The Critque of the Communitarians Arguments from an African Perspective

The communitarians claim that the individual is a natural member of the human society but that he needs the society and all the opportunities it makes available for the realization of his potential for living a life that is meaningful This claim is synonymous to African conception of individual and the community Thus this work set out to carry out the critique of some notable communitarians such as John Dewey Fredrick Hegel and Michael Sandel Macinyre Alasdair Charles Taylor We discovered in the work that the claim of these theorists on individual and community is identical to African ideal And the critique exposes the inadequacies in their claim as well as the African ideal because development today is beyond the narrow context of communal life which puts African under the illusion that communities constitute a paradise lost As such there is the need for African to seek their rights this will enable them to function properly in the global scheme of thing

The Ambiguous Power of Social Media: Hegemony or Resistance?

Recent developments have demonstrated the efficacy and effectiveness of social media as a veritable tool for mobilization and networking. Ordinary citizens rely on the power of social media to mobilize against sit-tight leaders. Oppressed citizens use social media to protest against bad government and anti-people’s policies. Based on the findings of a recent research, this article discusses recent protests across the world and how citizens use the new media and social media during the protests to stay connected, plot strategies and circulate news to the rest of the world. The article concluded that; with the new media, citizen-reporters and social media, there is no hiding place or safe haven for sit-tight leaders and anti-people policies as citizens are better empowered than ever by emerging technologies to challenge the status quo. The paper therefore hypothesizes that the ambiguous power of social media has become a tool for resistance movements as well as hegemony as demonstrated at the protest sites around the world such as the 2014 Burkinabé Uprising, Occupy Wall Street, the Arab Spring, the chilean students’ protest, the Los Indignados movement, the Québec student’s strike and Idle no more in Canada etc., The ambiguous power of the  social media has become a major issue in recent years in view of the use of the social media by protester to stay connected during protest to resist authoritarian regimes around the world. The use of the social media as a tool for resistance or hegemony in recent years has brought the issue to the Ambiguous power of the social media to the forefront of academic debate. It therefore becomes imperative to explore the double edge sword nature of the social media to determine its full impact on the society. This will add to our knowledge of social media as a veritable tool for resistance and hegemony.     Keywords: Social Media, New Technology, New media, Citizen Reporters, Democracy, Networking, Hegemony, Resistance

The Insecurity of Inequality in Africa: A Review of Recent Developments

This article examines the paradoxical and problematical relationship between inequality and insecurity. Leaning on Karl Marx’s structural approach in explaining social inequality and conflicts, a discussion of specific inequality-propelled conflicts that have made the continent to be plagued by a broad spectrum of traditional and non-traditional security threats was made. The inequality-insecurity nexus is particularly made daunting by constant intimidation of the lower-class by powerful rich which drives the socially excluded into conflict, terrorism and other behaviour that threaten security. Indeed, the cycle of insecurity occasioned by socioeconomic inequality can only be broken by deliberate policy interventions with political commitment. Keywords: Africa, Conflict, Development, Gender, Inequality, Insecurit

DC Motor with Load Coupled by Gears Speed Control using Modified Ziegler-Nichols Based PID Tunings

The used of DC motor in various applications has been increased due to the ease with which it speed can be controlled to give the desired performance characteristics under various condition. PID controllers are widely used in DC motor speed control due to its simple structure and robustness to the modeling error, however their effectiveness is often limited due to the poor selection (or tuning) of its parameters. To facilitate the determination of the appropriate values of the parameters of the PID controller for the control of DC motor at any set point therefore required using appropriate tuning method. This paper provides a better understanding of how PID controller is tuned using Ziegler-Nichols Step Response, Cohen-Coon Method and Chien–Hrones–Reswick (CHR) method. Experimental results of PID control of DC motor with load coupled by gear shows that CHR-PID tunings gives a much improved performance over Ziegler-Nichols Step Response and Cohen-Coon PID-tuning with settling time of 355sec., 112sec., and 111 sec . respectively at each set point Keywords: DC motor, Ziegler-Nichols Step Response, Cohen-Coon method and CHR metho

The Influence of Rape Myth Acceptance and Situational Factors in Defining Sex and Labelling Rape among Female University Students in Nigeria

Existing literature have posited that the problem of rape aggravates if it is unacknowledged as a result of the influence of rape myth acceptance. Being an understudied phenomenon, the present study sought to explore rape myths and examine situational factors that appear to differentiate women who experience various levels of victimization. Through mixed-method victimization surveys that covered four universities in Lagos and Ogun states, involving 206 respondents and 12 in-depth interviewees, the study found that emotions and societal perception of rape are strong factors in determining personal conception and description of rape-like experiences. The study concludes that young women should be enlightened about the health implication of nonconsensual sex, irrespective of their emotional attachment to the offender

Investigating African ‘Digital-Immigrant’ Students’ Reactions to Moodle Resources

In this study, we investigated the reactions and perceptions of ‘digital immigrant’ students to the adoption of blended learning combining the Moodle VLE and traditional face-to-face instructional delivery method on EAP courses in a Nigerian university of technology. Data sets from extractable online logs for activities, discussion board interaction and two online surveys are triangulated by focus group discussion responses. The data revealed that students’ use of the online components of the courses are high and perceptions of the various values such as relevance, reflective thinking, interactivity, tutor support, interpretation, learning experience and benefit are very positive, and are in the range of 60s to 90s in percentage points. However, peer to peer interaction while positive is not as high, indicating the additional work that need be done in addition to the challenges of infrastructure and cost that students would want addressed. Implications of the findings include the potentials of blended learning in difficult academic contexts and subject areas, the relevance of social interaction platforms in language learning and other subject areas, and the crucial role technology can play in large class contexts.Key words: Digital immigrant; Moodle; Blended learning; Interaction; Critical thinking; Learner autonom