Social Studies

This document was prepared by the author in his capacity as Task Manager RCE Kakamega Western. It was the main background paper for the RCE presented at the East Africa Regional RCE’s Pre-Conference Workshop on Environment and Society: Education and Public Awareness for Sustainability held at Golf Hotel, Kakamega, Kenya from 1st to 2nd August 2013. Second, it was a contribution by RCE Kakamega Western towards the implementation of the devolved system of Governance following the promulgation of the Kenya Constitution 2010. It borrows from the special work programme on Chapter 36 of Agenda 21 of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) which “calls upon UNESCO to refine the concept and key messages of education for sustainable development”. The document is based on a wide variety of source materials, background papers prepared by specialists, and a preparatory meeting held in April 2013. It is to be considered the beginning of a process of discussion and debate, not a conclusion. Among the international institutions contributing to its preparation were: Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology (MMUST),Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, International Education and Resource Nest Kenya (IEARN) and DAP Media. Beginning with a preface on the vision, mission and background of RCE Kakamega Western, the paper addresses priority issues reflected in the work programme of the CSD. Part I (“What is ‘Sustainable Leadership’?”) examines the emerging vision of ‘sustainability’ or ‘sustainable development’, including consideration of its inter-related components mainly addressing three key challenge areas and opportunities: Society, Economy and Environment. The role of education seen in this perspective is discussed, no longer as an end in itself but as a key instrument for achieving sustainability in the future. Part II (‘The Need for Effective Communication’) takes up the topic of public awareness and understanding as indispensable to support change towards sustainable development. Problems of vested interests, the difficulties of communicating science, the inherent complexity of the issues, and the tendency of the media to focus on extreme positions and controversies are considered. It is suggested that the most effective communication strategy for building awareness and understanding is to focus on problems which the public experiences in everyday life.

The Sivatattvaratnakara, a Sanskrit work of Basavaraja, the ruler of a small ruling Keladi dynasty. In this work he discussed variety of sciences in which the Ayurveda system of medicine is most important one. He deals the subject in the 21st and 22nd Parts of the work. It has been a practice in India to trace the origin of arts, sciences etc., to superior gods and it is believed that Ayurveda also was created for the welfare of mankind by the Supreme Being Brahman. In this work we find a condensed form of the legend related to the origin of Ayurveda. Here Basavaraj gives detail account on the different diseases and healing methods. He was a scholar-king deals with a vast number of subjects in general and particularly all branches of science like Ayurveda (medicine), chemistry, toxicology, typology, weapons, metallurgy, horticulture, child care and sacraments, geography, astronomy, cosmography, astrology etc.

In most African countries, it is exceedingly difficult to make the transition from youth to adulthood. Some people have attributed this to the hard economic times facing governments. Others have pointed it to the inadequate systems of education where as the rest blame it to poor planning. Statistics has it that most of the people after secondary level of education would wish to go to university. However, due to our filtering system, the smallest group makes it to this level. Those who don’t achieve the marks required join training colleges. There is still a 3rd group, which is unfortunately the largest, who still do not attain the mark to warrant them a place to these training colleges. Technical institutes were created to cater for the 3rd group. The technical institutions train on different skills which an individual could get employment in the informal sector. While some choose to be self employed, others are employed by people who have established themselves with enterprises which specialize in that particular trade. Machakos and Kakamega counties have been blessed by hosting a number of universities and upgrading technical institutes to university colleges. However, technical institutes are scarce and cannot comfortably cater for the 3rd group for as indicated earlier; it is the largest in numbers. In this 3rd group, there is a particular category called persons with disabilities. There is a strong temptation to write off what is strongly referred to as “a lost generation”. The question is, will we sit and watch as the so called “the lost generation” is written off? This paper seeks to show that the challenged have something to prove and given the opportunity they can assert themselves. An inclusive institute is what we are proposing. Inadequate educational system combined with the challenges of PWDs in job placement poses a challenge in acquiring financial security thereby hampering the transition from youth to adulthood. In the African setting, one is considered to be an adult when he/she is independent. This is not the case with persons with disabilities for in most cases they are considered as dependants. Some challenged youth gain technical training in the few special vocational training institutes but cannot compete with their peers. More often than not, their path is blocked because they are seen as liabilities. The idea of a sheltered workshop proposed in this paper seeks to address the informal sector for persons with disabilities. This will involve both vocational training on different skills together with placement and a full workshop where there will be immediate employment for individuals who graduate from the trainings. This initiative is aimed at improving job skills and awareness and possibly coming up with a show room where the finished products could be exhibited for the purpose of marketing. This project will focus on educating and socializing the people with special needs to play a role in the county’s development and growth. The paper proposes a sustainable, gender based and inclusive human resource development initiative.

Social history, often called the new social history, is a broad branch of history that studies the experiences of ordinary people in the past. In its "golden age" it was a major growth field in the 1960s and 1970s.History is important because it helps us to understand the present. If we will listen to what history has to say, we can come to a sound understanding of the past that will tell us much about the problems we now face. History taught to our children is playing a role in shaping their values and beliefs. This paper examine the responsibility of historians in constructing the faulty, ethnocentric and historical account of the past and contemporary Nigerian State.

Local affairs and ensuring the welfare of the village as a desirable habitat for most people is a task The charge is based Dehyarys and according to law, public affairs, directly involved and of course Dehyarys legal entity, financial and administrative autonomy and property, funds and revenues, rights and specific duties and honors of the state. In this context, the role of village councils no secret. In this study, we have investigated the characteristics of Islamic Councils in the rural city of Bushehr, with a descriptive approach. This study aimed to identify qualitative and quantitative trends Council last three periods (second, third and fourth respectively). The findings show Decreasing age, increasing the role of women in village councils, more specialized work by increasing the number of people with higher education, higher education, council members and increase the average number of Islamic Councils has 5 members. The study was presented Proposals such as increasing the powers of councils, creating a bridge between city and rural Councils considering the findings in order to share experiences and Rural Management Training Program for Rural Councils.

“Stomach infrastructure” is a jocular slang that was coined in the heat of the build-up towards the Ekiti State gubernatorial elections that took place on the 21st of June, 2014. One interesting highlight of the campaign was the wooing of prospective voters with things that could appeal to the masses like foodstuffs, money, recharge cards, etc, by the gubernatorial challenger. He ended up defeating the incumbent in a landslide victory. Hence, the term “stomach infrastructure” is used widely to describe petty inducements and bribes. It is also used to describe materialism, and the love of pleasurable things.This paper seeks to examine Pentecostalism and the impact it has on the lives of Nigerians. It also seeks to clarify the role of material or worldly wealth in the Pentecostal brand of the Gospel.

This study is a descriptive research attempting to compare and contrast the use of two types of cohesive devices (i.e. lexical cohesion and ellipsis) in the original dialogues of a television serial with the Persian subtitled and dubbed versions of the same dialogues. The data used in this study comprised the dialogues of 10 scenes selected by the researcher from the television serial ‘Ann of Green Gables’ as well as the dubbed and subtitled counterparts of the dialogues of the same scenes. The study sought two objectives: First, it attempted to investigate the original dialogues of the film, in terms of the frequency of the use of the two mentioned types of cohesive devices, and to compare them with the dubbed and subtitled versions; second, it aimed to compare the two types of audio-visual translations (i.e. dubbing and subtitling) to find out how they have dealt with these cohesive devices and what differences exist between these two types of translation in terms of their handling lexical cohesion and ellipsis. For this purpose, the study employed Halliday and Hasan’s (1976) model of cohesive devices. The findings revealed that repetition has the greatest frequency of use among lexical cohesion elements and clausal ellipsis has the greatest frequency among ellipsis types in the original dialogues. The findings also demonstrated that the two translated versions were relatively similar in their handling lexical cohesion but the dubbed version contained a substantially greater number of cases of ellipsis than the subtitled version did. The findings of this research could provide audiovisual translators with information as to how the cohesive elements are differently used in the English dialogues and their Persian translations (subtitled and dubbed dialogues).

Abu Hanifa Dinavari is one of the most prominent scholars of Islamic civilization and the glories of Iranian history and culture with a venerable and high position in various branches of science especially botany, astronomy, mathematics, mechanics, atmosphere science, climate change (Elm al-Anvae), lexicology, literature, grammar and syntax, interpretation of Quran sciences, historiography, and other branches of intellectual sciences and traditional knowledge. His brilliant knowledge and ample publications made him one great scholar among several scientists and knowledgeable scholars of his time, so that he influenced many sciences. However, his scientific status is not as high as what he deserves to be. What has influenced his character more than anything in scientific circles and among scholars is his historiographical approach due to the publication of the complete text of Al-Akhbar at-Tiwal. While criticizing this viewpoint, the present paper attempts to study the scientific-cultural status and function of Abu Hanifa Dinavari in Islamic civilization. Also using a new and comprehensive approach, and by a complete and more deeply approach and in proportion to the effective position of such scholar in Islamic civilization, the study aims to analyze intellectual thinking and different scholarly and scientific aspects of this distinguished scholar. In addition, with a careful and thorough review and introducing Abu Hanifa Dinavari works, different aspects of his knowledge and character will be further clarified in the study.

If we have a look at the history of the English Language we can understand that the sounds of English are not uniform since English is an unphonetic language. There is no relation between the letter and the sound. This paper aims at investigating the effect of pronunciation teaching of English to high school students. More specifically, it examines to realize whether learners can learn phonetic symbols better explicitly or implicitly. In order to do this, two different teaching methods were implemented, which resulted in having two different experimental groups; an explicit vs. an implicit one. The former received explicit teaching of English pronunciation through a variety of activities while the latter was taught implicitly via the use of recasts. The results showed that the explicit form of teaching is better than implicit one.

This study examines the environmental management issues in Nigeria with a view to delineate a management framework for effective implementation of environmental policies. This study present an argument on the management framework which would enable Nigeria to initiate, plan, and implement environmental policies in a way that would enable the country to achieve a sustainable goals. Further, the study investigates the social distribution of environmental benefits and burden. The finding revealed that, environmental policy without effective management component is unlikely to achieve its espoused objective.