Sociology Commons^™

‘Tell Your Own Story’: Manhood, Masculinity And Racial Socialization Among Black Fathers And Their Sons, Quaylan Allen

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study examines how black fathers and sons in the U.S. conceptualize manhood and masculinity and the racial socializing practices of black men. Drawing upon data from an ethnography on Black male schooling, this paper uses the interviews with fathers and sons to explore how race and gender intersect in how Black males make meaning of their gendered performances. Common notions of manhood are articulated including independence, responsibility and providership. However, race and gender intersect in particular ways for black men. The fathers engaged in particular racial socializing practices preparing their sons for encounters with racism. Both fathers and sons …

"Pitiful Creature Of Darkness": The Subhuman And The Superhuman In The Phantom Of The Opera, Jessica Sternfeld

Music Faculty Books and Book Chapters

"This chapter focuses on The Phantom of the Opera, the megamusical that perhaps most boldly faces the idea of disability head-on, as it stars a character whose face, as one journalist described it, looks 'like melted cheese' (Smith, 1995). The musical's approach to the Phantom's disability is remarkably layered and inconsistent; the Phantom is portrayed in numerous ways (monster, criminal, genius, god, ghost) and his physical disability blurs regularly with his 'soul;' which is where numerous characters locate the origin of his problems. His face and its famous mask covering are both feared and thrilled over, but with a reassuring …

From A Chat In The Parlor To Viral Music Videos: An Analysis Of Music As A Social Occasion, Emma Plotnik

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Imagine an intimate room filled with people playing cards and casually chatting, while one of Chopin’s piano sonatas plays elegantly in the background. This scenario is characteristic of the atmosphere surrounding Classical and Romantic European salons. Salons served as havens of musical discourse from the Baroque era to the early twentieth century. However, with the advancement of technology from the mid-twentieth century to the present, there has been a decline, or, arguably, even a cessation of salon life.

The aim of this project was to recreate the salon environment through the generation of the online discussion forum, "Music Soirée." To …

“There’S Still That Window That’S Open”: The Problem With “Grit”, Noah Asher Golden

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This narrative analysis case study challenges the education reform movement’s fascination with “grit,” the notion that a non-cognitive trait like persistence is at the core of disparate educational outcomes and the answer to our inequitable education system. Through analysis of the narratives and meaning-making processes of Elijah, a 20-year-old African American seeking his High School Equivalency diploma, this case study explores linkages among dominant discourses on meritocracy, opportunity, personal responsibility, and group blame. Specifically, exposition of the figured worlds present in Elijah’s narratives points to the attempted obfuscation of social inequities present in the current educational reform movement and our …

First Report Of The National Evaluation Of Rsvp Volunteers, Annie Georges, Susan Gabbard, Ashley Wendell Kranjac

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

"In 2013, the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) initiated a national evaluation of the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP). The national evaluation was intended to collect the necessary information to better guide the RSVP program and to address three objectives: 1) describe the characteristics of RSVP volunteers, including how volunteers are distributed across CNCS’s performance measure categories, and how volunteers allocated their time to different service activities across the performance measure categories; 2) measure the relationship between volunteer characteristics, service activities, and volunteers’ psychosocial health; and 3) measure the impact of RSVP national service participation on volunteers’ …

1st Place Research Paper: Moviegoers And The Moon In 1953, Hannah E. Gary

Kevin and Tam Ross Undergraduate Research Prize

"By analyzing the complicated production of the sexually-provocative The Moon is Blue in the early 1950s, this essay seeks to isolate the perspectives of censorship groups, artistic authorities, governmental legislatures, and the Production Code Administration (PCA) in their respective appraisals of the Hollywood industry’s movie-going public. Referencing communications between studio personnel and the PCA, as well as court documents and scholarly research, this paper highlights how the various organizations’ differing conceptions are relevant with regards to their Cold War context. This period inspired containment ideology in narratives celebrating 'universal ideals and patriotic or sacred causes' through the awareness of a …

Voting Preference, Religion And Ethnicity’S Impact On Party Identification, Benjamin Gourley

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Voting in the Presidential election always comes down to the wire, which leads political scientists to contemplate the most efficient ways for candidates to target and seize voters. The study explores how ethnic and religious values affect a voter’s party identification. This study will identify theories of opinion formation and connect these theories to the values that religious and ethnic voters rely on when voting for a candidate. This study hypothesizes three things: first, religious groups will tend to vote for candidates that hold the same religious values. Second, Ethnic groups will tend to vote for candidates that share the …

Fear And Media: The Relationship Between Crime Related Television Consumption And The Fear Of Crime Among Americans, Timothy Breitfeller, Tatiana Broukhim, Angelina Riccio, Leah Whitenack

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

This paper explores the relationship between crime-related media consumption, shows about actual and fictional crime, internet-related problems, and the fear of crime. Our research proves that there is a direct relationship between crime-related media consumption, internet-related issues, and the fear of crime. The Chapman Survey of American Fears (Bader, 2014) identified fear of crime among various categories and included seventeen questions that were the subject of the key variables and were measured on a four point Likert scale. A series of questions directed at 1,573 respondents regarding the variables resulted in findings of positive correlations between crime-related media consumption and …

Moving Back To The 18th Century View's Of Women's Role And Perception Of Their Lives: The Case Of Motherhood, Yelena Liepelt

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

This project will explore the role of French women of the 18th century, and specifically the problems they faced due to their gender. I will analyze the obstacles that made it difficult for strong women, such as physicist and author Madame du Châtelet, to obtain happiness. These include the complicated identity of educated and ambitious women who lived within a strict gender binary system.

I will compare Châtelet’s concept of happiness from a female perspective to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s view of women’s happiness and maternity. Rousseau believed women played an important role in society; however, their existence was always relative to …

How Disney Is "Kingdom Hearts?” A Comparison Between Disney Films And The Video Game, Andrew Vo, Kassidy Vo

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Disney is known for movies that often entail gendered morals for boys and girls. This research examines Kingdom Hearts, a video game developed by Disney and Square Enix, to show how the game has "Disney morals" that are progressive in terms of gender, race, and religion.

Honorable Mention Research Paper: A “Land You Could Not Escape Yet Almost Didn’T Want To Leave:” Japanese American Identity In Manzanar Internment Camp Gardens, Mckenzie P. Tavoda

Kevin and Tam Ross Undergraduate Research Prize

"While prior scholarship on Japanese American Internment during World War II has been prolific, few have researched the role the natural environment played within the camps and the impact it had on the internees. Some scholars have supposed that the environment was chiefly a negative influence, like Connie Chiang, but few have studied the resourceful accomplishments of the internees in designing and cultivating gardens that reflected both their ancestral identity and contemporary American sensibility. Scholars such as Kenneth Helphand argued that the gardens were strictly an act of defiance. Others like David Neiwert lay claim to the Japanese immigrant enclave …

Honorable Mention Contest Entry: A “Land You Could Not Escape Yet Almost Didn’T Want To Leave:” Japanese American Identity In Manzanar Internment Camp Gardens, Mckenzie P. Tavoda

Kevin and Tam Ross Undergraduate Research Prize

This is McKenzie Tavoda's submission for the 2014-2015 Kevin and Tam Ross Undergraduate Research Prize, which won honorable mention. She wrote about Japanese American identity in the Manzanar Internment Camp gardens. You can read the final essay that came out of her research here.

Race, Culture And Agency: Examining The Ideologies And Practices Of Us Teachers Of Black Male Students, Quaylan Allen

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study examines teachers of Black male students in a United States secondary school setting. Qualitative methods were used to document teachers' ideologies of and practices with their Black male students. In general, teachers drew upon competing structural and cultural explanations of Black male social and academic outcomes, while also engaging in practices that contested school barriers for Black males. Teacher beliefs about and practices with their Black male students were inconsistent in many ways, yet their agency on behalf of Black males might be understood as essential to Black male educational progress.

“I’M Trying To Get My A”: Black Male Achievers Talk About Race, School And Achievement, Quaylan Allen

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study seeks to challenge deficit views on Black male education by highlighting the perspectives of academically successful Black males in a secondary school setting. Employing interpretive qualitative methods, I present the narratives of academically successful Black males, emphasizing their reflections on race, school and academic achievement. In particular, this study highlights the educational dispositions and expectations of Black males, including the influences of their support systems on their academic trajectories. One support system comprised of parents, including the academic expectations held of their sons as well as their racial socializing practices. Another support system included their teachers, particularly those …

Where We Have Been And Where We Can Go From Here: Looking To The Future In Research On Media, Race And Ethnicity, Riva Tukachinsky

Communication Faculty Articles and Research

This special issue illuminates the ways in which media portrayals and practices, together, create barriers to inclusion for diverse groups and normalize existing patterns of relegation on and off the screen. Media representations of race and ethnicity have critical consequences for intergroup relationships and for marginalized group members’ self-concept. A synthesis of the research included in this volume demonstrates the significance of these questions across media outlets, their relevancy despite the rise of new technologies, and their application to social contexts outside the U.S.. Finally, this concluding article suggests directions for future research and offers implications for policies that can …

When Actors Don’T Walk The Talk: Parasocial Relationships Moderate The Effect Of Actor-Character Incongruence, Riva Tukachinsky

Communication Faculty Articles and Research

The study examines the effect of a narrative that featured an actor playing a counterattitudinal role. Participants read an online magazine interview with a popular comedian and then watched a sitcom in which this actor played a role that was either consistent or inconsistent with his personal views. Parasocial relationships with the actor moderated the effect of actor-character incongruence. Specifically, incongruence was associated with lower support for narrative-related attitudes, but only among viewers with weak parasocial relationships. These results provide evidence of the existence of vicarious cognitive dissonance, wherein witnessing another person’s hypocritical behavior produces attitude change in the observer.

Documenting Portrayals Of Race/Ethnicity On Primetime Television Over A 20-Year Span And Their Association With National-Level Racial/Ethnic Attitudes, Riva Tukachinsky, Dana Mastro, Moran Yarchi

Communication Faculty Articles and Research

The current study content analyzes the 345 most viewed U.S. television shows within 12 separate television seasons spanning the years 1987 to 2009. Using multilevel modeling, the results from this comprehensive content analysis then are used to predict national-level racial/ethnic perceptions (between the years 1988 and 2008) with data from the American National Election Studies (ANES). Content analysis results reveal severe underrepresentation of Latinos, AsianAmericans, and NativeAmericans, and a tendency to depict ethnic minorities stereotypically (e.g., overrepresentation of hyper-sexualized Latino characters). Multilevel-modeling analysis indicates that both the quantity and quality of ethnic media representations contributes to Whites’ racial attitudes.

Women And Violence In The Age Of Migration, Lilia D. Monzó, Peter Mclaren

Education Faculty Articles and Research

"Women from across Latin America are migrating north at great peril to their lives – their intended destination is, as expected, the US – that giant powerhouse that in spite of its well documented historical and continued imperialist violence and exploitation against Latin America is still able to create the ideological haze that encourages hope for that illusive “American dream.” Pushed to the brink of desperation resulting from unimaginable poverty, privation, and fear, these women muster the courage that only women of color know that they have (it is imbued in their flesh and in their hearts as a result …

When Justice Demands Inequality, John Thrasher, Keith Hankins

Philosophy Faculty Articles and Research

In Rescuing Justice and Equality G.A. Cohen argues that justice requires an uncompromising commitment to equality. Cohen also argues, however, that justice must be sensitive to other values, including a robust commitment to individual freedom and to the welfare of the community. We ask whether a commitment to these other values means that, despite Cohen’s commitment to equality, his view requires that we make room for inequality in the name of justice? We argue that even on Cohen’s version of egalitarianism equality, freedom, and welfare are not always compatible. Justice will require trade-offs between these values. Sometimes, equality will need …