Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Standing On The Edge Of A Dream, Parto Ahmadpour Mobarake

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Standing On the Edge of a Dream delves into the intricate tapestry of lived experiences shaped by relocation, emphasizing the nuanced space that exists between reality and imagination. As an individual who has undergone the transformative journey of immigration, I recognize that the concept of relocation is like standing on the edge of a dream. This notion becomes a living structure, intricately woven with threads from our past, present, and future. My artistic exploration extends beyond my artworks, yet it remains deeply rooted in my personal narratives. The artworks in the exhibition continue to draw inspiration from personal memories and …

A Critical Analysis Of Political And Media Discourse On Immigration During The Trump Era, Daleana Phillips

Dissertations

This research examines political and media discourse on Immigration through four studies: Trump’s immigration reform speech, newspaper coverage of DACA, a Saturday Night Live episode, and social media via #ColoradoBorderWall memes. Various critical cultural theoretical frameworks are used within critical discourse and textual analysis is to examine media and political rhetoric about immigrants and immigration policy during a period of drastic institutional political change evidenced by Trump’s administration. As a collective, these narratives examine how Trump’s rhetoric and populist style of communication demonstrate a return to restrictive immigration rhetoric not witnessed in a presidential administration since the 1920s. This research …

"Our Strength Is Unity:" Delivery Bikers In Their Own Words, Connor W. Zaft

Capstones

"Our Strength Is Unity" is a year-long photographic essay on food delivery workers and their attempts to self-organize during the pandemic.

Immigration And Crime In The News, 2014-2018: Do Focusing Events And Policy Windows Affect Framing?, Abigale Rongey

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although an abundance of literature demonstrates that immigrant populations are less crime-prone than the native-born population, the majority of Americans believe that immigration inherently threatens the security of the United States. Because Americans are not well versed in the complex issues of immigration and crime, public opinion is undoubtedly influenced by media outlets’ crafted narratives that simplify circumstances and events into easily digestible material. The current study examines how media behavior changes and responds to social and political events by examining “frames” utilized in articles that produce narratives about immigration and crime. Using content analysis of over 1,700 articles published …

Terministic Screening And Conspiracy Theory In Political Communication: A Critical Analysis Of Trump’S Rhetorical Ties To Fair And Alex Jones Through “Invasion” Immigration Discourse, Emily A. Wiedeman

Masters Theses

This study focuses on the political and social communicative implications that result from mirrored anti-LatinX immigration discourses from three different political entities: President Donald Trump, special-interest hate group the Federation for Immigration Reform (FAIR), and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. Through a critical communication lens, the author presents and discusses the influence of presidential communication, and its ability to contribute to and bolster xenophobic political undertones, creating a communicative environment that functions to empower and embolden proponents of racially based discrimination. Further, this study discusses the power presidential communication has to legitimize, normalize, and amplify the racist and xenophobic anti-LatinX discourses …

Overcoming Tools Of Oppression: Plain Language And Human-Centered Design For Social Justice, Michela Sims

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Technical communication audiences are increasingly international and intercultural. Some of these audiences may be vulnerable and suffering trauma following violations of their human rights and dignity. In such cases, technical documents can serve to reinforce the oppression experienced by these audiences. Technical communicators must adapt and create methods to communicate ethically and responsibly with these audiences through a social justice lens. This thesis utilizes adapted plain language guidelines from plainlanguage.gov combined with human-centered design (“HCD”) guiding principles to perform a qualitative document analysis of technical government forms. The findings of this analysis demonstrate a need for continued integration of plain …

Two Cultures, One Identity: Biculturalism Of Young Mexican Americans, Janela Aida Salazar

Theses and Dissertations--Community & Leadership Development

The purpose of this study was to explore the daily life of the younger generation of Mexican Americans through a phenomenology design. Specifically, in regard to how the culture-sharing pattern of biculturalism is reflected in their lives and the way they construct their bicultural identity. The study utilized rich qualitative data to paint a clear and descriptive picture of the internal process of biculturalism within eight Mexican American college students. Ultimately, the data analysis aimed to collect and reflect their voices and the stories. This was done through three distinct data methods that complemented each other: interviews (oral), photo elicitation …

Center For Immigration Studies: A Progressive Case For Immigration Restriction?, Jeremy Coppola

Senior Projects Spring 2019

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

New Australia, Un Nuevo Mundo, Elizabeth Christensen

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

I focus on the diaspora of the Australian immigration to the South American colony known as New Australia. My project addresses the question of identity. I address questions such as: how much do the surviving descendants of the New Australia colony identify with the homeland of Australia or the hostland of South America? How has their identities influenced the way they raise their children

Becoming United Statesian: Experiences Of Newly Resettled Iraqi Refugees And Iraqi Immigrants, Bnar Mustafa

Institute for the Humanities Master's Papers, Projects, and Capstones

The differences between refugees’ dreams before and after coming to the United States of America is often shocking. One might ask, “Isn’t America the country of the refugees?” The United States is the largest nation built by refugees and immigrants, yet recently resettled refugees or “new Americans” struggle in multiple and overlapping ways to reach successful resettlement. Some of the challenges they face are inherent to resettlement, others come from the socialization process, and the interplay of human beings as they exist together. Language and culture shock are the natural struggles that any internationally-relocated person experiences. The challenges that stem …

Repackaging The Reach Of Dreams: News Coverage Of Daca Rescindment By Three National Newspapers On Twitter, Megan Pietruszewski

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

This thesis examines the frames used by three news organizations to cover the rescindment of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. The rescindment of DACA was a pivotal transition period open to new immigration policy, and frames used in the news coverage of DACA are important as frames influence public opinion and possible future immigration policy. This study uses corpus linguistic methods and Van Gorp’s inductive framing analysis to explore how a complex political decision like DACA rescindment is covered in condensed news stories on Twitter as well as in full-length news articles. The Executive Critique frame, which …

A Guatemalan Trans Woman Navigates New York City In Hopes Of A Better Future, Manolo Morales

Capstones

Jamileeth, 25, is a trans woman from Guatemala. She's been in New York City for about 3 months. Before coming to NYC, she spent 26 days in a detention center in Cibola, New Mexico. Today she is navigating her way in the Big Apple to seek asylum.

Link to capstone: https://medium.com/@manolo.morales/a-guatemalan-tans-woman-navigates-new-york-city-in-hopes-of-a-better-life-bdfc5796f9d4

The State House And The White House: Gubernatorial Rhetoric During The Obama Administration, Austin Peyton Trantham

Theses and Dissertations--Political Science

What is the importance of political speechmaking? Do state governors discuss presidential priorities? This study addresses these questions by analyzing the contents of annual State of the State addresses given by governors from 2012 to 2014 during the presidency of Barack Obama. A descriptive paper provides evidence that governors primarily discuss employment and economic issues in their addresses, are discussing greater number of policy issues than in previous decades, and are delivering their address before the presidential State of the Union message. Examining health care and immigration policy in separate empirical papers, I theorize that contextual factors, including legislative partisanship, …

The “Trump” Card: Donald Trump’S Rhetoric On Immigration And Refugee Issues -- Perspectives From Mexico, Pakistan And Spain, Sarah A. Campbell

Departmental Honors Projects

This research paper asks the question, how are global media sources covering Donald Trump’s position on the issues of immigration and refugees? How might reader’s perceptions of Donald Trump be impacted by this coverage? By conducting a comparative, qualitative framing analysis of three international newspapers, El Universal, El País, and Pakistan Today, this project attempts to better understand how popular Mexican, Spanish and Pakistani news sources are framing Trump’s campaign in regards to immigration and refugee issues. Articles from the 18 months of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign were analyzed for content as well as common frames. Overall trends from …

A Case For Empathy: Immigration In Spanish Contemporary Media, Music, Film, And Novels, Constantin C. Icleanu

Theses and Dissertations--Hispanic Studies

This dissertation analyzes the representations of immigrants from North Africa, Latin America, and Eastern Europe in Spain. As engaged scholarship, it seeks to better the portrayal of immigrants in the mass media through the study of literature, film, and music about immigration spanning from the year 2000 to 2016. Because misconceptions continue to propagate in the media, this dissertation works to counteract anti-immigrant, xenophobic representations as well as balance out overly positive and orientalized portrayal of immigrants with a call to recognize immigrants as human beings who deserve the same respect, dignity, and rights as any other citizen.

Chapter 1 …

The Creation Of The Border Crisis: How The Media Influenced The Situation At The U.S./Mexico Border In 2014, Alejandra Baron

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

In 2014, thousands of women and children from Central America trekked across Mexico to reach the United States border in hopes of seeking asylum. As oppose to previous immigration surges, it was the first time that this amount of asylum seekers had reached within a short period of time the border. The media in the United States took an important role in describing the occurrences at the U.S./Mexico border in the rhetoric and dialect used. The polarization of the audience mimicked the partisan government that could not agree on a solution and left the situation at the border in a …

The Captivity Of Opportunity: The Conversation Surrounding Church-Going Hispanic Immigrants, Nicolet Hopper Bell

Master's Theses

Immigration is a long-standing topic of discussion in the United States. Hispanic immigrants, or families of Hispanic immigrants, living in America face unique challenges. Through focus group interviews, participants from a predominantly Hispanic Protestant church narrated their experience of living in the United States. Guided grounded theory data analysis revealed three categories and 14 subcategories, or themes of conversation, surrounding this hot topic. Participants shed light on the distinctive challenges they faced, how these challenges affected them, and how they attempted to overcome these difficulties. By exploring these results through the lens of social stigma theory (Goffman, 2009) and intergroup …

The Hear.Us Project - Reducing Anti-Immigrant Sentiment And Myth Through An Online Awareness Intervention, Douglas J. Epps

MSW Capstones

The following is an online awareness intervention designed to reduce anti-immigrant sentiment and myth throughout the greater community by means of an educational toolkit. The foundation of this toolkit was designed using macro level theoretical intervention frameworks. The content is grounded in empirically based interpersonal communication strategies specialized in addressing anti-immigrant sentiment. The goal of this toolkit is to provide a source for humanizing and factual education especially for those who are unfamiliar with immigrant community members. The intervention achieves this goal by means of three specific elements: 1) Humanizing and inspiring personal stories from immigrants in the local community …

“We Send Our News By Lightning . . .”: The Information Explosion Of The Nineteenth Century And Adaptation In The Press, 1840-1892, Timothy L. Moran

Wayne State University Dissertations

This dissertation examines the change that came to American newspapers and reporting between 1840 and 1892 as the result of increasing communication bandwidth and the emergence of fast communication networks. Improvements in news distribution by post roads, steam navigation, and steam railways, followed by application of telegraphic communications, significantly speeded the news and changed the news cycle itself by linking metropolitan news centers with peripheral newspapers. The American Civil War brought this new information technology together with an event that created massive audience demand for timely and factual news, as opposed to purely political or commercial information. In postwar years …

Is The Truth In The Comments? Anti-Feminism And Anti-Immigration In Norwegian Online Newspaper Comment Threads, Iselin Maria Ihrstad

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Norway has implemented many progressive social policies focused on the equality and inclusion of women, as well as immigrant and non-ethnic Norwegian individuals due to a commitment to state feminism. Yet recently it seems to be a number of anti-feminist and some anti-immigration stances expressed through online discussion threads. In order to highlight and explore the presence of a backlash against feminism and immigration in Norway, this study conducts a feminist textual analysis of online comment threads that follows pro-feminist online opinion pieces published in the two largest newspapers in Norway, Dagbladet and Verdens Gang (VG) published between July 2014 …

Into The Red: A Look Into The Reasons Why Refugees Decide To Flee, Settle Or Migrate To And From Morocco, Fadeelah E. Holivay

Master's Theses

This research paper explores some of the main reasons why refugees and asylum seekers, particularly from sub-Saharan African countries, embark on a journey and decide to settle, flee or migrate to and from Morocco. Because of this phenomenon, Morocco has seen a 96% increase of refugees migrating to the borders of Morocco each year for the past three years. Many say that this astonishing increase of migrants choosing Morocco is due to such factors as: wars breaking out regionally across central African and Middle Eastern countries causing them to flee; Morocco being a culturaly diverse francophone country whose laws and …

Mediated Narratives On Citizenship, Immigration, And National Identity: The Construction Of Dreamer Identities In Public Discourse Surrounding President Obama's 2012 Deferred Deportation Announcement, Marisa Garcia Rodriguez

Communication ETDs

In the present study, I explore mediated constructions of citizenship, immigrant identities, and national identity in the coverage of the debates that surrounded President Obama's 2012 deferred deportation announcement. My goals in this study are to understand (1) how citizenship is constructed in mediated discourse in response to President Obama's announcement; (2) how immigrant identities, specifically young undocumented immigrants (DREAMers), are constructed in mediated discourse; (3) how national identity is constructed through these mediated discourses; and, (4) how the representation of DREAMer identities reproduces or challenges dominant public discourses on citizenship, immigrant identity, and national identity. Using social constructionism and …

The Death Of Mississippi House Bill 488: Latinos In America, Mary Faye Stanton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In March 2012, the Mississippi House of Representatives passed House Bill 488, an immigration bill similar to those passed in Arizona and Alabama that allowed, among other provisions, law enforcement officers to check the legal status of an individual after a legal stop. This thesis sets out to show how three key factors: the opposition of industry and agricultural representatives, the outcry against the racial aspects of the bill, and an alliance between Democrats, the Black Caucus, and Latino rights activists -- prevented the bill from becoming a law in a state with a Republican governor and Republican majority in …

The New Mexican Migration: Remembering Violence, Connecting, And Living In The Third Space, Uriel G. Posada

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The concept of identity has become a topic of discussion in the last few decades, especially with the growing immigration across several countries. Countries such as the United States and Canada are receiving people who arrive from different parts of the world and who are changing the composition of these countries. In this thesis I explore how a group of Mexican journalists are adjusting their identity as they live in countries outside of Mexico. Five of the journalists are now living in the United States, and one of them is in Canada. They were forced to leave Mexico after they …

News Coverage Of The Sergio Hernández Case In Newspapers Of The Border Region, Rodrigo Giovan Barragan

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This study analyzes the news coverage of two newspapers from the border region between the United States and México (El Paso Times) from El Paso, Texas; and (El Diario de Juárez) from Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, about the case of Sergio Hernández, a 15 year old Mexican teenager who was shot and killed by a U.S. Border Patrol agent in the boundary zone between both countries on June 7, 2010. Using a textual analysis of the stories published about this case in these newspapers, the research seeks to identify news frames and competing meanings of community and identity embedded in the …

(Re)Constituting The Immigrant Body Through Policy: A Rhetorical Analysis Of The Narratives Within The Discourses Of The Development, Relief, And Education For Alien Minors Act (Dream Act), Emily Rae Ironside

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Using the testimonies surrounding the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act (DREAM Act) as a primary case study, this project provides a rhetorical investigation of the interplay between narratives, nation building, national identity, policymaking, and the American immigrant. This project first identifies the grand narrative of exclusionary nationalism as the primary narrative constituting the American identity. Then, this project examines the rhetoric of policymakers to demonstrate how an Anglo-Saxonized, elitist notion of American identity is rhetorically constituted by assimilationist, racist, xenophobic, and classist discourses. Moreover, it argues policymakers maintain the narrative dominance of exclusionary nationalism through restrictive immigration …

The Influence Of New Communication Technologies On The Acculturation Of Bhutanese Refugees In An American Community, Cheryl A. D'Mello

ETD Archive

This study examines the Bhutanese refugees, who are the newest group of refugees to arrive in the United States. It provides a detailed account of this community in the Cleveland-Akron area in Ohio. Research on this refugee population has only just begun, and they have been surveyed at an early time in the acculturation process. In 2007, their resettlement in the United States from camps in Nepal began, and by 2012, a total of 60,000 are expected to arrive in the United States. The research questions examine to what extent new communication technologies and media (ethnic and host) help the …

Contagion From Abroad: U.S. Press Framing Of Immigrants And Epidemics, 1891 To 1893, Harriet Moore

Communication Theses

This thesis examines press framing of immigrant issues and epidemics in newspapers and periodicals, 1891 to 1893. During these years, immigration policies became more restrictive because of the Immigration Act of 1891, the opening of Ellis Island in 1892, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1892, the New York City epidemics of 1892, the National Quarantine Act of 1893, and the nativist movement. Framing theory guided the following research questions: 1) How did articles in newspapers and periodicals frame immigrants and immigration issues in the context of epidemics from 1891 and 1893?; and 2) How did the press framing of immigrants …