The meaning of "diversity" was at the core of the U.S. Senate debate of 1991-92 concerning continued Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) funding, a debate that was both reported on and fueled by a parallel discourse on the topic in the popular press. Ideas about the diversity of programming fell into three sub-dimensions: (1) political…

In April of 1990, a three-day conference was convened at which 76 men and women from 18 countries representing a spectrum of government, business, labor, academia, the media, and the professions gathered to discuss how the United State should reorient its policies and relations toward other countries and international institutions to preserve the…

This document consists of a packet of materials published in December 1990 and designed to assist citizens in forming study circles to discuss the crisis in the Persian Gulf. The resources are designed to be nonpartisan, fair, and balanced, and try to make the strongest possible case for four different options, reflecting a broad range of…

Writing courses which incorporate the tenets of "critical literacy" (such as the "difference" curriculum at the University of Texas at Austin) not only often fail to make students more aware of the role ideology plays in their culture, but also create profound new silences in the classroom--silences caused by political…

An investigation of college students' belief structures underlying their support or non-support of a nuclear freeze revealed a three-dimensional structure for beliefs in the areas of nuclear weapons and national defense. A questionnaire containing 25 belief statements concerning national defense and nuclear weapons and 4 media use questions was…

A study examined how use of different kinds of "involvement" measures (behavioral, cognitive, or affective involvement, gratifications sought, and cognitive effort expended) could help explain differences between people's knowledge of election information and whether the way that knowledge is measured affects conclusions about…

Locating the issue of abortion in a global public policy context, with the array of public health, human rights, and social questions that are implicated, is the aim of this paper. Abortion laws around the world have been liberalized since the 1950s, with a resultant decrease in abortion-related mortality among women. The proportion of the world's…

Support for the traditional principle of separation of church and state has eroded in recent years. Although a majority of citizens say they support church-state separation, opinion polls find they have difficulty with the issue. The report presents a summary of such church-state conflicts in 38 states. The conflicts are categorized as follows:…

The Australian education system is denying equity and social justice to ethnic minorities and women. This paper examines the development of Australia's educational policy for those two groups. It argues that the educational disadvantages they have experienced have been enhanced by the marginalization of the issues. Policies such as multicultural…

The widely accepted notion that the management of resources in schools involves merely strategic decisions about the deployment of finances, staff, and materials must be contested. The school effectiveness movement ignores the social and political context of schools and, through emphasis upon superficial managerial matters, teaches pupils to…

One in a series of interviews with Native American poets, this interview with William Oandasan of the Yuki tribe of Round Valley, California, is conducted by an Abenaki poet, storyteller, and editor. Questions focus on Oandasan's literary style, his cultural heritage, and his development as a writer. Opening questions relate to the role of place…

Supreme Court decisions tend to take the form of either (1) an act of justification or argumentation that defends the verdict of the communicator, or (2) a construction of a new symbolic reality that influences the world view of its audience. The "Roe vs. Wade" decision is an example of the merger of these two rhetorical functions. The…

This paper examines the potential impacts of the comprehensive free-trade agreement negotiated by the United States and Canada in 1987 on transborder data flow between the two countries. An introductory overview of transborder data flow (TDFs) is followed by a discussion of how TDFs have been dealt with by both the United States and Canada to…

This report examines the participation of teacher unions in the education reform process. It analyzes the many roles that these organizations are playing at the national, state, and local levels through collective bargaining and political action. The focus is upon three major issues: (1) the extent to which teacher unions have attained more…

A study examined the content of direct mail materials, distributed by the National Organization for Women (NOW) and Stop ERA groups, favoring or opposing passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. It was expected that NOW's pieces would concentrate on counteracting or counterattacking Stop ERA's arguments against the amendment (military draft, lesbian…