Rebranding Terroir: Ethnoecology and Tea Agro-Ecosystem Management in Response to Increased Market Integration in Southern Yunnan,China

Prompted by increased domestic and transnational demand for Pu’er tea, an emergence of agroecosystem intensification in Southern Yunnan, China has resulted in various agro-ecosystems including tea forests, mixed crop systems, and monocultural terrace tea gardens, in the tea production system. Plants of Camellia sinensis assamica often grow as trees in forests whilst C. sinensis sinensis grow as shrubs in terrace tea gardens. Inspired by the wine industry, the concept „Terroir” acts as a framework that analyzes both environmental and human factors yielding var ying botanic profiles, and hence quantifies values created by the cultivation process. The approach allows economic opportunities of place-based tea products to be driven by the origin in lieu of extrinsic qualities, which has resulted in to the fabricated reputation of terroir. In response to a common gap in terms of botanical and cultural values between tea cultivation and marketing trends, this artic le investigates an alternative scenario in which tea production and promotion model could minimize its environmental impacts and utilize its economic weight to advance land conservation efforts specific to cultural complexity at community scales.     

The role of tutors in peer led teaching

Problem based learning can impact not only on students’ academic performance but also their social interactions within their peer group, and many institutions have embedded such teaching within their core curriculum. This paper looks at the interactions within a first year undergraduate engineering cohort that uses peers to tutor small groups through problem based learning at a Scottish Higher Education Institution. Most significantly, this work focusses on the impact that these interactions have on the students engaged as tutors within the programme, bridging the gap left by previous studies and providing an insight into how tutors are affected by their experiences. It was found that the recruitment of tutors requires careful consideration of their social as well as academic qualities, and that they should receive training and guidance within their adopted roles that takes account of social factors, questioning the traditional practice of employing individuals purely on the basis that they have studied the class previously themselves. The dynamic of tutor position with regard to the presence of senior staff is also explored, and suggests mechanisms for further student development.     

The case against a positivist philosophy of requirements engineering

Requirements engineering is a field with a heavy practical emphasis and for the most part is quite rightly unconcerned with philosophical reflection. However, there have been exceptions. Philosophical arguments are important because they can be used to powerful effect, facilitating explicit debate on views that may previously have been implicit, and shaping the direction of thought and research within the field. Several cases from both requirements engineering and software engineering have given prominence to the philosophy of positivism. This paper will outline arguments against such a view.

User customisation of medical devices: the reality and the possibilities

While studies of office environments have treated the customisation of technology by users as a positive response to the situated nature of work, customisation of devices in the medical domain, and other safety-critical domains, when acknowledged, has been treated understandably as a violation and a threat to safety. This paper looks at the customisation of medical devices by nursing staff, based on an observational study carried out in three Scottish intensive care units. Drawing on the insights of ethnomethodology, this paper proposes an alternative approach to the study of user customisation and its organisation. An attempt has been made to go beyond the simple categorisation of types of customisation to explicate the detail of how customisation is carried out. Drawing on concerns in human-computer interaction and arguments in medicine surrounding the use of protocols, the potential for supporting customisation in the medical domain is discussed.     

The social organisation of communication in the home of the twenty-first century: an analysis of the future of paper-mail and implications for the design of electronic alternatives

This paper reports ongoing investigations into the use and role of paper-mail communications in domestic environments. It utilises ethnographically informed data to analyse how paper-mail supports various social roles within the home, particularly a division of labour whereby women tend to be largely responsible for what may be called "managing the home". Implications for the future of paper-mail are considered, as well as suggestions made about how email tools may be designed to reflect the patterns of social organisation within the home. Electronic Publication     

互动社会语言学与交际民族志学的渊源探究

本文从核心概念、研究方法、研究对象等方面对互动社会语言学和交际民族志学进行了梳理。互动社会语言学中的"语境提示"是交际民族志学中核心概念的动态、深层次发展;互动社会语言学沿袭了交际民族志学实地考察、深度参与的研究方法;互动社会语言学的落脚点是会话策略,这是对交际民族志学所研究的单一、静态的言语事件的动态汇总。经过比较分析,揭示了互动社会语言学继承和发展了交际民族志学的精髓。     

Practice, systems and technology for seniors

This paper explores how research teams in Intel’s Digital Health Group are using ethnography to identify ‘designable moments’—spaces, times, objects, issues and practices which suggest opportunities for appropriate interventions. It argues that technology innovation should aim to incorporate the views, experiences and practices of users from the start of the design process to support independent living and develop culturally sensitive enhancements that contribute towards wellbeing and a life of quality for local older populations.     

From ethnographic record to system design

This paper explores the issues involved in moving from ethnographic explorations of work in context to a practical contribution to system design. It does so using the example of an interdisciplinary research project involving sociologists and computer scientists in the domain of air traffic control systems. It forms a pair with another paper (Sommerville et al., 1992) exploring these questions from the perspective of our computer science partners. We characterise ethnography as a research method, and consider the differences between undertaking it for strictly sociological or anthropological purposes by contrast with interdisciplinary and design purposes. We summarise some of our results in ethnographic explications of the work of air traffic controllers, and the sociality which it manifests. We describe the dialogues involved in rendering these observations informative for systems design, and the mutual translations implied in attempting to reconcile sociological with software engineering questions about supporting the work. We conclude by specifying some features of cooperative work which an engineering approach is in danger of overlooking; the ways, and limits, in which ethnographers can form a bridge between users and designers; and some of the conflicts of interest entrained in generating technical change.The research is funded by the UK MRC/SERC/ESRC Cognitive Science/HCI Initiative with the title Social Analysis of Control Systems for HCI Design, grant number SPG 8931598. The computer science partners are Professor Ian Sommerville, Dr Tom Rodden, Dr Pete Sawyer and Mr Richard Bentley. Thanks are due to Val King, Kjeldt Schmidt, Ian Sommerville and Tom Rodden for very helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper.     

Fences of childhood: Challenging the meaning of playground boundaries in design

Scholars have criticized the capacity of playgrounds to support children's participation in public life. Fences of childhood, such as walls, fences, and enclosures, dominate children's “public” spatial experiences in the global north. Challenging well-established critiques of the fenced playground as a space that segregates and controls childhood experiences, this study offers a novel and nuanced perspective, emphasizing the qualities of the playground fence that support play and playful connections, on, through, and around it. Employing an ethnographic methodology, this study includes 167h of observations in three typical urban public playgrounds in Greece and 65 semi-structured interviews with 124 participants. Drawing on recursive thematic qualitative analysis, the fence emerges as a blurred boundary, that is, an element that transgresses assumptions and questions spatial classifications and hierarchies. Rarely the subject of design discourse, these findings are particularly significant in design disciplines globally and offer new understandings on the possibilities afforded by the playground fence. Emergent themes, namely, indeterminacy, climbabilty, playability, and porosity, are proposed as principles to guide fenced playground design as part of a fundamental reconceptualization. This reconceptualization positions the fenced playground as a public space infrastructure, supporting intergenerational interaction and play as well as children's presence and play in the public realm.     

A theoretical agenda for feminist HCI

HCI has a complex and often ambivalent attitude towards the issue of gender and interactive systems. Here I discuss three dominant paradigms for treating gender in HCI, and discuss their limitations. Next, I will present the theoretical perspectives on gender which are on the fringes of HCI - Technology as Masculine Culture, Gender Positionality, and Lived Body Experience - and discuss their possible contributions. I will show how this supports a reassessment of the use of gender theory in technological settings and its relevance for framing questions of gender in HCI. My goal in doing so is to argue for the importance of a more direct treatment of gender in HCI and move towards a feminist theory for HCI.