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Book Review: Michel Danino. The Lost River: On The Trail Of The Sarasvati, Joseph Drew

Comparative Civilizations Review

When early civilizations were listed back at the beginning of the modern discipline that constitutes the comparative study of civilizations, one of the greatest of them all was yet essentially unknown. It was only about a century ago that information was brought forward on the possible existence of this most interesting, extensive, and influential Bronze Age civilization, the Indus River Valley Civilization.

Futures Under Threat: Education Policy And Barriers To Access For Syrian Refugees In Jordan And Lebanon, Ann Monk

Global Islamic Studies Honors Papers

This study provides a nuanced analysis of some of the most pressing barriers to education for Syrian refugees in Lebanon and Jordan, including: curriculum usage, language barriers, certification, accreditation, insufficient infrastructure, a lack of qualified teachers, child labor and early marriage. In addition, the study proposes a multitude of policy responses to reduce the barriers to access for Syrian refugee students. Several of the most important policy proposals include: standardizing curricula, certification and accreditation, developing remedial programs, enhancing teacher training, hiring Syrian teachers, reducing employment restrictions for Syrians, establishing family outreach initiatives and investing in transportation for students. Furthermore, case …

Ziba, Ziba, Sherianne Schow, Brandi Kilmer, Heather Oman

TSOS Interview Gallery

Ziba, a promising medical student, fled Afghanistan in 2018 due to instability and for her safety. Life was difficult upon arrival in the United States. In Afghanistan Ziba was involved in national and international poetry, math and science competitions. Ziba went from having everything to starting completely over in a new country. Her anxiety and depression became extremely difficult to deal with She reminded herself who she was, what her passions were and in January 2019 started medical school while working part time as a cashier. Her hope for future arriving refugees is to have a mental health network established …

Assimilating The Dominican Tourist: What Maps Tell Tourists In Puerto Plata About The Processes Of Capitalism And Imperialism, Amy Duncan

Undergraduate Honors Theses

The tourism industry in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic is dominated by foreign enterprise. Given the history of colonization in the Dominican Republic, the social dynamics in the tourism industry are imperialist by nature. This thesis seeks to understand how tourist maps are used to assimilate tourists into the social dynamics of Puerto Plata. To do this, it unravels existing literature on tourism in the Caribbean, the nature of the tourism industry in the Dominican Republic as well as its foreign benefactors, and foundational works on the sociological aspects of tourism.

The findings of this paper are that tourist maps seek …

Remote Sensing Applications In Population Estimation, Regression Analysis, And Urban Growth Simulation Modeling For A Middle Eastern City, Elaf Amer Alyasiri

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Due to a change in government regime and population migration, the City of Hillah in Iraq has been facing several urban issues, particularly population estimating and urban growth planning. Since the last census conducted in 1997, population in Iraq has been estimated based on the annual growth, without considering migration as factor of the population growth. Therefore, the aim of this dissertation study was to develop a population estimation method and an urban growth simulation method for the City of Hillah. Population data were estimated for Hillah, using the Normalized Difference Built-up Index (NDBI) derived from Remote Sensing (RS) and …

Hollywood Imagines Revolutionary Haiti: The Forgotten Film Lydia Bailey (1952), Judith E. Smith

American Studies Faculty Publication Series

This essay explores the history of Lydia Bailey, the only US studio-made film to depict the Haitian Revolutionary period. It asks why, in the late 1940s and early 1950s, such an unlikely project might have seemed commercially promising enough to justify a significant production budget. The essay draws on private studio memos as well as public press discussions to shed light on the high stakes in debates over racial representation and colonialism/decolonization in the late 1940s and early 1950s, and to illuminate everyday assumptions of white supremacy as these shaped the making of the film and its promotion. Production files …

Clash Of Interests? Conflicting Perspectives Of The State And Border Communities On Smuggling In Nigeria, Akhigbe Allwell O.

Young African Leaders Journal of Development

Smuggling has been a signature of African borders. The study takes a critical look at the issue of smuggling in the Imeko border community of Nigeria that is situated at the Benin border. It examines the perspectives of the state and the border communities and uses the Onion method of Conflict Analysis to determine the actual needs of both parties and how they could be met. While the government sees it as a crime that robs the state of its much-needed resources, the border communities consider smuggling to be legitimate trade relations with their kinsmen across the border as a …

Building Quality? Migration, Suzhi, And Subaltern Masculinity In The Shanghai Construction Industry, Leif Johnson

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This doctoral dissertation providesa novel perspective on the everyday lives of construction workers in urban China, demonstrating the underpinnings of urban infrastructure and citizenship policy in affective and gendered relations surrounding the construction industry. Drawing on 18 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Shanghai, China, this dissertation makes a series of three related arguments: First, focusing on the role that migrant labor plays in the construction of urban infrastructure in Shanghai, I argue that the physical existence of infrastructure itself is inextricably tied to systems that govern rural-urban migration across China. Second, building from the Chinese concept of suzhi as both …

The Rainbow Nation Vision: (Re)Constructing & (Re)Imagining South Africanness, Riley Crouthamel

Capstone Showcase

“Rainbowism” or the new form of nationalism inspired by Mandela’s “Rainbow Nation vision” emphasizes unity, equality, and non-racialism, and has become the dominant myth and metaphor by which South Africa is recognized in the post-apartheid era. Through an application of a theoretical framework that emphasizes the mythological and imaginative aspects of constructive nationalism and an analysis of Rainbowism’s rise to mythical dominance and evolution in the South African imaginary over the span of the past three decades of democracy using ANC “Rainbowist” discourses in both explicit and inexplicit ways, this thesis argues that Rainbowism arose as a counter myth in …

Law, Growth, And The Identity Hurdle: A Theory Of Legal Reform, Martin W. Sybblis

Faculty Articles

This Article offers a new theoretical approach to understanding resistance to legal change in the corporate and commercial context by introducing the sociological concept of "community economic identity" (CEI) into legal scholarship. I argue that community leaders (typically, but not exclusively, from the political, legal, and business spheres) generate public and recognizable identities-e.g., "Coal Country" or "Motor City"-with respect to some commercial activities. These identities influence how law reform is conceived and deployed within jurisdictional boundaries (i.e., country, state, town, region, etc.). CEI complicates the prevailing public choice narrative regarding the influence of special interests in the law reform process. …

An Application Of Economic Norms Theory To Brazilian Corruption, Nina B. Neto

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This study aims to explore the relationship between clientelistic economies and systemic corruption under the framework of Economic Norms Theory. Pointedly, it examines the evolution of contractual mortgage credit as a percentage of GDP (representing the growth of a non-self-enforcing contract market) compared to both actual and perceived levels of corruption in Brazil in order to assess whether Brazil is exemplary of a transitioning economy under the theory of Economic Norms. The hypothesis of this paper is two-fold. First, I expect that as mortgage credit as a percentage of GDP generally increases, actual corruption will decrease. Secondly, I expect that …

The Feasibility Of Containerization In The Great Lakes St. Lawrence Seaway System, Nick Edwards

Political Science Theses and Capstones

The use of waterways to transport goods has always been a staple of civilization dating back to some of our earliest days. And throughout history it has always played a pivotal role in our economies and affected the very way in which our civilizations developed. Perhaps one of the world's most important waterways is the Great Lakes that lie directly in the heart of the North American continent and connect the heartland of North America to the Atlantic Ocean. Thus, providing a vital mode of transportation for shipping a variety of products from North America’s heartland to the rest of …

Batman Saves The Congo: How Celebrities Disrupt The Politics Of Development, Alexandra Cosima Budabin, Lisa Ann Richey

Books and Book Chapters by University of Dayton Faculty

How celebrity strategic partnerships are disrupting humanitarian space: Can a celebrity be a "disrupter," promoting strategic partnerships to foster ideas and funding to revitalize the development field, or are they just charismatic ambassadors for big business? Examining the role of the rich and famous in development and humanitarianism, this book argues that celebrities do both, and that understanding why and how yields insight into the realities of neoliberal development.

Contents:

• Introduction
• Chapter 1. Celebrity, Disruption and Neoliberal Development
• Chapter 2. Narrating the Congo: Dangerous Single Stories and the Organizations that Need Them
• Chapter 3. Choosing the Congo: How a Celebrity …

The Dutch Atlantic And American Life: Beginnings Of America In Colonial New Netherland, Roy J. Geraci

Theses and Dissertations

The Dutch colony of New Netherland was one of the earliest attempts at a non-indigenous life on the east coast of North America. That colony, along with the United Provinces of the Netherlands and Dutch Atlantic as a whole, played crucial roles in the development of what would become the United States. This thesis project examines the significance New Netherland held in American history as well as explores topics which allow for new and inclusive narratives of that history to reach further exploration. Similarly to how individuals from various cultures, ethnicities, and backgrounds all come to exist amongst one another …

Effects Of States’ Laws On Youth Physical Activity Participation And Obesity Prevalence, Chae Young Chang

Midwest Social Sciences Journal

The alarming prevalence of obesity and lack of physical activity among adolescents led to immediate policy action to address these concerns. Accordingly, many states introduced and enacted their own legislation to encourage physical activity in schools. Few studies have explored the effectiveness of the new legislation, however, especially at the state level. To answer the fundamental question of whether policy is effective and to describe the varying effects of state obesity policies, this study analyzed the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System from 2007 to 2017. Using the difference-in-differences method, this study found that legislative efforts to encourage physical activity had …

Profitable Retail Customer Identification Based On A Combined Prediction Strategy Of Customer Lifetime Value, Yinglu Sun, Dong Cheng, Subir Bandyopadhyay, Wei Xue

Midwest Social Sciences Journal

As a fundamental concept of customer relationship management, customer lifetime value (CLV) serves as a crucial metric to identify profitable retail customers. Various methods are available to predict CLV in different contexts. With the development of consumer big data, modern statistics and machine learning algorithms have been gradually adopted in CLV modeling. We introduce two machine learning algorithms—the gradient boosting decision tree (GBDT) and the random forest (RF)—in retail customer CLV modeling and compare their predictive performance with two classical models—the Pareto/NBD (HB) and the Pareto/GGG. To ensure CLV prediction and customer identification robustness, we combined the predictions of the …

The World System, Regional Systems, And The Limitations Of Historical Urban Population Datasets, Karl E. Ryavec

Comparative Civilizations Review

This study presents a method for mapping and comparing the regional extents of historical city-based economies at the global scale by integrating the World-Systems Theory of Immanuel Wallerstein with the Regional Systems Theory of G. W. Skinner. The approach taken here focuses on mapping urban cores and their rural peripheries based on available disaggregated urban population estimates for 1741 cities according to six main historical periods from ca. 3700 BCE to 1900 CE. As a result, a spatial history of some regional-scale changes wrought by increasing modes of capitalism in the Modern and Industrial periods may be compared with earlier …

Imagining An Asian American Superhero Of North Korean Origin: A Design Fiction, Seo-Young J. Chu

Publications and Research

My talk, a thought-experimental blend of literary criticism and speculative "design fiction," will introduce you to an Asian American superhero of North Korean origin. In this science-fictional superhero, whom I have tentatively named "구름"/"☁️"/"Ku-reum," Korea's elusive realities coalesce into legible form. More specifically, they become available for narrative experience and relatable to us as an anthropomorphic character, a person with whom we might identify, come face-to-face, sympathize, interact dynamically, and have a conversation. Ku-reum is designed to reflect Korea's complex past and hopes for the future. Existing beyond division systems, Ku-reum uses the non-binary pronouns "one"/"they." Neither "South" nor "North," …

Guest Editorial: Disaster, State And Science: Historical Narratives Of Extreme Weather In East Asia And The Pacific, Fiona Williamson

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This curated special issue asks how history can be used as a lens into disaster and disaster management. It takes as its premise the idea that approaches from different disciplines - including the humanities and social sciences – can offer new perspectives on understanding disaster, managing disaster and disaster risk. The concept is not new, historically focussed studies have long provided meat for hazard investigations and modelling, especially those focused on geological or hydrological time-series analyses; multi-hazard interactions and identifying historical underliers for contemporary risk. It has become increasingly common, for example, to include historians in collaborative efforts to better …

Vietnam-India Security Relations: Extrapolating India’S Potential Role In The Maintenance Of Balance Of Power In Aasen, Felix Jonas Jantz

Chulalongkorn University Theses and Dissertations (Chula ETD)

The thesis examines why and how Vietnam-India security relations have deepened significantly in reaction to the shifting geopolitical landscape of the Indo-Pacific. As Vietnam has to date been the ASEAN state that has engaged most deeply with India’s potential to be a regional security partner, the thesis focusses on ascertaining the factors that have led these two countries to develop a deeper security relationship than other states in the region. Following the analysis of the big geopolitical shifts that drive the two partners’ willingness to cooperate more deeply, the progression of bilateral security arrangements is analyzed, both in terms of …

The Great Upheaval: Women And Nation In Postwar Nigeria, Judith A. Byfield

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

This social and intellectual history of women’s political activism in postwar Nigeria reveals the importance of gender to the study of nationalism and poses new questions about Nigeria’s colonial past and independent future.

In the years following World War II, the women of Abeokuta, Nigeria, staged a successful tax revolt that led to the formation first of the Abeokuta Women’s Union and then of Nigeria’s first national women’s organization, the Nigerian Women’s Union, in 1949. These organizations became central to a new political vision, a way for women across Nigeria to define their interests, desires, and needs while fulfilling the …

'Fraught' Chineseness: 'Chinese Christians' In The Vancouver Sun, Justin Kh Tse

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This chapter explores the ways in which Douglas Todd, a journalist for the Vancouver Sun, has covered stories about Chinese churches in Vancouver, BC, for over three decades. It shows how Todd has focused on Chinese Christians as a way to offer a particular perspective on religion and cultural diversity in Vancouver, and as a window into their relationship with the civil society. Ultimately, this chapter highlights the ways in which Todd essentializes “Chineseness” and reinforces a problematic public narrative of homogeneity among Vancouver’s Chinese Christians.

High-Intensity Monsoon Rainfall Variability And Its Attributes: A Case Study For Upper Ganges Catchment In The Indian Himalaya During 1901-2013, Alok Bhardwaj, Robert J. Wasson, Winston T. L. Chow, Alan D. Ziegler

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

High-intensity monsoon rainfall in the Indian Himalaya generates multiple environmental hazards. This study examines the variability in long-term trends (1901–2013) in the intensity and frequency of high-intensity monsoon rainfall events of varying depths (high, very high and extreme) in the Upper Ganges Catchment in the Indian Himalaya. Using trend analysis on the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) rainfall dataset, we find statistically significant positive trends in all categories of monsoon rainfall intensity and frequency over the 113-year period. The majority of the trends for both intensity and frequency are spatially located in the Higher Himalayan region encompassing upstream sections of the …

The ‘Global South’ In The Study Of World Politics: Examining A Meta Category, Sebastian Haug, Jacqueline Braveboy-Wagner, Günther Maihold

Publications and Research

This introductory contribution examines the ‘Global South’ as a meta category in the study of world politics. Against the backdrop of a steep rise in references to the ‘Global South’ across academic publications, we ask whether and how the North–South binary in general, and the ‘(Global) South’ in particular, can be put to use analytically. Building on meta categories as tools for the classification of global space, we discuss the increasing prominence of the ‘Global South’ and then outline different understandings attached to it, notably socio-economic marginality, multilateral alliance-building and resistance against global hegemonic power. Following an overview of individual …

‘Mingren Are The Respectable Ones’: An Analysis Of Everyday Engagements With Contemporary Celebrity Culture In China, Min Xu, Stijn Reijnders, Sangkyun (Sean) Kim

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

To investigate the values and social norms underpinning celebrity culture, it is crucial to study everyday uses of celebrity culture. Yet, studies in this area have been limited thus far, especially in non-Western contexts. This exploratory study focuses on the ways how young and middle-aged adults in everyday life in urban China discuss and value media celebrities. The results show that respondents have a rather similar way of valuing celebrity: celebrities need to have strong work ethics and showcase social responsibility; only then do they ‘earn’ their right to be considered ‘famous’. We conclude that these values are closely related …

Getting Undergraduates Ready For China’S Belt And Road Initiative (Bri) Through An Overseas Experiential Learning Project, China And The World: Ancient And Modern Silk Road, Andrew Chin, Thomas Menkhoff, Hans-Dieter Evers, Hoong Hui Daniel Gn, Kevin Koh, Chester Wey Lee, Patrick Loh, Linda Low, Sebastian Tan, Teng Seng Teo, Natalie Yap

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

In this paper, we explain how an experiential learning course and study tour to Gansu Province (People’s Republic of China) enabled undergraduates at the Singapore Management University (SMU) to acquire 21st-century competencies and higher-order thinking skills by analyzing and evaluating specific aspects of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and China–Singapore (Chongqing) Connectivity Initiative — New International Land–Sea Trade Corridor (CCI-ILSTC) with emphasis on developing viable Go-To-Market (GTM) strategies aimed at selling Gansu produce in four Southeast Asian markets. We share how the course was designed to support the attainment of key learning goals and discuss how we turned pedagogical …

The Rise Of Self-Interests: How Shifting Political Goals Changed The Effectiveness Of Dutch Official Development Aid To Bangladesh From 2005 Until 2016, Thomas L. Oomen

Global: Jurnal Politik Internasional

Aid effectiveness has been situated in the central debate of development studies and, particularly, among foreign aid policy making community. As the Netherlands was one of the unique countries which focused extensively on the needs of its recipient, it is important to investigate the Netherlands’ recent practice of its development aid, particularly to Bangladesh and the associated goal ambiguity. This article attempts to answer the question, “to what extent does goal ambiguity in Dutch development aid affect the effectiveness of Dutch development aid given to Bangladesh?” This analysis is based on independent assessments of Dutch official development aid (ODA) to …

Catalan Identity And Paradiplomacy Strategy In Catalonia’S Independence Movement, Windy Dermawan, Akim Akim

Global: Jurnal Politik Internasional

This article seeks to analyse how Catalan identity, within the context of its conflict with the Spanish government, contributes to its foreign relations with the global public through paradiplomacy. This article uses qualitative research method with literature study. It finds that Catalonia, as one of Spain’s autonomous regions, have a distinct history, language, and culture from other Spanish regions. To protect their identity, there have been an emergence of movement for greater Catalan autonomy, even independence. This conflict reached climax on 1 October 2017 when the Catalan government initiated an independence referendum amongst Catalan people, with the majority voted for …

Five Poems By Michael Krüger, Louise Stoehr

Transference

No abstract provided.

The Evolutionary Global Vision Of Chinese Political Philosophy; China's Socio-Economic Transformation In The 21st Century, Meryem Gurel

Master's Projects and Capstones

Evolving relations of East Asia due to trade liberalization raised the search for financial stability for institutional development. It also increased the importance of China integrating the global economy into renewing its political philosophy in the new century. This capstone project aims to examine why China has transformed its socio-economic structure by generating outward investments and how it has affected international political relations in terms of the role of the economic institution Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Quantitative methodology aims to examine the impact of China’s export trade on income distribution and economic growth through linear regression analysis for the …