Digital Commons Network^™

Critical Commentary On Raising The Point With Director's Reply, R. Scott Frey, Jason Mendez

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

Raising the Point!, is an educational documentary which supports the South Bronx’s Hunts Point community’s efforts in improving the social, educational, environmental, and health injustices it encounters. Though the Hunts Point community faces many inequities, the film focuses on the issue of poor air quality.

Ask, Tell, Vickie R. Phipps

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

When I was designing these marks a year ago, I wanted to acknowledge GLBTQI military persons serving under the unjust policy of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. To accomplish this, one of the counterforms in each of the military branch logos is flipped upside down creating the GLBTQI symbol of an inverted triangle.

On September 20th, 2011, the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy was repealed.

Before the repeal, the simple act of wearing a t-shirt with one of these logos on it would have been an act of defiance and resistance. Today that same mark serves as a celebration of …

Polishing Treadmills At Midnight: Is Refugee Integration An Elusive Goal?, Woods Nash

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

It is often said that justice requires us to treat like cases alike. Accordingly, the U.S. refugee resettlement program provides all refugees—no matter where they are from, no matter their pasts—with very similar funding and services. Refugees, however, are far from alike. In this essay, I invoke Borgmann’s distinction between a “thing” and a “device” and draw on stories from my work with a resettlement agency to argue that our current, employment-driven system is in need of reform. Instead of being restricted to generic programs, refugee resettlement agencies should be funded to help each family achieve social integration in ways …

The Garden Is Always Greener..., Billy Hall

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

This essay builds upon a case study of community gardening in Miami to explore the extent to which these gardens are contributing to, and possibly triggering, processes of gentrification within low to lower-middle income neighborhoods. Through a literature review of recent urban planning policy and development in Miami and relevant discourse on the neoliberalization of food, food politics, food justice activism, and gentrification, I situate Miami’s gardens within a complex, multi-scalar web of ideas and processes. I show how the interaction of these forces, varying dramatically with respect to place, is implicit in the motivations for each garden’s development and …

The Sound Of Fury: Teaching, Tempers, And White Privileged Resistance, Tema J. Okun

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

This essay focuses on the resistance of students situated in positions of privilege in classrooms addressing issues of dominance, identity, and oppression related to race and racism. Examining the psycho/social history of two critical aspects of resistance – defensiveness (related to guilt and shame) and denial – the author draws from both practice and theory to explicate the roots of this resistance and offer specific, effective ways to support students in moving through resistance into responsibility.

Educating For Peace And Justice In America's Nuclear Age, Ian Harris, Charles F. Howlett

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

The emergence of peace education as embodied in the context of peace studies, which emerged during the post-World War II ideological struggle between capitalism and Communism, the nuclear arms race pitting the United States against the former Soviet Union, the Vietnam War, and the civil rights movement in America, met with considerable criticism. There were many within and outside the academic community who argued that peace studies had very little to offer in terms of “real scholarship” and were primarily politically motivated. Some went so far as to insist that this new area of study lacked focus and discipline given …

Pushing Me Through: A Poetic Representation, Jessica Nina Lester, Rachael Gabriel

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

For many children and adults labeled learning disabled (LD), the very process of being identified and eventually labeled is oriented to as difficult to understand, disorienting, and just a taken-for-granted part of a system that names some ‘normal’, even gifted, while others are named abnormal. Minimal research exists that attends to the ways in which the official ways of talking about LDs are worked up in the everyday language of those most involved in the special education process, particularly the students themselves. Thus, in this article, we present, in an alternative form of writing (Richardson, 1997), a poetic representation of …

Instant Racism, Vickie R. Phipps

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

Ubiquitous messages are, by definition, everywhere and therefore familiar to us. Due to the nature of attention, the familiar often gets past critical filters because it feels so comfortable. After all, there is nothing different or alarming about the familiar. I am interested in the powerful ability of graphic design to reframe the ubiquitous because once we see something differently, we never see it the same again.

I was inspired to create this work after reading Clinging to Mammy: The Faithful Slave in Twentieth-Century America in which author Micki McElya critically examines the image of Aunt Jemima in the American …

Editors' Introduction, Shane Willson, Rachael E. Gabriel

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

It is with great pride that we present to you the inaugural issue of Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum. Here we have attempted to create an innovative, peer-reviewed space in which people from numerous disciplines, or even those claiming no discipline, can present research, multimedia, and art aimed at furthering the ideals of social justice, broadly defined. Social justice is not a concept owned by the academy, for attempts to create a more just world can come from many professions, or even from no profession at all. By applying the traditionally academic peer-review process to work done by activists, artists, …

Front Matter: Csjf Volume One, Issue One, Editors Csjf

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

No abstract provided.

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum, Volume One, Issue One, Shane Willson, Landon S. Bevier, Rachael E. Gabriel, Taylor Krcek, Alaina Elizabeth Smith

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

It is with great pride that we present to you the inaugural issue of Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum. Here we have attempted to create an innovative, peer-reviewed space in which people from numerous disciplines, or even those claiming no discipline, can present research, multimedia, and art aimed at furthering the ideals of social justice, broadly defined. Social justice is not a concept owned by the academy, for attempts to create a more just world can come from many professions, or even from no profession at all. By applying the traditionally academic peer-review process to work done by activists, artists, …

How Jane Austen Uses Marriage To Get What She Wants, Hannah Eberle

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

As a biochemistry major approaching the subject of Jane Austen and feminism, I found the dichotomy between pleasure readers and critical readers interesting. How can books that are almost 200 years old draw so much attention from both quarters still today? In my thesis, I use Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Emma to discuss how Austen uses the marriage plot in the context of the 18th century. This plot device allows her to point out problems with marriage as a market, such as emphasis on wealth and the social setup that requires women to be "taken care of" …

Perceived Containment As A Predictor Of Children’S Aggression Towards Peers, Kristina L. Gowin

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

The current study investigates the extent to which children’s levels of perceived containment predict their aggression towards peers in a community program in a sample of 132 school-age children (Mean age = 8.83 years; 55% male). Perceived Containment was assessed by the administration of the Perceived Containment Questionnaire (PCQ) (Schneider et al., 2003). Relational Aggression was measured by using the Children’s Social Behavior Scale-Teacher Report (Crick et al., 1996). Children’s ratings on the Perceived Containment Questionnaire were found to be unrelated to staff reports of relational aggression. However, a direct relationship was discovered between children's ratings on the Perceived Containment …

Acknowledgements, Sarah Russell

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

No abstract provided.

A Message From The Editor, Sarah Russell

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of Surface Coal Mining On Residential Property Values: A Hedonic Price Analysis, Austin M. Williams

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

The use of certain surface mining techniques is currently a heavily-debated environmental issue and one where consideration of non-market values is likely to lead to the creation of better public policy. This study uses the hedonic pricing method to investigate the impact that surface coal mines have on residential property values. The results of this statistical analysis show that as the number of surface mines and their average production increases, the median value of housing units in a county significantly decreases. In particular, for the three model specifications explored, it is estimated that the addition of a surface mine to …

Local Government Relations In Knox County Executive Collaboration And Its Impact, J. Ryan Sowell

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

The recent governmental history of Knoxville and Knox County represents an intriguing case study of interest-group-led referendums, corruption, and reform. Recent structural reforms were a direct response to the unethical behavior displayed by some members of the Knox County Commission, but indirectly the changes attempted to address a number of lingering community issues. When placed in the context of the community’s contemporary political history, the reforms' significance becomes apparent. In the past twenty years the greater Knoxville community experienced intergovernmental court battles, a failed unification referendum, a sheriff with unprecedented political clout, and state legislative intervention. Executive leadership has had …

Putting Their Eggs In India’S Basket: What Vertical Integration, Church’S Chicken, And Globalization Mean To Increasing Chicken Consumption In India, Scott E. Basford

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

India has the second largest population in the world and a rapidly growing economy, yet it lags far behind the world average in chicken meat consumption. Nonetheless, rates are increasing briskly and are expected to double within five years. Understanding the factors that contribute to this rise can provide broader insight into political, economic and social developments in Indian society. This paper reviews current and projected levels of chicken consumption across India through an investigation of current literatures which assert that a cultural dietary aversion to red meat, rising incomes, increased urbanization, lower consumer cost, and, most importantly, vertically integrated …

Neurogenetic Studies On The Role Of Diap1 In Neuronal Programmed Cell Death In Drosophila, Faith V. Creekmore

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

The ventral Corazonin (vCrz) neurons provide a model system to study neuronal programmed cell death (PCD) in Drosophila, as they undergo caspase-dependent PCD during early metamorphosis between 1 and 7 hours after puparium formation (APF). DIAP1 (Drosophila inhibitor of apoptosis) is a key survival factor, preventing accidental cell death at the wrong stage. In response to death signals, caspase activation resulting from DIAP1 degradation is a primary cause of the PCD in many tissues. However, transgenic over-expression of the wild type diap1 gene in vCrz neurons failed to block PCD completely. This previous result suggested its role as a survival …

Price Appreciation, Bargaining Power, And The Determinants Of Corporate Leasing Policy, Daniel John Stone

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

This study uses price appreciation and bargaining power measures to determine whether current accounting standards are effective at classifying leases by ownership risk. I use a regression model, and find that there is a positive and significant relationship between changes in capital leases and my proxies for price appreciation and the interaction between price appreciation and bargaining power. I also find, however, that it’s possible that operating leases may be increasing faster, which would discount the theory that these standards are operating properly. These results should be cause for further study on the subject and should be interesting to regulators.

Summer Research Opportunities Valuable To Science And Engineering Students, Sarah Russell

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

No abstract provided.

Number 53 (December 2011), Southern Fishes Council

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

(December 2011) - Population Status and Environmental Associations of the Rare Striated Darter, Etheostoma striatulum. By Andrew C. Abernathy and Hayden T. Mattingly

Conservation Status of the Longhead Darter, Percina macrocephala, in Kinniconick Creek, Kentucky. By David A. Eisenhour, Audrey M. Richter and Joshua M. Shiering

First Observation of a Natural Hybrid Between Endangered Roanoke Logperch (Percina rex) and Chainback Darter (Percina navisense). By James H. Roberts

Minutes, Business Meeting, 36th Annual Meeting, Southeastern Fishes Council

2010 Treasurer's Report for the Southeastern Fishes Council

Population Status And Environmental Associations Of The Rare Striated Darter, Etheostoma Striatum, Andrew C. Abernathy, Hayden T. Mattingly

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

No abstract provided.

Front Matter, Southeastern Fishes Council

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

No abstract provided.

First Observation Of A Natural Hybrid Between Endangered Roanoke Logperch (Percina Rex) And Chainback Darter (Percina Navisense), James H. Roberts

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

No abstract provided.

2010 Treasurer's Report For The Southeastern Fishes Council, Southeastern Fishes Council

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

No abstract provided.

Conservation Status Of The Longhead Darter, Percina Macrocephala, In Kinnicock Creek, Kentucky, David A. Eisenhour, Audrey M. Richter, Joshua M. Shiering

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

No abstract provided.

Minutes, Business Meeting, 36th Annual Meeting, Southeastern Fishes Council, Southeastern Fishes Council

Southeastern Fishes Council Proceedings

No abstract provided.

Quality Vs Quantity: The Effect Of Aristolochic Acids On Preference And Performance Of A Non-Specialist Herbivore, Samantha Eileen Jeude

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

As immobile organisms, plants have evolved many strategies for defense against herbivores. These defenses can be physical, such as thorns, or chemical, such as antifeedant compounds. Most plants possess chemical compounds that serve a deterrent function against at least some herbivores. Aristolochic acids are alkaloids characteristic of plants of the genus Aristolochia. Although their toxicity and efficacy as herbivore deterrents have been documented, it is unknown whether different kinds of these compounds elicit different responses in herbivores. In this study, we use the generalist caterpillar Spodoptera exigua as a bioassay to evaluate both qualitative and quantitative effects of four aristolochic …

Acknowledgements, Jenny Bledsoe

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

No abstract provided.