Race and Ethnicity Commons^™

A Performance Analysis Of Dorothy Rudd Moore's Sonnets On Love, Rosebuds, And Death, Cordelia Elizabeth Anderson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this document is to evaluate Dorothy Rudd Moore’s Sonnets on Love, Rosebuds, and Death through a performance analysis, and to discuss the significance of the Harlem Renaissance in relation to the song cycle. Moore used seven reputable poets from the Harlem Renaissance to compile this song cycle. The poets are Alice Dunbar Nelson, Clarissa Scott Delany, Gwendolyn Bennett, Langston Hughes, Arna Bontemps, Countee Cullen, and Helene Johnson. A few of them were a part of the core group that spurred this powerful movement. The Harlem Renaissance was a flourishing time in American history when African Americans felt …

Image, Narrative, & Concept Of Time In Valerie Capers's Song Cycle Song Of The Seasons, Lillian Channelle Roberts

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Once I was a classical pianist, then I was a jazz pianist, but now I’m a pianist – No label. And in my writing, I’m not concerned with any particular style. I’ve found that if you have musical groundwork and some idea of the emotional impact the music should have, the musical style will hang together.

—Valerie Capers

Primarily known as a renowned jazz pianist, Valerie Capers is a blind, African-American woman composer who defied all odds by becoming the first blind graduate of The Juilliard School. Dr. Capers also became valedictorian of the New York Institute for the Education …

Alleged Insanity: Frank Johnson Sr., Racial Injustice, And The Failure Of The Mental Health Care System In South Carolina, Jonathon P. Johnson

Senior Theses

This thesis is about Frank Johnson Sr. and the circumstances that led to his downfall as a farmer and father of six, to his tragic death in the isolation of a racially segregated mental institution 18 miles away from his home. Using his life and incarceration at the South Carolina State Park mental health facility, I argue that racial injustice contributed to his tragic death and the woefully inadequate treatment thousands of African Americans in South Carolina received during Jim Crow. Additionally, I argue that the tragic circumstances around my great grandfather’s institutionalization and death were part of an enduring …

In Plain Sight: Changing Representations Of "Biracial" People In Film 1903-2015, Charles Lawrence Gray

Dissertations (1934 -)

Rooted in slavery, the United States in both law and custom has a long history of adhering to the one drop rule–the stipulation that any amount of African ancestry constitutes an individual as black. Given this history, decidedly mixed race people have been subjected to a number of degrading stereotypes. In examining the three broad themes of the tragic mulatto, racial passing, and racelessness in cinema, this dissertation asks to what extent film representations of mixed race characters have had the capacity to educate audiences beyond stereotypes. Although a number of film scholars and critics have analyzed mixed race characters …

Ethnic And National Identity Of Third Generation Koreans In Japan, Haruka Morooka

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Despite Japan’s emphasis on its ethnic homogeneity, there actually are ethnic minorities in Japan. Most of foreign residents in Japan came recently, but a group of Koreans, which is called Zainichi, has been living in Japan before World War II. “Zainichi”, literally means “residing in Japan,” with a connotation of impermanence. It could be Zainichi Chinese or Zainichi Americans, but the term almost exclusively refers “to a population of colonial-era migrants from the Korean peninsula that settles in the Japanese archipelago and their descendants” (Lie, 2008, x). After decades of living in Japan, over 90% of the Zainichi population is …

How The City Of Indianapolis Came To Have African American Policemen And Firemen 80 Years Before The Modern Civil Rights Movement., Leon E. Bates

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study explores a series of events that occurred in the spring of 1876. The relationship between the Indianapolis city government, the Marion County Courts, the Indianapolis Police Department, and the African American community came together to usher in changes never before envisioned. The Indianapolis Police Department (IPD) was formed in 1855, then disbanded 12 months later in a political dispute. From 1857-to-1876, the IPD was all white. These changes took place as the Reconstruction era was coming to a close. The first Ku Klux Klan was at its apex, terrorizing black communities, and Jim Crow was coming into its …

Still Waiting: An Analysis Of The Permeation Of Racial Stereotypes In Top-Grossing Black Romance Films From The 1960s To The 2000s, Jasmine Boyd-Perry

Honors College Theses

In this study, I compare how films portray relationships involving Black people, over the course of 5 decades. I do this by analyzing the characters and relationships in the top-grossing film from each decade (1960’s through 2000’s), that have a focus on Black love. I started this journey curious about how the silver screen portrayed how Black people loved romantically. As a person who regularly frequents my local major movie theatre, I had become tired of only seeing Black actors in comedies, Black men in drag and buddy dramas. I also grew tired of the sappy love stories featuring White …

Displaying Race At The Jamestown Ter-Centennial Exposition, Bryan Patrick Bennett

History Theses & Dissertations

World expositions of the nineteenth and early twentieth century often displayed the latest anthropological, ethnological, biological, and technological research on race and ethnicity, promoting the view that whites were superior to all other peoples. The Jamestown Ter-Centennial Exposition of 1907, held in Norfolk, Virginia to commemorate the three-hundred anniversary of the founding of the Jamestown settlement and its contribution to the building of the United States, offers an opportunity to examine American perspectives on whiteness, race, and society.

First, the Jamestown Exposition offered a glimpse into the historical memory of white America, especially the influential citizens that comprised the controlling …

Understanding School And Interethnic Relations Of Mexican Immigrant Youth In A Post-Industrial Community, Roberto Martinez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

There is a dearth of literature on how immigrant groups understand minority groups in the United States, in particular, African-Americans. Increased technology and more rapid global movement in the 21st Century challenges 20th explanations of assimilation (Chicago School) and necessitates more research focused on how immigrant groups and racialized minorities interact to negotiate new worlds. This ethnographic research was conducted over thirteen months during 2012 and 2013 in a post-industrial neighborhood in the northeast that had been the site of 11 purported anti-bias attacks against Mexican immigrants during the summer of 2010. Research questions focused on: 1) Mexican immigrant youth …

Media Representation Of Asian Americans And Asian Native New Yorkers’ Hybrid Persona, Min Huh

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Asian Americans, having been degraded in the realm of popular media and neglected in the consumer market, have been unable to obtain a voice or leave a trace in American pop culture. The meager representation that Asian Americans rarely have is highly controlled through a distorted lens, inclined to paint them in a grotesquely exaggerated light for comic relief. The absence of Asian Americans in the media has compelled the Asian American youth to adapt the personas of different cultures in their desires for social and cultural mobility. These factors have given birth to a hybrid persona among Asian Native …

Remember The Holocaust And The Killing Fields: A Comparative Study, Ilan Levine

Honors Theses

Why is the Holocaust almost universally remembered as the most horrific event in the modern age while the Cambodian genocide is hardly remembered both in and outside of Cambodia? Do the two events share similar aspects despite their differences, and what implication does that have on a wider understanding of both genocides? This thesis explores these questions by examining how the Holocaust and Cambodian genocide (killing fields) have been remembered over time. Examining both shows the respective roads of memorialization that each have taken and reveals where the two catastrophes share major aspects: notably, the tactics used by the perpetrators, …

The Endless Long Hot Summer: A Study Of Urban Riots And The Kerner Report, Taylor Anderson

Honors Theses

This thesis examines the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders’ (Kerner Commission) investigation from 1967 to 1968 of the urban violence that occurred throughout the late 1960s in the United States. The study focuses on the process by which the Kerner Commission’s research and investigation became the conclusions and recommendations found in the Final Report they produced. For purposes of analysis, three sections of the commission’s research and findings were examined—the relationships between urban violence and racism, the police and minorities, and the press and urban violence. The commission’s methodology was a combination of investigative fieldwork that included interviews and …

Les Refugies De La Mer: L'Histoire La Sociologie Le Cinema Et La Litterature Des Immigres Vietnamiens Apres La Guerre Du Vietnam(1978-1995), Kathryn Dowling

Honors Theses

In the years following the Vietnamese War, more than one million refugees left Vietnam. Many of these immigrants arrived in France, diversifying an already well-established Vietnamese community. These immigrants have a unique history, social identity, and cultural contributions. Yet, Vietnamese immigrants in France are an understudied group. The current research examined the history, sociology, and cultural contributions of Vietnamese immigrants in France.

The American Nightmare: Land Of The Incarcerated, Jamara Bernard

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

A collection of poems focusing on the mass incarceration of African-American men and how the prison industrial complex is designed to legally exploit prisoners specifically for profits. Along with a reflective essay about the history of legal discrimination and the creative process by which the poems were created. Then how it ties in with the capstone course theme of race, gender, class, feminist theory, and social justice.

Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?: Food Inequlaity And Black Americans, Christina Foster

Capstone Collection

Food insecurity is an issue that plagues many people throughout the world. It only requires a brief search on the United Nation’s (U.N.) World Hunger Map to determine that this is indeed a worldwide crisis. Conversely, within the United States, the issue of hunger is often treated as “minimal” in comparison to other countries. A deeper inquiry into hunger within the U.S. reveals an even more disturbing connection: the role of white supremacy and systemic racism in regard to hunger. Academic research pertaining to food access is quite recent. Be that as it may, it is of no surprise that …

Young, Urban, Professional, And Kenyan?: Conversations Surrounding Tribal Identity And Nationhood, Charlotte Achieng-Evensen

Educational Studies Dissertations

By asking the question “How do young, urban, professional Kenyans make connections between tribal identity, colonialism, and the lived experience of nationhood?,” the researcher engages with eight participants in exploring their relationships with their tribal groups. From this juncture the researcher, through a co-constructed process with participants, interrogates the idea of nationhood by querying their interpretations of the concepts of power and resistance within their multi-ethnic societies. The utility of KuPiga Hadithi as a cultural responsive methodology for data collection along with poetic analysis as part of the qualitative tools of examination allowed the researcher to identify five emergent and …

Race, Rebellion, And Arab Muslim Slavery : The Zanj Rebellion In Iraq, 869 - 883 C.E., Nicholas C. Mcleod

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the ninth century, enslaved Africans from the east coast of Africa, called the Zanj, revolted for nearly fifteen years in southern Iraq against their Arab slave masters and challenged the social order of the Abbasid Empire. This thesis is a socio-historical investigation on the role that race played in starting the Zanj Rebellion of 869 C.E. It examines the Arab Islamic slave trade and the racial stratification experienced by blacks in the early centuries of Islamic history in conjunction with the Zanj Rebellion. The thesis applies a structural framework for analyzing race, to demonstrate the racialization process, prevalent racial …

"Do Not Fashion The Other": Representing Contemporary Haudenosaunee Literature 2016, Michael Patrick Brewster

Master's Theses

Historically, the issue of representation in postcolonial studies is one of some contention. While scholarship might recognize the necessity for highlighting the plights and struggles attendant to postcolonial societies, the primary literature being studied is most often written by natives of those societies themselves. This gap is especially evident with Indigenous cultures, because there are relatively few Indigenous scholars working in the academy. We are at the point now when we have a multiplicity (but not a plurality) of Indigenous voices writing literature (poetry, memoir, fiction, film, etc.) and academic criticism. However, there is value in non-Natives reading and writing …

Bolling V. Sharpe And Beyond: The Unfinished And Untold History Of School Desegregation In Washington, D.C., Bryce Celotto

Honors College Theses

While the Brown V. Board of Education case is constantly referenced when discussing educational equity and desegregation, Bolling v. Sharpe stands as another important education civil rights case and is perhaps more telling of the story of education in the United States. Bolling V. Sharpe was argued and decided in the United States Supreme Court over the course of 1952 to 1954. Similar to Brown v. Board in terms of intent, Bolling v. Sharpe aimed to desegregate public schools in Washington, D.C. in order to give African-American students equal access to a high quality public education on par with that …

Whiteness In Contemporary Feminist Campaigns : Free The Nipple., Laura Patterson

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Lullaby For The Burning Ear: How Intersectional Feminism Can Help Decolonize The Latino Consciousness, Donovan E. Hernandez Garcia

Senior Theses

People exist with their own religions, cultures, and practices, which illustrate the ingenuity of humanity. Yet, because of major events that altered the fate of the Americas, a certain societal structure was created to maintain power. Due to colonization, the prolonged exposure to numerous cultures, and the continuation of oppressive systems, people have been forced to band together based on similar characteristics, be it race, gender, or sexual orientation, creating divisions within society. It is because of such colonial mentality, subliminal and apparent, political and cultural movements, such as Feminism and intersectionality, have been created to combat the harmful effects …

Choral Theatre, Albert Joseph Wolfe Jr.

Dissertations

Jamaica gained its independence from Great Britain in 1962, after some 300 years of colonization. Prior to Independence, the standard arts education curriculum was decidedly British and Western European. That which was labeled Caribbean or Jamaican “folk” by the British was deemed inferior and was not taught, demonstrated, or performed in formal settings. Thus, generations of Jamaicans never observed or imagined a Caribbean aesthetic in the visual and performing arts. Instead, pre-Independence Jamaicans were taught British and Western European music and performed it the “British” way.

Today, Jamaicans boast a number of artistic developments that are instantly recognized across the …

"Divest Now!" The Student Divestment Campaign At The University Of Louisville : A Crusade For Equality., Chris Burns

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Seventh-Day Adventists And ‘Race’ Relations In The U.S.: The Case Of Black-White Structural Segregation, Cleran Hollancid

Dissertations

A worldwide Christian denomination of some eighteen million in global membership, and with a presence in over 200 countries and territories (i.e., in just about every country on the globe), the Seventh Day Adventist (SDA) Church is one with a distinctive arrangement in the U.S., insofar as it concerns its racial segregation practice. The SDA Church professes and preaches unity in the pulpit, as in all members being equal and one in the faith, yet the actual practice says otherwise. Such is the case since it is officially segregated along black-white lines.

The segregation arrangement, essentially a black-white schism, falls …

Cedar Weaving & Co-Sleeping Safety: A Parenting Class For Expectant Coast Salish Parents, Rena Pugh

MSW Capstones

This proposed intervention is a parenting class that combines co-sleeping safety information and cedar baby basket weaving instruction for the Pacific Northwest’s Coast Salish population. Parents will weave cedar baskets to provide their baby with the safest sleeping space in the adult bed. Parents learn to weave cedar, and understand the safety advantages provided by the basket simultaneously. This project pairs community values with the latest scientific research and safety advice to provide an intervention that addresses the disparity in infant injury and death in Native America without sacrificing cultural practices.

Empowerment From Within: Supporting Palestinian Women’S Struggle Against Violence, Ortal Bensky

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Recent reports by the United Nations and local non-governmental organizations present a troubling increase in incidents of violence against Palestinian women in Palestine. These are cases of domestic violence, where the attackers are Palestinians, and political violence, where the attackers are Israeli settlers and soldiers. These violent incidents include attacks on body and property. Most incidents are neither dealt with by the Palestinian authorities nor by the Israeli government and judicial system. There is not sufficient international pressure to enforce justice. The purpose of this study is to offer alternative ways to prevent violent crimes, enforce relevant laws, and provide …

Civilizational Imperatives: American Colonial Culture In The Islamic Philippines, 1899-1942, Oliver Charbonneau

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation examines the colonial experience in the Islamic Philippines between 1899 and 1942. Occupying Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago in 1899, U.S. Army officials assumed sovereignty over a series of Muslim populations collectively referred to as ‘Moros.’ Beholden to pre-existing notions of Moro ungovernability, for two decades military and civilian administrators ruled the Southern Philippines separately from the Christian regions of the North. In the 1920s, Islamic areas of Mindanao and Sulu were ‘normalized’ and haphazardly assimilated into the emergent Philippine nation-state. Never fully integrated, the Muslim South persisted as an exotic frontier zone in the American and Filipino …

Lengua Latina: Representations Of Sex And Gender In Latina Literature, Jessica L. Harris

Master of Liberal Studies Theses

An exploration of the influence of Spanish language on gender, sexuality, and sisterhood in various aspects of Latina/o literature. In Chapter I, I examine Spanish director Pedro Almodovar’s film, Chicana playwright Josefina Lopez's Real Women Have Curves, and Gloria Anzaldua’s Borderlands/La Frontera as a tool for analyzing conceptions of “Other” and the ways these issues intersect with one another. In Chapter II, I look at La Virgen and La Malinche dichotomy and the ways stereotypes appear in Latina poetry. In Chapter III, I discuss hermanas and comadres and their importance outside the intimacy of romantic relationships. Throughout this project, I …

College-Educated, African American Women's Marital Choices, Katherine M. Oliver

Theses and Dissertations--Family Sciences

This study explores the desire to marry, marriageable mate criteria, and marital choices/options as they pertain to college-educated, African American women within today’s society. A purposive, nationally based sample (N = 95) of never married, college-educated, African American women (i.e., 18 to 40 years of age) was gathered via an online survey accessed by an emailed link. A mixed methods approach was utilized within the survey design, followed by data analyses (i.e., frequencies, two-way analyses) interpreted through a theoretical framework of social exchange. Areas discussed include life goals of marriage, cohabitation, and career; romantic barriers; the perceived availability of …

The Multiple Meanings Of San Diego's Little Italy: A Study Of The Impact Of Real And Symbolic Space And Boundaries On The Ethnic Identities Of Eight Italian Americans, Thomas Joseph Cesarini

Dissertations

The literature suggests that identifying with a particular place can promote a sense of ethnic identity. This study focused on eight Italian American community members’ perceptions of San Diego’s Little Italy as both a container and creator of ethnic identity. The study addressed a) how the participants define and convey their Italian American ethnic identity and b) how the participants perceive the role of San Diego’s Little Italy pre-redevelopment and post-redevelopment in creating and shaping their sense of being Italian American.

The study employed a case-study design. Ethnohistoric accounts of life experiences were gathered from participants selected through convenience and …