Globalization Through Latin American Literature

Seminet, G. — 2009-01-22

Through a combination of practical applications and theoretical underpinnings, this article explores the question of how to approach the teaching of Latin American Literature in the current period of globalization. Many theorists argue that we need new epistemologies in which to ground our pedagogy for the 21st century. Understanding the effects of globalization on Latin American Literature is a challenge, but one way we can meet it is by taking heed of new epistemologies such as Walter Mignolo's idea of `border thinking' or Boaventura de Sousa Santos' `epistemology of the South' that advocate an inclusive, dialogic approach to the integration of histories, cultures and different knowledges.

`Interface: Virtual Environments in Art, Design and Education': A report on a conference exploring VLEs in art and design education

2009-01-22

Funded as part of an EU collaboration, under the Socrates/Minerva initiative, the key motivation for the Interface: Virtual Environments in Art, Design and Education Conference was a sense that, while VLEs and the use of ICT tools are a growing facet of third-level education, and indeed play an important role at the cutting edge of contemporary practice in both design and fine art, their relevance to educational practice in `hands-on' or practice-based disciplines such as art and design is less clear. While the range of presentations within the conference sought to excite conversation amongst artists and designers as well as art and design educators, those selected for inclusion here specifically address VLEs and ICT tools in a higher education context. Further, the emphasis accorded to those described here reflects the wider conference objective of engaging with questions arising out of practice-based educational contexts, from art and design to archaeology.

Editorial: The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in the Humanities: The Place -- and Problem -- of Theory

Huber, M. T., Hutchings, P. — 2008-09-04

Placing Theory in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

Hutchings, P., Taylor Huber, M. — 2008-09-04

As the scholarship of teaching and learning matures as a field, the place of theory has garnered growing attention. Educational research and the learning sciences can certainly contribute, but professors who view their classrooms as sites for inquiry draw from a wide range and variety of theoretical foundations. With their diverse efforts in view, we ask: Which (and whose) theories are most relevant? What is the role of theory in different (disciplinary and other) contexts? How can scholarship of teaching and learning both build on and contribute to theory that improves classroom practice and student learning? Our argument is that theoretical pluralism can help keep the scholarship of teaching and learning movement vital and open.

On the Evidence of Theory: Close reading as a disciplinary model for writing about teaching and learning

Bass, R., Linkon, S. L. — 2008-09-04

While some literary scholars claim that their discipline's research practices do not fit the scholarship of teaching and learning, close reading — the signature critical practice of literary studies — provides a useful model. Close reading involves not only attention to the text but also the integration of text and theory. This article analyzes how literary scholars use close reading practices in writing about teaching and learning. The study finds that literary scholars use disciplinary methods effectively in analyzing their teaching, integrating the text of teaching with theories about literature and learning, but they do not read the evidence of students learning in the same ways.

Disciplinary Expertise Revisited: The scholarship of teaching and learning philosophy

Riordan, T. — 2008-09-04

How should students be able to think and what should they be able to do as a result of studying philosophy? What will most readily engage students in the practice of the discipline? And how do we determine the learning strengths and needs of students in order to assist them in the practice of the discipline? These are the questions taken up in this article in an attempt to explore the difference it makes and the expertise it requires to inquire into philosophy as a framework for student learning. Reflecting on his own principles and practices in teaching philosophy, the author indicates potential implications for the scholarship of teaching and learning and the place of theory within it.

Appropriate Use of Theory in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning as a Strategy for Institutional Development

Roxa, T., Olsson, T., Martensson, K. — 2008-09-04

In this article we — as academic developers in two different faculties within a large, research-intensive university — discuss the scholarship of teaching and learning as a strategy for institutional improvement of teaching and learning. We focus on three related issues. Firstly, how can individual engagement in the scholarship of teaching and learning be related to patterns of communication within academia and subsequently have an effect on issues concerning academic identity and status; and how can this be related to an institutional strategy for development? Secondly, what is the appropriate use of educational theory when academic teachers make inquiries into their own teaching, considering that in most cases they are not scholars in education? Finally, while a higher education institution evolves to become gradually more scholarly in relation to teaching and learning, how could the evolving use of theory be supported and monitored? Related to this third issue we describe two cases from Lund University where this has been done. The first case describes how individual teachers can be systematically supported in a scholarship of teaching and learning-direction through pedagogical courses. The second case describes how a faculty uses a reward system for the same purpose.

Minding the Gap: Annotation as preparation for discussion

Feito, J. A., Donahue, P. — 2008-09-04

This research project examines classroom discussion in its relationship to reading as made visible through the practice of textual annotation. In order to develop a rich description of student reading/discussion processes, we targeted multiple undergraduate seminars at a liberal arts college as they encountered the first two Acts of Shakespeare's King Lear. We collected triangulated data from these class sessions including targeted reading surveys, student reading annotations, naturalistic observation of real-time seminar discussion behavior, and student reflections. Our analysis of the students' annotations relies upon reading theorist Wolfgang Iser's conceptions of interpretive gap, consistency building, and individual repertoire. Our discussion considers the theoretical implications of this local, in-depth data for the broader analysis of student reading and discussion practices.

What's So Funny? Moving Students Toward Complex Thinking in a Course on Comedy and Laughter

Ciccone, A. A., Meyers, R. A., Waldmann, S. — 2008-09-04

This case study involves investigation of freshman students' abilities to engage in the pursuit and appreciation of complex thinking through their study of comedy and laughter in a Freshman Seminar at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. We offer an analysis of students' reflections on their confrontation with complexity as they attempt to formulate theories of these phenomena, and describe how this confrontation changes the students' understanding of both the subject matter and their learning process. In investigating these changes systematically, we demonstrate the value of a methodology of close reading supported by theories of learning (e.g. John Dewey's) for course design and evaluation, and seek to add to our growing understanding of the place of theory in the scholarship of teaching and learning.

Learning to Ask Naive Questions with IT Product Design Students

Gunn, W. — 2008-09-04

What does it mean to use, or do, theory in the scholarship of teaching and learning? The article approaches the question by considering the role of design anthropology in developing studio-based engineering programmes. Central to my discussion within situated contexts of learning is the idea of practice-based exploration conceived as a way of enhancing collaboration between knowledge traditions. My focus is on the practice of interdisciplinarity, and I show how such practice is a way of doing anthropology with other disciplines rather than doing an anthropology of these subjects. Through this `anthropology with', I examine the learning and teaching of critical reflection skills. Building upon an experiment in learning and teaching carried out at the Department of Anthropology, University of Aberdeen in 2004 in developing ways of knowing and understanding on the interface across disciplines, I aim to show how learning can itself be a form of research that generates new knowledge and understanding. I suggest that `anthropology with' could be a powerful way of doing theory in the scholarship of teaching and learning.