Laura Czerniewicz

Unbundling and rebundling are happening in different parts of college and university education, through new forms of teaching and learning provision and in different parts of the degree path, in every dimension and aspect—creating a complicated environment in an educational sector that is already in a state of disequilibrium.

Using the promises of networked learning as a base, this chapter describes changes in the Higher Education (HE) sector, using inequality as a frame. It provides a brief overview of particular aspects of the reconfiguring landscape where education itself has become intrinsically digitally mediated and disaggregation an important trend. It notes the global shift online, and locates the MOOC trend in the broader curriculum provision terrain. Other important considerations include the ways that globalisation and marketization are playing out, noting the geopolitical differences and contested power relations. The paper then reviews the rise in inequality across the world, noting the UK's position in Europe and the extreme situation in South Africa, as well as the different approaches in an information age to addressing inequality: through market-led and commons-lead approaches. Therborn's equality/inequality framework is then used to interrogate this increasingly online HE landscape using three types of inequality: vital inequality; resource inequality; existential inequality. Vital inequality shows how educational inequality is a life-and-death issue. Resource inequality includes a range of capitals: economic disparities (eg costs of data and availability of connectivity); discrepancies of cultural capital (e.g. digital literacies), and the value of institutional capital as new forms of certification jockey for legitimacy. Existential inequality, the most neglected, comprises five dimensions: self-development, autonomy, freedom, dignity and respect. Considerations here include issues of virtual representation, discoverability and visibility online, as well as the skewed geopolitics of knowledge, ironically worsened in an open access context. The chapter ends with a call for critical research, inequality-framed experimentation, policy and advocacy. It argues for theorised explorations of the fluid intersection between inequality and the digital as well as for innovations in the development of new commons-based business models.

This special issue is being published at a significant point in time in relation to simultaneous changes in higher education, in technology and in the field of learning technology itself. As the 2011 ALT C conference themes clearly state, learning technology needs to learn to thrive in a colder and more challenging climate. In this difficult political and economic environment technological trends continue to develop in terms of mobility, cloud computing, ubiquity and the emergence of what has been called big data. E-learning has become mainstream and the field of learning technology itself is beginning to stabilisE as a profession. Profession here is understood as a knowledge-based occupation and a form of cultural work where the tasks addressed are human problems amenable to expert advice and distinguishable from other kinds of work by the fact that it is underpinned by abstract knowledge (Macdonald, 1995). Abstract knowledge is the focus of this special issue, in the form of theory. The hallmarks of a profession include both a codified body of practices (embodied knowledge including competence) and abstract knowledge in the form of theory which is expressed in a codified body of principles; in conceptual knowledge (Denning 2001 1). Indeed learning technology, like other applied technology fields, has a distinct relationship to explicit, codified, systematic and scientific knowledge (Jones 2004). Czerniewicz (2010) has shown how learning technology as an applied field takes the form of a horizontal knowledge structure , segmented and expressed as co-existent parallel specialist 'languages', with a tendency to repeat and proliferate. A Bernsteinian framework shows how theory is manifest in a " general approach discursive plane " , where metalanguages are produced to legitimize how phenomena are understood and interpreted, and to determine what counts as a proper description. It is important that the theories expressed through these metalanguages are developed and made explicit. Coherent theoretical frameworks are needed to enable integration across the segmented clusters so that generalizations can be made, lessons learnt across multiple sites, and a community of researchers enabled to share a common language to build knowledge together. In addition, because of the emergent nature of the field and the particular nature of learning technology in terms of practice, several related issues pertaining to theory and its role arise. These include: the place of theory in an applied practice-based field; the legitimacy of specific theories; the related contestation between theoretical positions and claims; and the tensions and disjunctures between the empirical and the theoretical in research.

It is important that academics’ research communication practices are explored to complement these system approaches. How do we think about these issues in order to investigate and illuminate changing forms of knowledge creation and communication? The project from which this paper is drawn was interested to answer three interrelated questions: • What are the research communication practices of academics? • What enables or constrains the flow of research communication within these practices? • How closed or open are academics’ scholarly communication practices? This paper describes our thinking as we developed the analytical framework that would enable us to answer these questions. The analytical framework was developed from the conceptual framework we used to shape our study through an iterative process with the data collected.

This paper reports on an investigation into the online visibility of work undertaken in South Africa in the field of poverty alleviation. An experiment with Google searches was undertaken, motivated by concerns about the visibility of South African research and development work, particularly in a context where social inequality is extreme and poverty such a critical issue. Aware that much attention – through research and the practice of development work – is being paid to poverty alleviation, the authors set out to examine whether that work could be found easily, and what the nature of the search results would be. Significant sums of public money are invested in research, which should result in the production and dissemination of locally generated knowledge as a public good grounded in local realities. A great deal of national and international funding is also spent. Thus, research published online should inform and reflect on national and regional development practice, while contributing perspectives from the South to the global corpus of poverty research. Research to understand poverty and inform the design and targeting of poverty alleviation programmes needs to be freely available and actively shared in order for it to accumulate value. In this regard it is argued that there are exponentially beneficial linkages between research, scholarly publication and social development, which originate with local knowledge production and are amplified by the availability and discoverability of that research. Availability and discoverability add breadth and depth to the potential use, value and impact of the knowledge produced.

This paper describes the habitus and technological practices of a South African rural student in his first year at university. This student is one of five self-declared rural students, from a group of 23 first-years in four South African universities, whose access to, and use of, technologies in their learning and everyday lives was investigated in 2011 using a ‘digital ethnography’ approach. Their digital practices, in the form of their activities in context, were collected through multiple strategies in order to provide a nuanced description of the role of technologies in their lives. The student reported on here came from a school and a community with very little access to information and communication technologies (ICTs). While the adjustment to first year can be challenging for all students, the findings show that this can be especially acute for students from rural backgrounds. The study provides an analysis of one student’s negotiation of a range of technologies six to nine months into his first year at university. Earlier theoretical concepts provide a lens for describing his practices through a consideration of his habitus, and access to and use of various forms of capitals in relation to the fields – especially that of higher education – in which he was situated.

Scholars globally are increasingly required to account for the visibility and impact of their research, and visibility and impact are increasingly digitally-mediated through the platforms and practices associated with Web 2.0. Traditional prestige-based metrics of visibility (ISI/WoS Impact Factor) measure only scholar-to-scholar outputs like journals and books. In many African universities with nascent research cultures, legacies of colonialism and imperatives of national development, these measures present scholars with particular challenges. At the same time, in the North, moves towards Open Access, along with the potential of Web 2.0 technologies for increasing visibility of research, offer the potential for changes to traditional measures of assessing impact and visibility. Using a framework whereby the extent of change in research communication practices at all stages of the research process can be analysed, this paper reveals the pressures shaping African research communication practices and the visibility of research, using data from a case study at the University of Namibia.

Using Schatzki’s practices framework as a lens, this paper reports on the practices of university students accessing learning resources at a research-intensive  university in South Africa. Using a mixed methods approach, 1001 survey responses and six focus groups were analysed to explore how students in three professional disciplines access learning resources, with the focus on digitally-mediated piracy practices. The findings suggest a blurring between the legal and the illegal and indicate the normalcy of piracy practices, with nuanced distinctions and understandings manifest.

In this paper, we locate open access in the South African higher education research context where it is, distinctively, not shaped by the policy frameworks that are profoundly changing research dissemination behaviour in other parts of the world. We define open access and account for its rise by two quite different routes. We then present a case study of journal publishing at one South African university to identify existing journal publishing practices in terms of open access. This case provides the springboard for considering the implications – both positive and negative – of global open access trends for South African – and other – research and researchers. We argue that academics’ engagement with open access and scholarly communication debates is in their interests as global networked researchers whose virtual identities and online scholarship are now a critical aspect of their professional engagement.

MOOCs offer opportunities but are also pose the danger of further
exacerbating existing educational divisions and deepening the homogeneity of global knowledge systems. Like many universities globally, South African university leaders and those responsible for course, curriculum, and learning technology development are
coming to grips with the implications and possibilities of online and open education for their own institutions. What opportunities do they offer to universities, especially from the point of view of research-focused campus-based institutions which have not yet engaged with MOOCs and have little history with online courses? Given the
complexities of the MOOC-scape, this paper provides a means for contextualising the options within an institutional landscape of educational provision as possibilities for MOOC creation, use and adaptation. This takes into account what is currently available and identifies what new opportunities can be explored. Refining this further, a categorisation of existing MOOCs is provided that maps to broad institutional interests.

This exploratory paper picks up elements from the European Commission’s educational vision and philosophy behind Opening up Education, the resulting initiative of the OpenupEd.eu MOOC platform, and takes this as a starting point to look at potential challenges for developing MOOCs that include vulnerable learner groups. In order to align the future conceptualization of MOOCs with the vision and philosophy of Europe, potential tensions of contemporary and future education are listed. The current dichotomy of xMOOC and cMOOC are used to mark some of the unexplored MOOC territory. Practical answers to contemporary, ICT-supported educational challenges are provided as options to fuel the debate. The challenges and options for future online education initiatives are based on insights and ideas of international scholars and researchers reflecting on potential barriers for learners and online education. This paper aims to stimulate discussion of the potential for new educational technologies to ensure social inclusion for virtual and physical vulnerable learner groups

"Research by higher education and communications scholars provides growing evidence of the changes taking place in the field of scholarly communication, both as a result of changes in
research activity in higher education systems globally (Etzkowitz 2004; Cooper 2009, 2011; Gibbons et al. 1994), as well as those offered by the affordances of Web 2.0 technologies (Tenopir 2003; Palmer 2005; Thorin 2006; Procter et al. 2010; Weller 2011). There is also growing evidence that the research terrain is becoming more open (Van der Vaart et al. 2013). While attention has been paid to how scholarly communication and libraries are changing as part of a larger ecosystem (Pendleton-Jullian 2013), it is less clear how the changing scholarly communication system plays out in actual research practices, as scholars go about their academic work. It is important that academics’ research communication practices are explored to complement these system approaches. How do we think about these issues ininterested to answer three interrelated questions:
• What are the research communication
practices of academics?
• What enables or constrains the flow of research
communication within these practices?
• How closed or open are academics’ scholarly
communication"

A level playing field is key for global participation in science and scholarship, particularly with regard to how scientific publications are financed and subsequently accessed. However, there are potential pitfalls of the so-called “Gold” open-access (OA) route, in which author-paid publication charges cover the costs of production and publication. Gold OA plans in which author charges are required may not solve the access problem, but rather may shift the access barrier from reader to writer. Under such plans, everyone may be free to read papers, but it may still be prohibitively expensive to publish them. In a scholarly community that is increasingly global, spread over more and more regions and countries of the world, these publication access barriers may be quite significant.
In the present paper, a global suite of colleagues in academe joins this debate. The group of colleagues, a network of researchers active in scholarly publishing, spans four continents and multiple disciplines in the natural sciences, humanities, and social sciences, as well as diverse political and economic situations. We believe that this global sampling of researchers can provide the nuance and perspective necessary to grasp this complex problem. The group was assembled without an attempt to achieve global coverage through random sampling.
This contribution differs from other approaches to the open-access problem in several fundamental ways. (A) It is scholar-driven, and thus can represent the ‘other side of the coin’ of scholarly communication. (B) It focuses on narrative report, where scholars were free to orient their responses as they saw fit, rather than being confined to binary or scalar choices. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, (C) it distinguishes among institutions and countries and situations, highlighting inequalities of access among wealthy and economically-challenged nations, and also within countries depending on the size and location of particular institutions.

"A level playing field is key for global participation in science and scholarship, particularly with regard to how scientific publications are financed and subsequently accessed. However, there are potential pitfalls of the so-called “Gold” open-access (OA) route, in which author-paid publication charges cover the costs of production and publication. Gold OA plans in which author charges are required may not solve the access problem, but rather may shift the access barrier from reader to writer. Under such plans, everyone may be free to read papers, but it may still be prohibitively expensive to publish them. In a scholarly community that is increasingly global, spread over more and more regions and countries of the world, these publication access barriers may be quite significant.
In the present paper, a global suite of colleagues in academe joins this debate. The group of colleagues, a network of researchers active in scholarly publishing, spans four continents and multiple disciplines in the natural sciences, humanities, and social sciences, as well as diverse political and economic situations. We believe that this global sampling of researchers can provide the nuance and perspective necessary to grasp this complex problem. The group was assembled without an attempt to achieve global coverage through random sampling.
This contribution differs from other approaches to the open-access problem in several fundamental ways. (A) It is scholar-driven, and thus can represent the ‘other side of the coin’ of scholarly communication. (B) It focuses on narrative report, where scholars were free to orient their responses as they saw fit, rather than being confined to binary or scalar choices. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, (C) it distinguishes among institutions and countries and situations, highlighting inequalities of access among wealthy and economically-challenged nations, and also within countries depending on the size and location of particular institutions."

This paper describes the habitus and technological practices of a South African rural student in his first year at university. This student is one of five self-declared rural students, from a group of 23 first-years in four South African universities, whose access to, and use of, technologies in their learning and everyday lives was investigated in 2011 using a ‘digital ethnography’ approach. Their digital practices, in the form of their activities in context, were collected through multiple strategies in order to provide a nuanced description of the role of technologies in their lives. The student reported on here came from a school and a community with very little access to information and communication technologies (ICTs). While the adjustment to first year can be challenging for all students, the findings show that this can be especially acute for students from rural backgrounds. The study provides an analysis of one student’s negotiation of a range of technologies six to nine months into his first year at university. Bourdieu’s theoretical concepts provide a lens for describing his practices through a consideration of his habitus, and access to and use of various forms of capitals in relation to the fields – especially that of higher education – in which he was situated.

This paper follows two South African Media Studies university students and their activities as producers of online content. It considers the online publication services they chose to express media-related academic and creative interests outside of formal curriculum requirements. Through peer guidance and using online search, both students were able to access educational resources and communities of expertise relevant to varied creative production interests. These relationships supported self-directed and interest-driven learning across academic, civic and career domains. Such cross-linkages are a unique feature of the pedagogical approach of ‘Connected Learning’ (Ito et al., 2013), which knits together three crucial contexts for learning: peer- supported, interest-powered and academically-oriented. It argues that learners flourish and achieve their potential when they can connect their interests and social engagement to academic studies, civic engagement, and career opportunity. This paper shows how the varied online publication services used by both students provided them with inter-connected and relevant extramural experiences

This paper reports on an investigation into the online visibility of work undertaken in South Africa in the field of poverty alleviation. An experiment with
Google searches was undertaken, motivated by concerns about the visibility of South African research and development work, particularly in a context where social
inequality is extreme and poverty such a critical issue. Aware that much attention – through research and the practice of development work – is being paid to
poverty alleviation1
, the authors set out to examine whether that work could be found easily, and what the nature of the search results would be. Significant sums
of public money are invested in research, which should result in the production and dissemination of locally generated knowledge as a public good grounded in
local realities. A great deal of national and international funding is also spent. Thus, research published online should inform and reflect on national and regional
development practice, while contributing perspectives from the South to the global corpus of poverty research. Research to understand poverty and inform the design
and targeting of poverty alleviation programmes needs to be freely available and actively shared in order for it to accumulate value. In this regard it is argued that
there are exponentially beneficial linkages between research, scholarly publication and social development, which originate with local knowledge production and
are amplified by the availability and discoverability of that research. Availability and discoverability add breadth and depth to the potential use, value and impact
of the knowledge produced

Scholarship in transition: mapping the changing ecology
The entire scholarship ecology has been changing shape as scholarly practices become digitally-mediated as a norm, and as openness in the higher education terrain becomes more mainstream. Every dimension of traditional scholarly cycles are affected: the conceptualisation of research, data collection and data analysis, the publishing and sharing of findings, as well as the translation of findings through teaching and engaged scholarship. In a context where communication is visible, content now intrinsically includes communication; expectations are for two-way interaction, new relationships are formed and old ones change shape with emergent roles and activities which previously did not exist. Understandings of impact and value are under scrutiny with the rise of non – traditional outputs and the development of alternative metrics of impact. This presentation will map these changes, provide examples of new tools and trends, and consider the power plays, threats and opportunities for the role players involved.

Abstract This special issue is being published at a significant point in time in relation tosimultaneous changes in higher education, in technology and in the field of learningtechnology itself. As the 2011 ALT C conference themes clearly state, learningtechnology needs to learn to thrive in a colder and more challenging climate.

This journal provides open access to all of its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Such access is associated with increased readership and increased citation of an author's work. For more information on this approach, see the Public Knowledge Project, which has designed this system to improve the scholarly and public quality of research.

The number of African journals listed on the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is increasing too; over the last five years there has been an increase of 543% from 40 African journals listed in 2007 to 217 in 20111. In the last year countries such as Kenya, Ethiopia and Ghana have appeared on the list or substantially increased their presence.

“If you build it they will come” is the dream in a context where access to computers is uneven, unequal and socially demarcated. More specifically,“If its there will they use it?” Is this a realistic vision? Does improved access lead to more use? Does it lead to more use for all?

Both authors work in the Multimedia Education Group at the University of Cape Town. Laura Czerniewicz (lcz@ ched. uct. ac. za) focuses on ICT use for learning and teaching institutionally and Dick Ng'ambi (dngambi@ ched. uct. ac. za) is interested in students' use of ICTs to support learning.

Globally, the increase of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in higher education is shaking up complex tertiary institutions from the inside while provoking larger questions about the overall role of higher education itself. It is evident that ICTs are being taken up in the core business within institutions while they are simultaneously integral to the various pressures that are presently being experienced by the higher education sector as a whole.

Page 1. i Centre for Educational Technology The virtual Möbius strip Executive summary Laura Czerniewicz and Cheryl Brown Published by the Centre for Educational Technology The virtual Möbius strip Access to and use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in higher education in the Western Cape Page 2.

Social divides in South Africa remain deep and the digital di-
vide is worsening with regards access to broadband and to com-
puters. Yet standard cell phone technologies are ubiquitous
amongst university students, creating new forms of digital prac-
tices and offering possibilities of access to learning and to high-
er education itself.
This chapter provides two students as illustrative cases of mo-
bile-centric and computer-centric digital practices respectively.
Bourdieu‟s
concept of cultural capital (in its objectified and
embodied forms) offers a lens to examine the
students‟
differ-
ences and similarities, their convergences over time and their
disparate histories. The different types of objectified cultural
capital available to each student are described, as are the pro-
cesses of appropriation of embodied cultural capital respective-
ly. The relationship between these different types of capital and
their influence on the students‟ attitudes to and choices about
using ICTs for learning is especially relevant. Of particular note
is the role that one type of objectified capital
–
the cell phone -
has played in this relationship. The case studies surface com-
plexities which need unravelling, and point to the research ques-
tions to be explored when grappling with participation in higher
education in a digital age.

Research into South African students¶ digitally mediated learning and social practices revealed a sub-
group termed ³digital strangers´, students lacking both experience and opportunities, who had barely
used a computer and who did not have easy access to technology off campus. Using a Bourdieun
framework, this group¶s technological habitus and access to capital were considered within the field
of higher education. There was a focus on two forms of cultural capital: embodied cultural capital,
specifically disposition and values; and objectified cultural capital especially computers and cell
phones. Social capital - in terms of personal connections and the values of those close to the students
- was also considered. The investigation showed a complex technological habitus, with a paucity of
access and limited practices in relation to computers, while computers and their associated practices
are highly valued within higher education Simultaneously, diverse practices and widespread
indications of astute use of cell phones were described even though these remained under-
acknowledged both by the students and the institutions in which they operated. Students recognised
what the field of higher education valued, but they also used what they had available in order to best
operate within the field. The findings point to a contradiction between students¶ practices and the field
of higher education yet also show how student practices with an alternative form of objectified capital
are pushing the boundaries of the field itself

"Universities in Africa face enormous challenges in serving growing numbers of diverse students and  responding to a new economic order in the shape of  a knowledge economy where ICTs and globalisation are twinned. Educational technology initiatives form part of institutional responses to these ongoing and sometimes discontinuous social, economic, political, technological and policy changes. Educational technologists are acutely affected by the rapid pace of technological change and by developments within a new and emerging profession. In African universities educational technology initiatives often face further challenges relating to infrastructure, staff capacity, limited  access to professional networks, severe resource constraints and until very recently exorbitantly expensive and highly unreliable bandwidth.

This paper considers one institution’s response in the form of the contribution made by its Centre  for Educational Technology (CET). Formed in 2005 at the University of Cape Town and preceded by the foundational work of UCT’s Multimedia Educational Group (MEG), CET‘s work has occurred during a period typified by the massification and transformation of South African university education,key developments in higher education policy and the rise of the mobile web and social media. The unit has responded to ongoing and consistent environmental factors and has indeed at times been able to anticipate changes. CET’s projects involving African colleagues and partners will before grounded in this paper. Along the way the paper will focus on what we think are some of the success factors for what has come to be regarded as an effective and impactful educational technology unit. "

This paper describes the habitus and technology practices of a South African rural student in his first year at university. This students is one of five  self-declared rural students from a group of 23 first years  in four South African universities whose access to and use of technologies in their learning and everyday lives was investigated in 2011 using a “digital ethnography” approach. Their digital practices in the form of their activities in context were collected by multiple strategies in order to provide a more nuanced description of the role of technologies in their lives..  The student reported on here came from a school and community of almost no information and communication technologies. While the adjustment to first year can be challenging for all students, this can be especially acute a challenge for students from rural backgrounds (Motala 2007). The study reports on how he managed to negotiate a whole range of technologies six months to nine months into his first year of a humanities degree. Bourdieu’s conceptual framework provides a lens for describing his practices through a consideration of his habitus, access to and use of various forms of capitals in relation to the fields – especially that of higher education -in which he was situated.

This chapter forms part of the key findings of The eLearning Africa 2012 Survey, completed by 447 respondents. A detailed analysis of the Survey findings is provided in this, The eLearning Africa 2012 Report, which is the first of its kind, bringing together the views of eLearning professionals and a range of other stakeholders from across 41 African countries.

In this chapter the authors use the Bernsteinian framework of boundaries to help them interpret data from six years of survey based research. They demonstrate how to use this combination of empirical research and a theoretical lens to explore complex issues including: boundaries between, in and out of the curriculum; social and academic uses of technology; and physical and virtual learning environments. Finally, they challenge us to use these findings to consider the new literacies and practices that learners are beginning to need.

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are a new form of educational provision occupying a space between formal online courses and informal learning. Adopting measures used with formal online coursesto assess the outcomes of MOOCs is often not informative because the context is very different. The particular affordances of MOOCs shaping learning environments comprise both scale (in terms of numbers of students) and diversity (in terms of the types of students). As learning designers we focus on understanding the particular tools and pedagogical affordances of the MOOC platform to support learner engagement. Drawing on research into learner engagement conducted in the broader fieldof online learning, we consider how learner engagement in a MOOC might be designed for by looking at three pedagogical aspects: teacher presence, social learning and peer learning.

This presentation outlines the changing and diverse nature of the higher education landscape in South Africa in 2013, with a focus on how technology usage is changing and can potentially continue to transform educational practice, both to increase the effectiveness and scope of higher education instruction.

This presentation explores the need for, rationale behind and difficulties of publishing in Open Access journals and other open distributive platforms. It was presented at the 30th Annual Conference of the Asian Association of Open Universities

This paper reports on the findings of ICT access issues and social and academic uses in higher education, undertaken as part of a study in 2007 in three dissimilar South African higher education contexts. This diversity provided insight into a highly differentiated student body, varied contexts, different infrastructures and historically distinct backgrounds, thus providing a rich data set. The study focused on forms of “thick” access including both computers and cell phones. Access to the Internet via cell phones proved unexpectedly high, and was undifferentiated across socio-economic background. Findings challenge a staged model to ICT access and use suggesting that take up and use are complex, with students proving enterprising in meeting their educational needs, satisfying their curiosity and finding ways to participate in the “information age” even in difficult environments.

Drawing on Archer’s perspectives on the agency/structure relationship, this paper explains situations where students in varied, challenging circumstances find ways to negotiate difficult conditions. The paper firstly reports specific findings of a study on student access and use of technology in three universities in South Africa; and then uses Archer’s concept of agency to explain the findings. The paper reports on a 2007 study undertaken through a survey at three quite different universities in three South African provinces, addressing inter-related questions on access and use: What are the conditions of access for students? What are the enabling and constraining factors? What are student responses to these conditions? How are students using ICTs? In what ways are students using ICTs for academic and/or social purposes? Our findings are that on campus access is generally reported favourably, and off-campus access is problematic and uneven. There is a cluster of students using their cell phones  to access the Internet, and using their cell phones for academic purposes, and this is true across socio-economic groups. It is especially striking that students from low SEGs do so. The findings show the choices students are prepared to make and the strategies which they find in order to engage online or access the Internet to support their studies. Archer’s nuanced approach to agency and structure help us begin to make sense of the way that students exhibit a more complex and nuanced way of engaging with the availability of different kinds of technologies, as well as making considered decisions about using ubiquitous technologies in unexpected ways and for purposes for which they may not have been intended. Her concept of reflexivity provides a way of describing how those choices are made in relation to structural conditions and enables us to explain how students are “persons” showing an inventive capacity to circumvent the constraints imposed by structures.

This paper examines findings from two surveys of 10110 university students conducted in South Africa in 2004 and 2007, and explores a theoretical lens for taking the work further. We report on the differences between male and females students' access to and use of ICTs for learning. In particular we note that whilst equal opportunities do largely exist for both genders, there are subtle differences in terms of female students' practical access and sense of personal agency. Findings about use are complicated with male students using ICTs more frequently particularly in the sciences disciplines and for activities such as information seeking and communication (in contrast to research elsewhere). In order to try and better understand our findings and to better focus the qualitative phase of the research currently being undertaken as a result of the findings reported on in this paper, we explore four different theoretical perspectives: Bourdieu's notion of habitus; Feminist Standpoint Theory; Critical Information Systems Theory; and Expectations States Theory. We then suggest using Bourdieu's notion of habitus as our theoretical focus as we believe it offers us the most flexibility whilst enabling a gender focus to be maintained.

This paper describes two cases - of a mobile-centric and a computer-centric student respectively- and uses Bourdieu's notions of objectified and embodied cultural capital to explore their differences and similarities, their convergences over time and their disparate histories. We describe the different types of objectified cultural capital available to each student and examine the processes of appropriation of embodied cultural capital respectively. We then explore the relationship between these different types of capital and their influence on the students' attitudes to and choices about using ICTs for learning. In particular we note the role that one type of objectified capital – the cell phone - has played in this relationship. The case studies surface complexities which need unravelling, and point to the research questions to be explored when grappling with participation in higher education in a digital age.

In recent times the nature of scholarship has both remained consistent to its core principles, and undergone profound changes. Despite numerous high-flown claims, no-one knows how these will play out. This paper describes the digitally-mediated changes which are in process throughout the familiar scholarly cycle, and considers the issues – including for librarians, curators and scholars - which arise from these changes.

Research by higher education and communications scholars provides growing evidence of the changes taking place in the field of scholarly communication, both as result of changes in research activity in higher education systems globally (Etzkowitz 2004; Cooper 2009, 2011; Gibbons et al 1994) as well as those offered by the affordances of web 2.0 technologies (Tenopir 2003; Palmer 2005; Thorin 2006; Procter et al 2010; Weller 2011). There is also growing evidence that the research terrain is becoming more open (Van den Bart et al 2013). While attention has been paid to how scholarly communication and libraries are changing as part of a larger ecosystem (Pendleton-Jullian, 2013), it is less clear how the changing scholarly communication system plays out in actual research practices, as scholars go about their academic work. It is important that academics’ research communication practices are explored to complement these system approaches. How do we think about these issues in order to investigate and illuminate changing forms of knowledge creation and communication?

The practices and perceptions of educators formed through the creation and running of a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) provide a case study of how educators understandings of 'openness' change (Beetham et al 2012, p 3). We are interested in how educators engage with open education resources (OER) and openness as part of developing open online courses, and how this informs their practices and attitudes afterwards. Deepening understandings of these changes is important for informing strategies involving helping educators in adopting productive open educational practices. Our research question is how do educators' practices change or not change when using-or not using-OER in and as a MOOC? We are interested in whether and why educators adopt open practices in their MOOCs. We employ an Activity Theory (AT) conceptual framework as a heuristic tool to track and thickly describe educators' practices and perceptions. This frame enables us to locate educators' practices-in a context of mediating nodes, i.e., tools/artefacts, rules, divisions of labour, and community – as they strive towards and consider their object. The object upon which the educators act is the development of a new interdisciplinary field. We focus on the role of two mediating artefacts introduced into the activity system, namely Creative Commons (CC) licenses and the 'MOOC design'. We describe how the open aspect of these artefacts mediate and affect educator's perceptions, attitudes and educational practices in the context of their object-directed activity system. We draw predominantly on semi-structured interviews with the MOOC lead educators and the MOOC learning designers. Interviews were conducted at two time intervals, before and after the MOOC has run. From this we craft two activity systems. We have categorised our findings according to Beetham et al's dimensions of open practices. Further, two broad themes emerged from the data analysis. These are Affordances of the MOOC and Reflection on educational practices.