Social Justice Commons^™

Playing With Policy: What Insights Arise From Transgender Adults After Participating In A Legislative Theatre Exercise, Skylar A. Stratemeyer

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

The transgender community is underrepresented in the current body of academic research, underserved in the current clinical model of healthcare services, and legislatively oppressed on a state and federal level in the United States. As of March 2023, more than 400 anti-LGBTQI laws have been introduced on a state level in 2023 alone (ACLU, 2023). In response to the hostile Western sociopolitical climate, this thesis will focus on what insights arise from transgender adults and cisgender allies (N = 12) after participating in a dramatherapeutic group therapy session that explored current anti-trans legislation and highlighted the legal needs of …

Strategies To Advance Antiracist Programs: Why They Matter, Scott D. Scheer

The Journal of Extension

The U.S. Extension system has been aware for many years of the racial inequality and disparities present today and throughout U.S. history. Even though there have been concerted efforts in Extension to improve racial equity and inclusion, much work remains. A dual approach is proposed for Extension to focus both internally (program planners) and externally (program participants) to bring about antiracist programs that are inclusive and racially equitable. Research-based strategies are discussed for both domains of program planners (e.g., implicit bias training) and program participants (e.g., reach people of color through culturally relevant curricula).

Pursuing Antiracist Public Policy Education: An Example Connecting The Racist History Of Housing Policy To Contemporary Inequity, Craig W. Carpenter, Tyler Augst, Harmony Fierke-Gmazel, Bradley Neumann, Richard Wooten

The Journal of Extension

We review the antiracism concept and contextualize it in Extension public policy education and the Extension system itself. Despite public policy education having a long history in Extension on a wide variety of issues, missing from this programming is the pursuit of antiracism. As a programmatic example, we review some historical causes of present-day housing inequities and an associated example approach for pursuing antiracism in housing policy education. Finally, we conclude by noting additional opportunities to pursue antiracism in Extension public policy education. In doing so, we emphasize that public policy education cannot be “nonracist” if it is not antiracist.

Book Review: Under The Weather: Reimagining Mobility In The Climate Crisis., Raymond Murphy

Critical Disaster Studies

Under the Weather: Reimagining Mobility in the Climate Crisis is an insightful, important book that reports on a fine-grained investigation Sodero made of the consequences and response to the disasters resulting from Hurricane Juan in Nova Scotia in 2003 and Hurricane Igor in Newfoundland in 2010, with comparisons to Hurricane Sandy in New York, Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, the 1998 ice storm in northeastern North America and the Icelandic ash cloud. One original feature is the focus on mobility, how indispensable it is in modern societies, how it is disrupted by extreme weather, and …

Institutional Decline Or Evolution?: An Intergenerational Analysis Of African-American Religiosity, Ellis Braveboy Walker V

Whittier Scholars Program

African American religion, born from the traumas of institutionalized slavery, has played a significant role in the religio-cultural development of enslaved Africans and their descendants. Forced to adapt to the tumultuousness of systematic mistreatment and dehumanization at the hands of oppressive European forces, African peoples managed to create faith-based safe spaces in which they could socialize freely amongst themselves, ultimately protecting their indigenous spiritual belief systems and negotiating them with a reinvention of Eurocentric Christianity into the Black Church. This hybridization of West African spirituality and the Christian faith cemented itself into the culture of Black Americans for generations. However, …

Dynamic Risk Trajectories, Community Context, And Juvenile Recidivism, Kevin T. Wolff, Michael T. Baglivio, Jonathan Intravia

Publications and Research

Purpose

While the implementation of risk assessment has expanded, the extent to which there are different trajectories of risk/protective factors among adjudicated youth during supervision in the community remains unanswered. The goal of the current study is to identify the distinct trajectories in dynamic risk and protective factors among youth on probation and assess whether different patterns in risk over time are associated with continued offending.

Method

Group-based trajectory modeling is used to identify distinct trajectories across multiple domains of risk/need. The individual- and neighborhood-level factors associated with these trajectories are then explored, prior to examining their relationship to continued …

Understanding The Significance Of Building A School In Belize Through Action Research, Stephen Todd Speer

Theses & Dissertations

Research Focus. In Central America, the country of Belize shares its border with Guatemala and Mexico. These countries, with El Salvador and Honduras, are known as the most dangerous areas in our world outside active war zones (Dudlry, 2012; Edwards & Gill, 2002; UNODC, 2019). Crime is the largest contributor to instability in the region and creates a dangerous environment that must be reduced. Reduction of crime can correlate to an increase in available educational opportunities (Edwards, 2002; OSAC, 2019). The U.S. government conducts foreign humanitarian programs that increase educational opportunities in hope of reducing crime and stabilizing the region …

The Myth Of Perfection: Charting The Rhetoric Of Veteran Disability For A Course To Stability, Nicholas Rader

All Dissertations

This dissertation rhetorically analyzes discrimination in Western institutional discourses and documentation procedures, such as architectural texts and procedures, through a historiographic lens. An analytical methodology will be offered to show how discrimination of intersectional bodies is historically informed and reaffirmed by the manipulation of Western myths and mythos. Specifically, by mapping navigational mathematics and cartographic methods over rhetorical, architectural, and historiographic theory, it will be shown how the manipulation of Western myths establishes and reifies patriarchal discrimination that eventually fissions into eugenicist logics in nineteenth and twentieth century France, England, and the United States. In modernity, the practice of manipulating …

Don't Say Gay: How Laws Are Tools For Hate, Discrimination, And Violence, Christina Hartman

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

American society teaches the narrative that the law is preeminently fair and just. The law is not now and never has been a bulwark for the rights of the marginalized, voiceless, or those who remain powerless. Instead, states effectively wield law to alter the social meaning behind thought patterns and behavior—whether through the writing of new laws, passing of new laws, or the disregarding of current laws—to mobilize a large population to accept a group as different or other. Florida’s 2022 “Don’t Say Gay” law is an example of that method aimed at the LGBTQ+ community and part of a …

Living And Dying In 'Cancer Alley': Using Human Rights Law And Environmental Justice To Create A Litigation Framework For Marginalized Communities, Neeharika Sistu

Honors Scholar Theses

Cancer Alley, Louisiana is a poignant example of the intersection between environmental justice, legal harm, and human rights abuses. This thesis dissects the laws and policies underpinning the creation of Cancer Alley with special attention to how they constitute human rights abuses under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.

Then, by performing a comprehensive analysis of litigation surrounding environmental justice in Louisiana, this thesis scrutinizes the efficacy of environmental law in creating environmental justice and suggests the integration of international human rights law and environmental …

“Nope. Don’T Like That.” In Search Of Justice And Commitment To Nonmaleficence In Dance/Movement Therapy, Johnee Border

Dance/Movement Therapy Theses

The American Dance Therapy Association (ADTA) and Dance/Movement Therapy Certification Board (DMTCB) have ensured those dance/movement therapists who have been educated, registered, and board-certified share a commitment to equity, justice, and nonmaleficence according to the ADTA and DMTCB’s Code of Ethics and Standards (The Code) (ADTA, 2015). “Nope. Don’t like that,” has been the actual, verbal, expression of the embodied experience of intersectional harm from a lack of assessed, decolonized dance/movement therapy practice and pedagogy. The ADTA, students, educators, and credentialed dance/movement therapists hold an established, ethical responsibility to justice and nonmaleficence, and as such, must demonstrate a commitment to …

Unidentified Deceased Persons: Who Are At-Risk?, Sarah Duncan

All Theses

This study explores the silent mass disaster of unidentified deceased persons that is occurring across the United States and identifies the individual and community level characteristics that make a person “at-risk” of becoming an unidentified deceased person within the United States. This study identifies trends-based hotspots by using data reported on the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs) and comparing those trends to the gender United States population. It finds that males, and age of death between 20-64 are overrepresented and White persons are underrepresented in the unidentified deceased person sample when compared the general population. Social and human …

Perceptions Of Student Loan Debt: A Phenomenological Study Exploring Black Undergraduate Students' Experiences., Pilar Prather

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The rising cost of higher education concerns many families in the United States, especially those from historically underrepresented backgrounds. The purpose of this study is to explore the phenomenon of Black students' perception of their student loan debt and how their financial knowledge influences their decisions at a public institution. This qualitative research provides space to empower individuals to share their stories through semi-structured interviews to get an account of their experiences. Grounded in Yosso's (2005) Community Cultural Wealth Theory, the study seeks to capture the unique ways Black students make financial decisions. The dissertation is divided into five chapters: …

One Pager - “How Scared Are You?” Mapping The Threat Environment Of San Diego’S Elected Officials, Rachel Locke, Carl Luna

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

This one pager includes data summary points from survey sent to San Diego County elected officials.

Targeted threats and the perpetration of physical violence against elected officials have been increasing steadily around the world. Democracy cannot function without individuals serving in elected governance. The presence and growth of threats and harassment undermines community cohesion, further undermining our ability to address our collective challenges.

Alternative Approaches To Police Interventions When Responding To Mental Health Crises Incidents, Karen Rivera Apolinar

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Purpose: This study explored mental health workers perspectives on alternative approaches in responding to mental health crises.

The study was carried out in Southern California, in collaboration with mental health workers who currently work or previously have worked in mental health crisis. It adopted a post-positivists paradigm and data was gathered through individual interviews with mental health workers who have direct experience with mental health crisis response in the community and with the police. The twenty participants in the study were men and women working in the mental health field, and of various backgrounds, licensures, and ages.

The study found …

Only 2000 Psi Of Bottom-Time Air: A Case Study Of Diveheart Participant Social Capital, Kirk J. Williams

Student Capstone Projects

Social capital development for many, but not all, is a relatively organic process, and as social creatures, people work together to reach collective goals. The defined interactions related to the practices of societal norms, taboos, and broad cultural acceptance are constructs of communal decisions lending deep credence to the value of any number of the social capital definitions. However, opportunities are not always readily available to individuals living with disabilities, so they can and do get left out to varied degrees. With unsurprising results, previous research relied on comparing survey data from individuals with and without disabilities to identify possible …

The Creation Of Political Survival Strategies By Black Collegiate Women On Virginia’S Predominantly White Campuses, Maya Jenkins

Student Research Submissions

The University of Mary Washington is a liberal arts institution founded in 1908 as a normal and industrial school for women (Our History - About UMW, 2015). Because of its small size, Mary Washington was historically known as Virginia’s “undiscovered gem” (Boyer, 2011). Mary Washington is described as a place built to support the “innovative, passionate, intellectual, and genuine” (Boyer, 2011). However, in 2020, the deaths of Breonna Taylor and Tony McDade and a racial protest that took place near the college’s campus caused many Black collegiate women at Mary Washington to question if their university was built to support …

Understanding And Addressing Disparities In Kidney Transplantation Access: A Focus On Disability And Other Identities, Razan Khalil

Honors Theses

The global prevalence of chronic kidney disease (CKD) is estimated to be between 8.7% and 18.4% (Samuels et. al, 2022), with approximately 843.6 million Americans having been diagnosed with one of the 5 stages of CKD in 2022 (Kovesdy, 2022). As of 2021, 1 in 7 adults were affected, which was about 37 million Americans according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, 2021). CKD is a long-term condition in which the kidneys gradually lose function, leading to a buildup of waste and fluids in the body. This can result in a variety of symptoms, including high blood …

Care Or Compliance? An Examination Of Sexual Violence And Institutional Responses At Two Crisis Points, Sophia Hartman

Honors Theses

Understanding the existence of sexual violence requires an investigation of the actions and contexts that either permit or prevent this form of violence. There exists a desire to draw a strict line between adolescence and adulthood, especially in relationship to sexual engagement, and in particular its implications for sexual violence. Utilizing Urie Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Model of Human Development and the concept of sexual citizenship—one’s right to sexual self-determination as well as the equivalent right of others—this thesis evaluates the perpetuation of sexual violence within the contexts of two crisis points. First, the moral panic during the Progressive Era surrounding female …

Racializing Service (Learning): A Critical Content Analysis Of Service Learning Syllabi, Tania Mitchell, Carmine Perrotti

Race and Pedagogy Journal: Teaching and Learning for Justice

This study examines service learning pedagogy and its use of racialized terms to frame service. Through a critical content analysis using 270 syllabi from 193 four-year U.S. institutions with the Community Engagement Classification from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, this study explores how the language used in service learning syllabi perpetuates and sustains racialized hierarchies in community engagement experiences.

Menstruation Products And Perceptions: Breaking Through The Crimson Ceiling, Ava Colleran

Young Historians Conference

This paper examines different views on menstruation throughout history and their effects on social, political, and economic landscapes. The ancient Greeks, Romans, and Mayans all believed in the supposed ‘magical powers’ of menstrual blood. These societies held their own ideas on the limits of these magical abilities, and the good and evil forces they could be used for. Throughout these ancient societies, menstruation was used as a justification for the increased control of the state and men over women’s bodies. If menstrual blood did have these magical powers, it was a power that needed to be limited and controlled so …

The Aftermath Of Dobbs: How The Criminalization Of Abortion Has Obstructed The Exercise Of Bodily Autonomy, Sonia Bakshi

Golden Gate University Race, Gender, Sexuality and Social Justice Law Journal

This Blog addresses the topic of bodily autonomy in relation to the criminalization of abortion because everyone should be entitled to the right to make their own choices, especially when it comes to their bodies, and even greater, their selves as a whole. With the recent overturning of Roe v. Wade, the ability to exercise bodily autonomy has never been more obstructed. The Supreme Court has left the nation with the impression that they do not believe women are capable of making decisions about their own bodies or their own futures. Now, it’s important to look into what the ripple …

Serving A Country That Will Not Accommodate Our Religion: The Sikh American Struggle To Choose Between Career Or Faith, Tanveer Moundi

Golden Gate University Race, Gender, Sexuality and Social Justice Law Journal

Sikhism is the fifth largest religion in the world, with approximately thirty million followers of the faith worldwide. It is a monotheistic faith that teaches honesty, compassion, humility, universal equity, and respect for all religions. Since the 1984 genocide of Sikhs in India, many followers of the faith have immigrated to Western countries in hopes of “the American dream” and the prospect of freely practicing their faith. But as a devastating response to the tragedy of 9/11, members of the Sikh community living in the United States have become victims of hate crimes, workplace discrimination, school bullying, and …

Indigenous African-Centred Organizational Change: Building Capacity At A Grassroots B3 Organization, Emanuella Nicola Bringi

The Dissertation in Practice at Western University

Nakupenda Community Services (NCS) is a B3 organization based in Ontario Canada. At NCS there are several valuable programs serving the everyday needs of clients. While the services are valued by the community, the internal challenge within the organization is the lack of capacity to lead all programs. Compounding this problem is the demand for more programs and services given the impacts of the recent pandemic. The very active board of directors and employees have made significant efforts to meet the needs of clients, but the problem of capacity persists and negatively impacts service delivery as employees and leaders tend …

The Effect Of Youth Sports Participation On Health Outcomes For Immigrants In The United States, Emma Kennedy

Honors Theses

My study investigates the relationship between youth sports participation and health outcomes for immigrants using a quantitative statistical analysis of secondary data. Given the theory behind the relationships between physical activity level, sense of community, and health outcomes, I test the hypothesis that immigrants are positively impacted by youth sports participation on a significantly higher level compared to non-immigrants. Using Stata as my statistical analysis software tool, I measure the associations between immigrant status, sports participation, and various indicators of health such as BMI and reports of chronic illness. I found that sports participation is associated with improved general health …

Sociology: A Guide To Action Or To Analysis In The Global Climate Change Crisis? A Call For Action By The Social Sciences And The Humanities, Kim Scipes

Class, Race and Corporate Power

The debate over the purpose of sociological research has historically been one between Marx and Weber: is sociology’s role to analyze society (ala Weber) or to change it (Marx)?

The issue of climate change and environmental destruction is one that has been relegated to the margins of Sociology, being seen as an “environmental” issue. The changes we’ve seen so far, however, show how this has had and is having a major impact on human beings and, at least in the United States, is having a major impact on the culture of the country, both in general and specifically on different …

Sociology Ethnographic Film Review, Kristen S. Addessi

Open Educational Resources

This is an assignment that gives students options of using different films as examples of ethnographies to understand key issues that occur in our society.

A Remembrance Project: The Lynching Of Brack Kinley And Luther Durrett, Addison Rogers

Undergraduate Theses

From 1882 to 1968, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) estimates that 4,743 lynching’s occurred in the U.S. While other organizations report a slightly different number, the harsh reality of terror and violence remains the same. These violent acts of murder were used as a mechanism by white mobs to promote terror and enforce control upon the black community. Despite the presence of terror and violence in our current society, little is taught about such history and the people who were murdered. Instead of an emphasis on the actual history and the lives lost, the emphasis …

Elementary School Parent Perceptions Of “Critical Race Theory” In The Curriculum, Helen Wallace

Honors Theses

Critical Race Theory (CRT) implementations within educational settings is a controversial and polarizing concept in the American political climate. Many Americans are strongly opposed to the idea of CRT within the classroom due to a misguided belief that children have no idea what race or racism is until it is taught to them explicitly. On the other hand, proponents of CRT argue that teaching children to ignore race further perpetuates racial discrimination and prevents children from adequately understanding racial injustice. There is currently a lack of research investigating perceptions of CRT implementations in education among parents. This research aimed to …

Name-Based Demographic Inference And The Unequal Distribution Of Misrecognition, Jeffrey W. Lockhart, Molly M. King, Christin Munsch

Sociology

Academics and companies increasingly draw on large datasets to understand the social world, and name-based demographic ascription tools are widespread for imputing information that is often missing from these large datasets. These approaches have drawn criticism on ethical, empirical and theoretical grounds. Using a survey of all authors listed on articles in sociology, economics and communication journals in Web of Science between 2015 and 2020, we compared self-identified demographics with name-based imputations of gender and race/ethnicity for 19,924 scholars across four gender ascription tools and four race/ethnicity ascription tools. We found substantial inequalities in how these tools misgender and misrecognize …