IMPACT : International Journal of Research in Humanities, Arts and Literature

1-6

Authors: SREEKALA

Culture is very much with the notion of power which paves way for the hierarchical structuring of cultures. Power refers to how certain cultures maintain privilege over the 'other'. At a secondary level it refers to choices related to personal matters like which movie to watch, which confectionary to eat in. The word 'Culture' with the capital 'C' referred to the elite way of living and their beliefs. What we have today is 'culture' with the small 'c', a term which is applied worldwide irrespective of all differences. The main agenda of Cultural Studies as a discipline is to dismantle the hierarchical impulses within culture and to negate binaries such as 'high culture' and 'low culture'. Narrowed down to Kerala scenario, the culture is inimitable and fascinating in many ways. Cultural heritage of Kerala goes way back to ancient times and its contribution to literature, music and arts of Indian heritage is unique and exemplary. The peculiar geographical features of the state has contributed to the ‘Malayali culture’ with a flavor of its own, even though it forms part of the Indian and Dravidian culture. Isolation of Kerala from the other parts of India by Western Ghats has helped Kerala to retain its cultural heritage almost to its original form. Kerala is a melting pot, where several ethnic and religious groups mingle. The historic process of cultural synthesis happened in Kerala is brilliantly reflected in its art forms, traditional rituals and sacred practices. The typical icons of Kerala throw light into the subtle and intricate details of the state; unfolding the beautiful blend of cultures owned by different religions and communities.

13-18

Authors: S.VIDHYA & G. METTILDA BUVANESWARI

Achievement motivation is essential for all children which helps them to build their confidence and achieve better .School children when they does not have achievement motivation they are not interested in studies that leads to dropouts.The reasons for children disinterest in studies should be found out by the social workers or teachers. The school becomes substitute for home and teacher as substitute for mother. The school education enhances the children for socialisation (C.L.Kundu D.N.Tutoo, 1988). School is an active and formal agency of education. It is an organised institutions in which the potentials of children are shaped out and their behaviours are controlled by the teacher by imparting education. School is a connecting link between Home and the outside world.(Dr.Sanjay Bhattacharya,2008). Raymont says “The school is a Half- way house between the entirely domestic life of early childhood and the larger life awaits the youth when he quits his parental roof

41-50

Authors: LINDA LILIAN

The recurrent challenges women political leaders continue to face as they lead form ethical dilemmas that require deliberation, review and prescription in terms of remedies for the quota system and affirmative action initiatives to meet their targets. The paper presents results from a study on the ethical implications of women’s participation in political leadership; the case of the Uganda parliament with a world view of ethical challenges that have been identified by scholars and yet again found to still build up in a system that has been executed for over 20 years in Uganda with minimal transformative impact. Opines emerging out of the existing literature are discussed against the identified challenges from the field findings and some remedial agenda is sketched in the paper leaving a latent task that demands for study to be conducted into remedies for the challenges in order to attain more effective women political leadership.

57-70

Authors: EKUA TEKYIWA AMUA-SEKYI, SETH KOFI NTI & PATRICK GODFRED ATIAH

Reading comprehension is central to student learning and to their learning outcome. Apart from the process of decoding information, reading comprehension depends on the construction of a coherent meaning-based mental representation of the situation described in a text. It is therefore necessary to activate a set of reading comprehension strategies that facilitate the representational construction of a text. Based on a self-reported study of a stratified sample of 400 students drawn from three colleges of education in Ghana, this paper explored teacher trainees’ awareness and use of reading comprehension strategies Teacher trainees displayed an awareness of their cognitive processes during reading and claimed the ability to utilize a multitude of reading strategies to achieve comprehension. The result however contradicts an earlier study which suggests that students have difficulty understanding academic texts. The gap between awareness of and use of comprehension strategies need to be bridged. It is recommended that explicit explanation and modelling will help students to think about their reading processes and make clear what they should be doing, what they were not doing before, or what they are doing wrong. This will build their confidence to use their reported strategic knowledge to enhance their reading efficacy.