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- Contributor(s)
- Steven Engler; Mark Q. Gardiner
- Date issued
- 2013
- Description
- In this paper we argue that, despite the fact that the term ‘god’ may be used effectively as a comparative concept in the study of religion within narrowly circumscribed contexts, the risks of doing so as a broad cross-cultural category outweigh any possible benefits. We advance an account of the kind of meaning that complex concepts, like ‘god’, have. This account guarantees a risk that certain further concepts that are associated with ‘god’ in some cultural contexts will be illicitly transferred to its use in others. The centrality of ‘god’ in western and Christian contexts makes this risk particularly acute, to the point of not being worth the trouble.
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- Arts
- Contributor(s)
- Kenneth Reilly
- Date issued
- 2017
- Description
- In the fall and winter of 1908, the Canadian Government developed the British Honduras Scheme, a plan to transport all South Asian immigrants from British Columbia to British Honduras. To justify this relocation, the Canadian Government argued that British Honduras needed cheap labour to maintain sugar plantations, railroads and that these immigrants could not survive in Canada because they faced unemployment, starvation, and they were not suited for harsh winters. This attempt was well received by many white Canadians of British descent. Many agreed that this transportation would benefit the South Asian community and white Canadians. Analyzing this scheme in the context of the way...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- Undergraduate Student Research
- Contributor(s)
- Cameron Mitchell
- Date issued
- 2019
- Description
- Throughout the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike, ‘constituted authority’ served as a rhetorical banner under which the interests of the state and capital overlapped. Throughout the six-week walkout, representatives of all three levels of the state and members of the shadowy Citizens’ Committee of 1,000 repeatedly returned to the language of ‘constituted authority’ in order to illustrate what was threatened by the strikers. Tapping into post-war fears of ‘enemy aliens,’ Bolsheviks, and Soviet revolution, the Winnipeg Citizen, capital’s mouthpiece during the strike, was adept at conflating the goals of the strikers with those of an attempted revolution. Even when the Western Labour News, the...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- Undergraduate Student Research
- Contributor(s)
- Steven Engler
- Date issued
- 2003
- Description
- This paper evaluates claims that classical Ayurveda was scientific, in a modern western sense, and that the many religious and magical elements found in the texts were all either stale Vedic remnants or later brahminic impositions. It argues (1) that Ayurveda did not manifest standard criteria of “science” (e.g., materialism, empirical observation, experimentation, falsification, quantification, or a developed conception of proof) and (2) that Vedic aspects of the classical texts are too central to be considered inauthentic or marginal. These points suggest that attempting to apply the modern western categories of “science” and “religion” to ancient South Asian medical texts at best...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- Arts
- Contributor(s)
- Karen Manarin
- Date issued
- 2018
- Description
- Why read? What is the point of reading in higher education if students can succeed in their classes without reading? Using Wigfield and Eccles’ Expectancy-Value theory of motivation as a framework, I explore why different instructors think their students should be reading and whether students share these motivations. Instructors and students attribute value to reading differently. Instructors value reading for what it allows students to do and become. Students may value reading but still not read depending on competing factors including time available and assessment tasks required. The essay concludes by asking higher educational professionals to consider what, if anything, should be done...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- Arts
- Contributor(s)
- Daniel Voth; Jessie Loyer
- Date issued
- 2019
- Description
- Though Métis people have had a long presence in Calgary and southern Alberta, their kinship within the Nehiyaw Pwat allied them against the Blackfoot Confederacy: as strangers politically and culturally, they remained as guests in this territory. For Métis people who live in Calgary who want to be good guests, the authors suggest an “ethic of reciprocal visiting” that emerges from Métis visiting culture, where Indigenous guests outside of their home territory are called to listen to their hosts as a dancer listens to the fiddler and adjusts their steps, engage in respectful non-interference, and be prepared for correction.
- Type
- book chapter
- Appears in collection(s)
- Arts
- Contributor(s)
- Ana Sepulveda; Ranee Drader; Margy MacMillan
- Date issued
- 2014
- Description
- These two scholarship of teaching and learning undergraduate student co-investigators talk about why they got involved in SoTL research, describe the projects they've worked on and what they've learned, and share their perspectives on how faculty and students can work together toward improving student learning. Some key themes from their talk include how they now have a better understanding of what research is and what universities do, how much they were inspired and excited by doing the research and gained confidence by being able to add value to a research project, and also how it taught them life skills such as developing time management skills, learning that setbacks are okay, and...
- Type
- conference publication
- Appears in collection(s)
- Centres & Institutes
- Contributor(s)
- Katrin Becker
- Date issued
- 2008
- Description
- We have always appropriated whatever technologies are available to us for use as technologies for instruction. This practice may well date back as far as human communication itself. The practice of “studying the masters” is also an old and respected one, and using this perspective we can take advantage of the opportunities afforded us in studying outstanding examples of commercial digital games as “educational” objects, even if they weren’t produced by professional educators. By examining successful games through this lens we can progress towards an understanding of the essential elements of ‘good’ games and begin to discuss the implications this holds for the deliberate design of...
- Type
- book chapter
- Appears in collection(s)
- Science and Technology
- Contributor(s)
- Katrin Becker
- Date issued
- 2000
- Description
- Most courses taught in Computer Science still use the traditional lecture plus lab format, usually with one or more required texts as reference. While many instructors now also use the web to augment this, many if not most use it simply as a convenient place to put materials they would normally hand out on paper in class. Some keep all their lecture notes and slides on their laptops or on the web and then display them during class as the basis for their lectures. Students do find it useful to have access to lecture notes and many appreciate being able to print out lecture notes before a class so they can follow along during lectures. Since access to computers and skill in their use is...
- Type
- offprint
- Appears in collection(s)
- Science and Technology
- Contributor(s)
- Janice Miller-Young; Jennifer Boman
- Date issued
- 2017
- Description
- This special issue demonstrates how “Decoding the Disciplines” not only provides a framework for inquiry into teaching and learning disciplinary concepts, but also holds much potential for bridging disciplinary thinking and teaching practice across disciplines, and serving as a tool for both teaching and curriculum development. In Chapter 1, together with our Faculty Learning Community (FLC) co-authors, we describe the “Decoding the Disciplines” FLC at Mount Royal University, including how it started as a faculty development initiative, and how it developed into various teaching, curriculum, and research projects which are presented in detail in subsequent chapters. We hope that others...
- Type
- book
- Appears in collection(s)
- Centres & Institutes
- Contributor(s)
- Francine May; Alice Swabey
- Date issued
- 2014
- Description
- This study examines how students are using academic library spaces and the role these spaces are playing in the campus community. Data was collected on five campuses (two community colleges, two undergraduate universities and one technical institute) via observational seating sweeps and questionnaires. The study found remarkably similar usage patterns across all library types. Academic pursuits remain the most common activities, despite perceptions of the modern library as a social space. The library as a place to study is shown to be a complex topic, with noise, need and personal preference influencing experience. The research provides libraries with evidence to demonstrate their support...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- University Library
- Contributor(s)
- Brian Jackson
- Date issued
- 2015
- Description
- University rankings play an increasingly large role in shaping the goals of academicinstitutions and departments, while removing universities themselves from the evaluation process. This study compares the library-related results of two university ranking publications with scores on the LibQUAL+™ survey to identify if library service quality—as measured within the LibQUAL+™ dimensions affect of service, information control, and library as place—is related to the standings. The results suggest that some indicators used to rank universities favor libraries with more highly rated physical facilities, while largely ignoring the impact that other services have on library quality
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- University Library
- Description
- Research and scholarship contributed by faculty members primarily based in the University Library.
- Appears in collection(s)
- Faculty Research & Scholarship
- Contributor(s)
- Amarnath Amarasingam; Andrew R. Basso; Kristin Burnett; Lori Chambers; Laura Beth Cohen; Travis Hay; Steven Leonard Jacobs; Lorraine Markotic; Sarah Minslow; Donia Mounsef; Adam Muller; Christopher Powell; Raffi Sarkissian; Scott W. Murray
- Date issued
- 2017
- Description
- Understanding Atrocities is a wide-ranging collection of essays bridging scholarly and community-based efforts to understand and respond to the global, transhistorical problem of genocide. The essays in this volume investigate how evolving, contemporary views on mass atrocity frame and complicate the possibilities for the understanding and prevention of genocide. The contributors ask, among other things, what are the limits of the law, of history, of literature, and of education in understanding and representing genocidal violence? What are the challenges we face in teaching and learning about extreme events such as these, and how does the language we use contribute to or impair what can...
- Type
- book
- Appears in collection(s)
- Arts
- Contributor(s)
- Richard Hayman; Erika E. Smith; Hannah Storrs
- Date issued
- 2018
- Description
- This research examines undergraduate students’ academic help-seeking behaviours by mining anonymous posts from a university Facebook Confessions page. From a dataset of 2,712 public posts, researchers identified 708 Confessions (26.1%) that supported student-student learning exchanges. Using a mixed methods methodology informed by a social constructivist framework, analysis of these social media interactions demonstrates that students use Confessions posts to legitimately inform their undergraduate learning and support their academic experience. Researchers conclude that Facebook Confessions can enable rich academic help-seeking and other information behaviours, and that these sites...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- University Library; Teaching and Learning
- Description
- This collection is reserved for significant research and scholarship produced by MRU's undergraduate students, such as honours theses and capstone projects.
- Appears in collection(s)
- Mount Royal University
- Contributor(s)
- Erika E. Smith
- Date issued
- 2017
- Description
- This instrument was developed as a part of the Erika E. Smith’s (2016) doctoral thesis, Exploring undergraduate perceptions of meaning making and social media in their learning, completed at the University of Alberta. For more information, please see: https://doi.org/10.7939/R33J39B71 and https://doi.org/10.1186/s41239-017-0049-y
- Type
- thesis
- Appears in collection(s)
- Teaching and Learning
- Contributor(s)
- Janice Miller-Young; Jennifer Boman
- Date issued
- 2017
- Description
- This chapter presents the bottlenecks identified by seven faculty members from diverse disciplines, and an inductive content analysis of their Decoding interviews. Representative quotations illustrate themes in the interviews and we consider the implications for both faculty development and pedagogical research.
- Type
- book chapter
- Appears in collection(s)
- Centres & Institutes
- Contributor(s)
- Margy MacMillan
- Date issued
- 2010
- Description
- Handout from Centennial Symposium on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning.
- Type
- presentations (communicative events)
- Appears in collection(s)
- University Library
- Contributor(s)
- Steven Engler
- Date issued
- 2011
- Description
- This paper interrogates a particular globalizing academic move: the appropriation of Afro-Brazilian religion by the academic study of religion in North America as a paradigmatic form of cultural mixture. Specifically, I ask what difference would it make if Umbanda were the key example of Brazilian cultural hybridity, rather than Candomblé serving as a more universal example of religious syncretism. I elaborate the concept of hybridity of refraction, according to which the ritual and doctrinal spectrum of Umbandas refracts the spectrum of social tensions in Brazilian society. Referring to recent theories of globalization, I argue that Umbanda’s internal variation manifests a variety of...
- Type
- article
- Appears in collection(s)
- Arts