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Which Came First, People Or Pollution? A Review Of Theory And Evidence From Longitudinal Environmental Justice Studies, Paul Mohai, Robin Saha

Environmental Studies Faculty Publications

A considerable number of quantitative analyses have been conducted in the past several decades that demonstrate the existence of racial and socioeconomic disparities in the distribution of a wide variety of environmental hazards. The vast majority of these have been cross-sectional, snapshot studies employing data on hazardous facilities and population characteristics at only one point in time. Although some limited hypotheses can be tested with cross-sectional data, fully understanding how present-day disparities come about requires longitudinal analyses that examine the demographic characteristics of sites at the time of facility siting and track demographic changes after siting. Relatively few such studies …

Assessing The Rural-Urban Divide In A Red State, Joe Blankenau, Chuck Parker

Online Journal of Rural Research & Policy

This paper explores the rural-urban divide, as it exists within Nebraska, which is a state that is largely homogenous, primarily red, with a historically sizable rural population that is in decline in most counties.1 Using survey data of attitudes towards political and economic issues, and self-identified political ideology, two key questions are considered. Has there been change in the rural-urban divide in Nebraska as rural areas lose population? Second, does the rural-urban divide persist when controlling for party identification, age, and income in multivariate analyses? Bivariate results show that the rural-urban divide continues to be an important factor on several …

Postcolonialism And The Marshallese Diaspora: Structural Violence And Health In The Marshallese Community In Springdale, Arkansas, Alexander J. Hirata

Master's Theses

Despite moving to the United States for better healthcare, among other benefits, Marshallese Compact of Free Association (COFA) migrants residing in Springdale, Arkansas continue to face similar acute health problems as Marshallese living in the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), and often without access to health services. These problems include high rates of noncommunicable diseases, such as type 2 diabetes and thyroid cancer, as well as rare conditions such as Hansen’s Disease.

To research this, I studied the limited texts surrounding the Marshallese diaspora, as well as relevant bodies of literature: postcolonialism, Pacific migration theory, and global health and …

Environmental Gentrification And Development In A Rural Appalachian Community: Blending Critical Theory And Ethnography, Rhiannon A. Leebrick

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this dissertation is twofold: first, to explore the relevance of environmental gentrification, a concept largely applied to urban settings, as a means to understand social change in rural and small town Appalachia; and secondly, drawing upon political economy perspectives within environmental sociology and the tradition of early Frankfurt School critical theory, to contextualize the process of environmental gentrification within global capitalism. Conflicts over green economic development, including the maintenance of idyllic vistas, appear to have arisen among various groups with opposing interests and perceptions. These conflicts are complex, affected by the rise of gentrification accompanying uneven development …

A Phenomenological Study Of Anticipated Intimacy And Sexual Expression Needs Of Aging Male And Female Baby Boomers., Charles Shawn Oak

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to understand the phenomenon of how heterosexual Baby Boomers define and understand intimacy, sexual expression, along expectations and desires relating to their respective expressions across the lifespan through their individual experiences and reflections. A set of guiding questions were used in a hermeneutic phenomenological qualitative research design. Data was gathered from thirteen subjects (n=13) using the Rappaport Time Line (RTL) that was used to develop individualized semi-structured interviews and follow-up interviews that were professionally transcribed. These were coded to identify emergent themes. Results of the study provided insight into the phenomenon of how heterosexual …

Panic At The Drive-In: Affordance, Moral Panic, And Drive-In Theatres, Maria Chatzifilalithis

The Partisan

No abstract provided.

Art Education In My Backyard: Creative Placemaking On An Urban Farm, Jodi Kushins

Artizein: Arts and Teaching Journal

An art educator describes how she used her knowledge and experience of artistic and educational initiatives that forefront collective activity in real world settings to transform her backyard into an urban farm with the help of friends and neighbors. She combines an autoethnographic account of her experiences, including original photographs, with research on conceptual artists, participatory culture, and creative placemaking to position her work as participatory environmental art education. The paper is organized around the major steps one undertakes in planting a garden – siting, amending, seeding, tending, and harvesting - to draw parallels between the processes of maintaining a …

Living With Students: Lessons Learned While Pursuing Tenure, Administration, And Raising A Family, Michael Humphrey, Janet Callahan, Geoff Harrison

Early and Special Education Faculty Publications and Presentations

This case study is centered on two faculty-in-residence: one pursuing tenure and raising a young child while living in the residence halls and one an established professor and associate dean raising two teens while living in the residence halls. This case study offers two unique perspectives of faculty-in-residence at various stages in their career, living in residence with their students, working closely with students outside a typical classroom, all while managing professional and familial obligations.

Rural Civic Action Project Poster, Heartland Center For Leadership Development

Heartland Center for Leadership Development Materials

The final project for the Rural Civic Action Project is to create a poster that includes the Community Capital Mapping activity (CCMA; Keith & Kinsey, 2013). The Community Capital Maps provide an opportunity to evaluate the impact of the projects from the participants’ perspective. Fellows should include 2 maps on their poster: the map that was created through facilitating the CCMA, the map created by the fellows evaluating the impact of their service project (the work the fellows are doing in the schools). Also included on the poster is a narrative describing the maps.

The Effectiveness Of Political Quotas In Representing Rwandan Citizens, Sarah Duncan

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Political quotas are controversial solutions for addressing the representative problems that arise within democratic institutions. The fundamental reasoning behind a state adopting the usage of political quotas is to promote political empowerment for its citizens. The Constitution of Rwanda ensures that numerically different identity groups have political representation vis-à-vis political quotas. Does this written decree of democratic progress on the macro level extend to effectively elevate the social and political status of individuals within the micro level? The simplified question: are political quotas viable solutions for protecting political representation amongst different sects of a state’s population within democratic institutions? Results …

I’M Not A Fishermen, I Don’T Sell Fish, I’M Not Even A Fish: The Microeconomy Of Fish Within The Formal And Informal Markets Of Mwanza, Austin Brush

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

The purpose of this study was to examine the microeconomy of fish in the city of Mwanza in the context of the formal and informal market place and how it operates on a daily, monthly, and annual basis. In particular, I examined the different roles of fishermen, formal vendors, and informal vendors within the harvest, movement, and sale of fish and their perspectives on their own contributions and those of others at each stage. Between November 7th and November 26th, data was collected through 102 nonrandom, opportunistic interviews with my sample population of fishermen, formal vendors, informal vendors and professors …

Recursos Y Servicios Disponibles Para Personas Afectadas Por El Uso De Agroquímicos Tóxicos En Avia Terai, Chaco, Argentina / Resources And Services That Are Available To People Who Are Affected By The Use Of Toxic Agrochemicals In Avia Terai, Chaco, Argentina, David Andersen

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Introducción: El Chaco es una provincia del norte de Argentina con los peores indicadores de salud y de menor ingreso. El estudio se desarrolló en Avia Terai, un pueblo que tiene cinco mil habitantes, está rodeado por cultivos que son fumigados con agroquímicos tóxicos y que tiene niveles muy altos de cáncer y de discapacidad. Muchas personas en Avia Terai trabajan con agroquímicos y viven cerca de los campos fumigados. La mayoría de las personas en el pueblo no tienen seguros de salud y usan el sector público. En el pueblo hay un Centro Integrador Comunitario (CIC), un hospital, dos …

Working With Locals To Restore Biodiversity To A Rubber Dominated Landscape, Francis Commercon

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Xishuangbanna, in Yunnan,China, contains the country’s highest concentration of biodiversity. Since the 1980s,rubber plantations have replaced a significant portion of the prefecture’s lowland Seasonal Tropical Rainforest, leading to wildlife habitat loss and other environmental issues.Monoculture farming practices also leave farmers economically vulnerable to market fluctuations. To learn the best solutions for increasing ecosystem services and income stability in rubber-dominated areas, the World Agroforestry Center (ICRAF) project Green Rubber engages smallholders directly in establishing and maintaining scientifically rigorous intercropping experiments in their villages.

Using Man’e village and the Green Rubber project as a case study, I asked to what degree and …

Not All Those That Are Buried Are Dead: An Analysis Of Memorialization At The Prestwich Memorial, Anna Sumner Noonan

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Memorialization is an ongoing process in South Africa as narratives are attempting to be reclaimed and transformation continues to be an approach of ‘new’ nation building. This paper attempts to understand how and why the most common form of memorialization of slavery and colonialism in the postapartheid moment is that of the physical monument, memorial and museum as well as the repercussions of such a space. Through the lens of the Prestwich Memorial I examined themes of memory, erasure, historical production and landscape as artifact. I problematized the notion of primary data because all data is skewed by personal bias, …

How We Saved Ourselves: A Look At The Positive Coping Strategies The Orphans Of The 1994 Genocide Against Tutsis Implemented During Bereavement, Gregory Barber

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Recent estimates report that there are approximately 145 million children worldwide who have lost at least one parent as a result of various causes (Development, 2008). Parental death is one of the most traumatic events that can occur in childhood (Haine, 2006). Literature has also indicated that parental death places children at risk for many negative outcomes, including mental health problems, grief, lower academic success, self-esteem, and greater external locus of control (Lutzke, 1997). Between April and July 1994, 800,000 to 1,000,000 Rwandans died in the 1994 genocide against Tutsis. Because of the 1994 genocide against Tutsis, nearly 75,000 children …

Fair Trade Or Fake Trade? Specialty Coffee Certifications And Development In Uganda, Eliza Cummings

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This project examined the relationship between specialty coffee certifications and development. The focus was exploring the local and national implications Fairtrade coffee certifications have in Uganda. Coffee is a critical commodity, accounting for 15 percent of Uganda’s foreign exchange and engaging over one million households in production. Currently, specialty certified coffees including Fairtrade, Rainforest Alliance, and 4C make up only four percent of total production. However, under Uganda’s 2013 National Coffee Policy, there is a target to expand specialty production to 24 percent. It is therefore imperative to understand how these specialty certifications affect primary producers participating as well as …

The Price On Our Practices: Motivation And Cultural Commodification In The Mongolian Tourism Industry, Joseph Recupero

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Mongolia, a country as rich in culture as it is in natural resources, is beginning the process of diversifying its economy beyond the mining sector. This process is opening the door to new industries such as tourism, and more specifically, culture-based tourism. The development of such an industry often leads to a phenomenon known as cultural commodification, by which local communities and peoples alter and sell cultural practices and experiences to tourists in return for a profit. Economically, the marketing of cultural practices is beneficial to local communities within Mongolia, but this conclusion is often drawn without considering other implications …

Audience Vs. Art: The Plight Of The Contemporary Bengali Filmmaker, Gabriel Doss

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This document is a 2015 survey of contemporary Bengali Cinema, which is primarily composed of (1) a brief history of the industry from its origins to the present day and (2) a survey of the careers of six prominent, active Bengali directors: Goutam Ghose, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Aparna Sen, Sekhar Das, Srijit Murkerji, and Kamaleshwar Mukerjee. The guiding question for the research was "How does a Bengali director express him/herself honestly within the economic restrictions serving the Bengali audience?" Research was conducting by watching 71 films, conducting 11 interviews, including 7 interviews with directors, including each director mentioned above. The conclusion …

Assessing The Sustainability Of Selective Logging In Ankarabolava-Agnakatrika New Protected Area, Eileen Nakahata

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Over the past 50 years, more than 90% of dense low-altitude humid forest in the District of Vangaindrano has been lost to deforestation and the remaining fragments continue to be threatened by slash and burn agriculture and selective cutting by local populations. These activities are driven by widespread poverty, population growth, and lack of development, which have made subsistence increasingly difficult. This study investigates logging rates and the stock of five commercially valuable trees in the Ankarabolava-Agnakatrika New Protected Area. Fifteen 1000m² transects were established systematically within the territory of the Matanga commune. Within each transect data was collected …

Perceptions Of Safety Among Adolescents In Jordanian Host Communities: A Pilot Study Conducted In Housing Communities In Baqa’A And Ramtha, Katie Stevenson

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

The purpose of this research was to understand how refugee and Jordanian adolescents perceive safety by answering the following three questions: 1) How do adolescents in host communities define safety? 2) How do they perceive the safety of their community? 3) What is being done, within their communities, to address the safety needs of adolescents? By answering these questions, this research aimed to increase the understanding of how safety should be defined, assessed, and addressed in regards to adolescents living in Jordanian host communities. Due to resources limitations, this research was only conducted with Syrian adolescents refugees. Four interviews were …

Conservation For Whom?: The Struggle For Indigenous Rights In Sagarmatha National Park, Jake Sivinski

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Since its creation in 1976 Sagarmatha National Park has been the subject of a great deal of internal scrutiny by the regions indigenous Sherpa Inhabitants. Since their arrival in the Khumbu valley some four centuries ago, the Sherpa people have held a deep respect for their land and have practiced a highly organized and effective form of environmental stewardship which they refer to as Yul-Tim. At its core Yul-Tim relies on the authority of certain village members to make and enforce rules within the community: a practice that has been greatly undermined by creation of SNP. While SNP has had …

Ngos, Community Associations, And Corporations In Partnership: Crosssectoral Collaboration In Serviluz, Fortalezace, Leila Reynolds

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This study will explore the relationships between corporate funding partners, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and the communities they work in (through the lense of community associations). Specifically I will examine the relationship between the NGO Instituto Povo do Mar (IPOM), the Associação dos Moradores do Serviluz (AMS), and the state controlled oil corporation PetroBras. PetroBras operates a refinery known as the Refinaria Lubrificantes e Derivados do Nordeste ( Lubnor ) within the neighborhood Serviluz, in Fortaleza, Ceara, and has become involved financially and socially in the neighborhoods surrounding the Lubnor . In this particular neighborhood, these three sectors work closely together …

La Casa Patria Grande “Presidente Néstor Carlos Kirchner”: El Sueño De La Unidad Latinoamericana / The Casa Patria Grande “Presidente Néstor Carlos Kirchner”: The Dream Of Latin American Unity, Ana Dougherty

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Resumen Como sede del proyecto de la “Patria Grande”, la Casa Patria Grande “Presidente Néstor Carlos Kirchner” en Buenos Aires teóricamente tiene un rol muy importante en la formación y consolidación de una identidad latinoamericana y del proyecto político que busca la cooperación y integración de los países latinoamericanos. Dentro del contexto de fragmentación de proyectos políticos en América Latina en cuanto a la integración regional y la inserción en el mundo, la construcción de una identidad latinoamericana se vuelve algo muy difícil de lograr, y aún no deseable para ciertos países y ciertos partidos políticos. Dada esta situación, la …

Casa De Los Ningunos: Un Estudio De Caso Sobre La Re-Imaginando De “Sumak Qamaña” En Un Contexto Urbano Y Contemporáneo, Vanessa Voller

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Una simple búsqueda en Google de "crisis globales del siglo XXI" dará una larga lista de crisis políticas, sociales, económicas y ambientales que enfrenta el siglo XXI. Teniendo en cuenta estas crisis, se ha hecho evidente que la gente del siglo XXI tendrá que encontrar formas alternativas de vivir, que pondrá a prueba el paradigma occidental dominante de la sociedad; un paradigma plagado por el consumismo, el individualismo, la destrucción del medio ambiente, la mentalidad extractivista y las fuerzas homogeneizadoras de la globalización (Choquehuanca 2010; Huanacuni Mamani-2010). En todo el mundo muchos diversos proyectos e iniciativas están surgiendo para desafiar …

Exploring Community Health Through The Lens Of The Community Unit In Kariobangi North And The Surrounding Areas, Maya Paris-Saper

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Healthcare is a challenge in countries of the Global South. Not only do climates and trends of rapid urbanization affect the health status of many negatively, but also many health facilities are inaccessible and not of good quality, they lack enough medical personnel and lack the resources to adequately provide for patients who do not have the resources them selves. As the wealth gap increases all over the world and resources continue to be distributed unequally communicable and non-communicable health issues plague those in urban and rural settings at an alarmingly high rate and as health innovation has worked to …

Perceptions Of Social Control In Disadvantaged Neighborhoods And Adolescent Drug And Alcohol Use: Are They Related?, Kanita Shiquia Sumner

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

Using data collected from the Evaluation of the Children at Risk Program (CAR) in Austin, Texas, Bridgeport, Tennessee, Savannah, Georgia, and Seattle, Washington (Harrell et al 1999), this study focused on problem behaviors in disadvantaged neighborhoods , specifically, drug and alcohol use, among at-risk youth. The purpose of this study was to determine if parochial and public levels of social controls in disadvantaged neighborhoods decrease the likelihood of adolescents using drug and alcohol. It was found that the parochial level of social control in disadvantaged neighborhoods was highly correlated with adolescent's alcohol and drug use; however, the public level was …

Reconciling Lgb And Christian Identities In The Rural South, Brandi Woodell, Emily Kazyak, D'Lane Compton

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Drawing on in-depth interviews with rural Christians living in the South who identify as lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB), this study analyzes how they negotiate their religious, geographic, and sexual identities. We find that most interviewees employed two strategies to reconcile their Christian and gay identities: emphasizing a personal connection to an accepting God and finding a local church in their rural community in which they felt accepted. We argue that rural contexts influenced interviewees’ reliance on these strategies and show how individuals can construct multiple interpretations about themselves, which do not always align with existing cultural assumptions. In addition, …

Duration Of U.S. Stay And Body Mass Index Among Latino And Asian Immigrants: A Test Of Theoretical Pathways, Annie Ro, Georgiana Bostean

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

Studies find that longer-term immigrants have higher body mass index (BMI) than their more recently-arrived counterparts. Most interpretations of these health patterns by duration of U.S. residence rely on theories of immigrant integration; they posit that with increasing time in the United States, immigrants incorporate economically, socially, and culturally into aspects of U.S. society, and that these changes impact health. Few studies empirically examine whether these aspects of integration are indeed mediators of the association between duration of U.S. stay and BMI, and if their patterns differ across immigrant subgroups. This study examines data from the National Latino and Asian …

Heirloom: A Piper's Orchard Abecadarian, Shin Yu Pai

The Goose

Poetry by Shin Yu Pai

Through A Wheat Field; To A Pond, Ian Mikyska

The Goose

Poetry by Ian Mikyska