About James Arvanitakis

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So far James Arvanitakis has created 34 blog entries.

Cultures of Resilience

One of the areas I have always found fascinating is the concept of resilience - but with a focus on 'cultures of resilience'. That is, why do some communities mobilise and respond to a crisis while others collapse? What are the cultural elements that allow this to happen? This question of resilience continues to [...]

Living in the age of algorithms: what does that mean for democracy?

We can confidently say we are living in the age of the algorithm. Some of the most influential organisations of our day use secret algorithms that steer us towards what we should read and watch, recommend restaurants and holiday destinations, as well as provide relationship guidance. But what about how we vote? The innovation [...]

Free textbooks for first-year university students could help improve retention rates

Despite 20 years of focus on improving university retention rates, we are still losing one in five of our first-year students. And the release of a new report by TEQSA again reminds us of the challenges of retention. The report highlights that, on average, universities have a 20% attrition rate. This builds on an article by The [...]

On collegiality and civility: or 9 tips on not being an academic jerk

I have now been an academic for just over 10 years. It is a job I love, and I have been lucky enough to experience some success. I work with some amazing people, get to sit in a classroom with amazing students, have great colleagues, and for some reason I am yet to fathom, [...]

Forms of Engagement and the Heterogeneous Citizen

This research article focuses on the challenges confronted by contemporary universities when they undertake ‘community engagement’ activities through the lens of an active citizenship workshop we have designed and implemented. Writing with Professor Bob Hodge, we begin by concentrating on the very concept of ‘engagement’, unpicking its ambiguities and returning its complexities to where they [...]

Meaning and Anxiety: a reflection of Lee Hong’s work

This week I had the pleasure of launching an exhibition of the work of Lee Hong. Lee is an Australian-Chinese artists who studied at the Central Academy of Art in Beijing. I find Lee’s art incredibly insightful. Below is the catalogue essay I wrote. -- According to Existential philosophers such as Soren Kierkegaard, we as [...]

How educators are failing and how we can respond

Brexit, the election of Donald Trump, the re-emergence of One Nation, refusal to accept human induced climate change and the failure of other evidence based policy initiatives such as needs-based school funding and health care. As we see this occurring, Prof. Andrew J. Hoffman from the University of Michigan wars that educators are losing relevance [...]

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