Digital Commons Network^™

Culture Clash: Teaching Cultural Defenses In The Criminal Law Classroom, Susan S. Kuo

Faculty Publications

In the law school classroom, the Socratic method of legal analysis removes a dispute at issue in a given case from its sociocultural context and takes the cultural backgrounds of the parties into account only when they serve the legal argument. The language of the law commands law students to siphon off the emotional and cultural content because of the enduring belief that the law is neutral and impartial. Accordingly, cultural conflicts are deemed irrelevant to legal analysis because laws are unbiased and culture-blind. This detached outlook has been termed perpectivelessness to denote a neutral, odorless, colorless non-perspective.

This essay …

Explicating Culture And Its Influence On Magazine Advertisements, Pamela Morris

School of Communication: Faculty Publications and Other Works

The research contributes knowledge about cultures and culture’s influence on advertisements. The study takes a macro-level perspective while identifying cultural differences that are linked to gender portrayal variations in advertisements. A model is built using 74 country economic and social statistics to arrive at cultural dimensions that are analyzed with a content analysis of magazine advertisements from 108 countries. Findings show stereotypical gender portrayals in advertisements throughout the world.

Personhood And Freedom In Religio-Scientific Realism, Hisakazu Inagaki

Pro Rege

This article was originally published in English (with a Japanese abstract) in Christ and the World (annual monograph of Tokyo Christian University), vol. 12 (2002), pp. 55-76 and is an extended article originally presented at the conference “Cultures and Christianity A.D. 2000” in Hoeven, the Netherlands. The current version was edited after a presentation by Dr. Inagaki at Dordt College for publication in Pro Rege. When asked recently by Dordt Professor Roger Henderson of his own stand on Emergence theory, Dr. Inagaki replied that “only God is the cause of the emergence of the world and human being, and there …

“It’S The Law.”: Social Norms And The Rule Of Law, Amir N. Licht

ExpressO

This Article posits that treating social norms as isolated regularities, as is commonly done in the legal literature, misses the big picture of social norms. Analyses of the relations between social norms and the law consequently run the risk of becoming “just so stories.” Economic analyses of other-regarding behavior may go beyond the narrow view of self-interestedness yet they remain confined to the individual level of analysis. To account for the societal-level mechanisms underlying social norms, this Article outlines a model in which norms form interdependent systems. Societal emphases on cultural values define the backbone of an evolving body of …

Can I Call Kimura Crazy?: Ethical Tensions In The Cultural Defense, Rashmi Goel

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Using the tragic case of Fumiko Kimura as a back drop, the author discusses the impact of culture on defendants and argues for a client-centered approach that considers the client beyond the walls of their legal issue. The author concludes her article with a discussion of legal ethics, advocating for a more well rounded vision of the client that includes both legal and cultural interests.

Cultural Long-Term Orientation And Facework Strategies, Rebecca S. Merkin

Publications and Research

This study added to extant research by investigating the relationship between cultural long term orientation (LTO) or Confucian Dynamism and harmony and cooperation facework strategies. Studying intercultural communication is particularly vital at this time given the increasing global nature of today’s communication interactions.

Respondents from two cultures -- Hong Kong and the United States --completed questionnaires. Multivariate analysis of variance results showed that LTO culture members were more likely to use harmonious and cooperative facework strategies than their short-term orientated counterparts. An inadvertent finding from this study was that Hong Kong, originally thought to be high on the LTO dimension, …

National Self-Determination And Ethnic Minorities, Olli Lagerspetz

Michigan Journal of International Law

The paper will include three parts. In the first part, the relation between nationality and popular sovereignty is explored. In the second part, there is a somewhat analogous discussion of the concept of ethnicity. In the last part, the conclusions are applied in a discussion of ethnic nationalism.

Speech And Strife, Robert L. Tsai

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

The essay strives for a better understanding of the myths, symbols, categories of power, and images deployed by the Supreme Court to signal how we ought to think about its authority. Taking examples from free speech jurisprudence, the essay proceeds in three steps. First, Tsai argues that the First Amendment constitutes a deep source of cultural authority for the Court. As a result, linguistic and doctrinal innovation in the free speech area have been at least as bold and imaginative as that in areas like the Commerce Clause. Second, in turning to cognitive theory, he distinguishes between formal legal argumentation …

Identity Lost: The Affects Of Trauma And Culture On Cambodian Refugees, John M. Targowski

Honors Capstones

This project analyzes the affects of trauma and culture change on Cambodian refugees. The horrors Cambodians experienced at the hands of Pol Pot had a dramatic impact on the 150,000 refugees who immigrated to America in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Extreme culture shock added to the difficulty these refugees had in adapting to life in America. Traditional Cambodian culture is discussed, highlighting how Cambodians practiced religion, education, and gender roles before the war and how life afterward has changed them. Due to the vast differences between American and Cambodian beliefs and the delicate nature of the refugee state …

Mb 730 The Change Agent, Darrell L. Whiteman

Syllabi

Diffusion of Innovations, 5th ed. – Everett M. Rogers (2003) Applied Anthropology Rev. ed. – John Van Willigen (1993) Bridging the Gap – Bruce Bradshaw (1993) The Church in Response to Human Need, edited by Vinay Samuel & Chris Sugden (1987) [Photocopy available in the bookstore] The Good News of the Kingdom Coming, Andrew Kirk (1983) [Photocopy available in the bookstore]

Fire, Metaphor, And Constitutional Myth-Making, Robert Tsai

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

From the standpoint of traditional legal thought, metaphor is at best a dash of poetry adorning lawyerly analysis, and at worst an unjustifiable distraction from what is actually at stake in a legal contest. By contrast, in the eyes of those who view law as a close relative of ordinary language, metaphor is a basic building block of human understanding. This article accepts that metaphor helps us to comprehend a court's decision. At the same time, it argues that metaphor plays a special role in the realm of constitutional discourse. Metaphor in constitutional law not only reinforces doctrinal categories, but …

A Case Study Of Culture And Change In A Small Architecture Firm, Valerie L Bugni

UNLV Retrospective Theses & Dissertations

Founded in 1982, Elphant1 is a 25-person architecture and interior design firm located in one of America's most "postmodern" cities (Venturi, Brown and Izenour 1977; Fontana and Preston 1990; Gottschalk 1995; Dickens 1999). In order to design better buildings that respond to as well as support people, organizations, and society, Elphant is engaged in an organizational change effort to incorporate sociological theories and methods into their design processes and operational activities; According to organization culture theorist Joanne Martin (2002), few researchers have integrated what is known about organizational change with cultural change. Applying Martin's (2002) three-perspective approach and Schein's (1992) …

Fire, Metaphor, And Constitutional Myth-Making, Robert L. Tsai

Faculty Scholarship

From the standpoint of traditional legal thought, metaphor is at best a dash of poetry adorning lawyerly analysis, and at worst an unjustifiable distraction from what is actually at stake in a legal contest. By contrast, in the eyes of those who view law as a close relative of ordinary language, metaphor is a basic building block of human understanding. This article accepts that metaphor helps us to comprehend a court's decision. At the same time, it argues that metaphor plays a special role in the realm of constitutional discourse. Metaphor in constitutional law not only reinforces doctrinal categories, but …

Speech And Strife, Robert L. Tsai

Faculty Scholarship

The essay strives for a better understanding of the myths, symbols, categories of power, and images deployed by the Supreme Court to signal how we ought to think about its authority. Taking examples from free speech jurisprudence, the essay proceeds in three steps. First, I argue that the First Amendment constitutes a deep source of cultural authority for the Court. As a result, linguistic and doctrinal innovation in the free speech area have been at least as bold and imaginative as that in areas like the Commerce Clause. Second, in turning to cognitive theory, I distinguish between formal legal argumentation …

Discovering A Contextualized Model For Training Japanese Cross-Cultural Ministry, Stephen Wesley Dupree

ATS Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Biblical Interpretation And The Shaping Of Religious Worlds: A Study Of Bible Study For Critical Contextualization, Mark J. Hatcher

ATS Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Musical Play Across Ethnic Boundaries In Western Jamaica, Ronald Eric Dickerson

LSU Master's Theses

An ethnography of music, ritual, and festival in western Jamaica, this thesis reports on fieldwork performed in St. Elizabeth and St. James Parishes between June 2002 and January 2003. Featured field sites include rural dancehall events, Kumina performances, Accompong Town's Maroon Heritage Festival, and a Rastafarian music and nutrition festival called "The Supper of Rastafari." Building an account of these and other sites of cultural performance, this study focuses on social connections between groups of participants, traced through poetic, historical, and personal relationships among performers, especially across boundaries of ethnic, stylistic, or religious difference within Jamaica's national cultural identity.

From Biology To Consciousness To Morality, Ursula Goodenough, Terrence W. Deacon

Biology Faculty Research

Social animals are provisioned with prosocial orientations that operate to transcend self-interest. Morality, as used here, describes human versions of such orientations. We explore the evolutionary antecedents of morality in the context of emergentism, giving considerable attention to the biological traits that undergird awareness and our emergent human forms of mind. We suggest that our moral frames of mind emerge from our primate prosocial capacities, transfigured and valenced by our symbolic languages, cultures, and religions.

Portions of this article were given by Deacon in a paper at the forty-ninth annual conference of IRAS, “Is Nature Enough? The Thirst for …

Family: Variations And Changes Across Cultures, James Georgas

Online Readings in Psychology and Culture

In order to study psychological phenomena cross-culturally, it is necessary to understand the different types of family in cultures throughout the world and also how family types are related to cultural features of societies. This article discusses: The definitions and the structure and functions of family; the different family types and relationships with kin; the ecocultural determinants of variations of family types, e.g, ecological features, means of subsistence, political and legal system, education and religion; changes in family in different cultures; the influence of modernization and globalization on family change throughout the world.

The New Imperialism: Violence, Norms, And The "Rule Of Law", Rosa Ehrenreich Brooks

Michigan Law Review

The past decade has seen a surge in American and international efforts to promote "the rule of law" around the globe, especially in postcrisis and transitional societies. The World Bank and multinational corporations want the rule of law, since the sanctity of private property and the enforcement of contracts are critical to modern conceptions of the free market. Human-rights advocates want the rule of law since due process and judicial checks on executive power are regarded as essential prerequisites to the protection of substantive human rights. In the wake of September 11, international and national-security experts also want to promote …

The Evangelical Movement In Ecuador, Steve Grosz

Honors Capstones

Capstone submitted as a graduation requirement for the BSU Honors Program.

Their Own Best Resources: Students And Real-World Interaction, Observation, And Reflection, Brenda Ferreira

MA TESOL Collection

Students can use their experiences outside the ESL classroom to facilitate their own learning of culture and communicative competency. In a course I continue to design, students prepare for real-world interactions and learning. They practice communication strategies and discuss topics largely of their own choosing in a multi-cultural context. They then go out into the community to make cultural and communicative observations, and interact with native- and non-native speakers of English. This IPP presents various definitions of culture and communicative competency and gives suggestions for in-class and real-world activities, including communication tasks, observations, and reflections through journal writing.

From Cousin Joe To The Comoros: Orthography And The Politics Of Choice In Africa And African America, Harriet Joseph Ottenheimer

Ethnic Studies Review

This paper explores issues of orthographic representation in two different projects, in two different locations, and draws some general conclusions about the role of an outsider linguistic anthropologist in working with individuals and their data. One project involved helping Cousin Joe, a blues singer from New Orleans, to edit his autobiography for publication. The other project involved developing a bilingual, bidirectional, Shinzwani-English dictionary for the Comoro Islands. Each project required an awareness of-and sensitivity to-the cultural and political implications of orthographic decisions.

Bringing Cultural Practice Into Law: Ritual And Social Norms Jurisprudence, Andrew J. Cappel

Santa Clara Law Review

No abstract provided.

Biology, Culture, And Environment: The Struggle For Hegemony In Arizona, Sondra Kae Cosgrove

UNLV Retrospective Theses & Dissertations

This is an examination of the various cultural groups who have attempted to extend hegemony control over what is now the state of Arizona. Each chapter focuses on the ways different societies adapted to the region's challenging environment; paying particular attention to those that sought to integrate their neighbors into their own socioeconomic systems, whether by force or through negotiation. The rise and fall of the indigenous Hohokam civilization marks the first phase in this struggle for hegemony, while conflicts between Spaniards and Indians characterize the second. The third, and so far, final cycle concludes with Euro-Americans seizing the region …

Legal Orientalism, Teemu Ruskola

Michigan Law Review

Fifty years ago comparative law was a field in search of a paradigm. In the inaugural issue of the American Journal of Comparative Law in 1952, Myres McDougal remarked unhappily, "The greatest confusion continues to prevail about what is being compared, about the purposes of comparison, and about appropriate techniques." In short, there seemed to be very little in the field that was not in a state of confusion. Two decades later, referring to McDougal's bleak assessment, John Merryman saw no evidence of progress: "few comparative lawyers would suggest that matters have since improved." And only a few years ago, …

New Light On The Cultures Of South Carolina's Distant Past - 2002, South Carolina Institute Of Archaeology And Anthropology--University Of South Carolina

Archaeology Month Posters

This poster was released in conjunction with South Carolina Archaeology Month, September 12-October 12, 2002.

The Law And Culture-Shift: Race And The Warren Court Legacy, John O. Calmore

Washington and Lee Law Review

No abstract provided.

Culture, Psychology, And Education, David Matsumoto

Online Readings in Psychology and Culture

In my view, the study of culture provides three main contributions to our understanding of human behavior and mental processes. First there is great knowledge to impart about cultural similarities and differences in behavior, and these form the basis for improving psychological theories. Second the study of culture is a prime example of critical thinking in the field, as cross-cultural research begs the question about whether our notions of truth and psychological principles are applicable to people beyond those whom were studied. Third research on intercultural adjustment provides us with clues about possible psychological constructs that may be universally necessary …

Asante Indigenous Goldsmithing:The Impact Of Contemporary Culture On Akan Jewelry, Dana Wilson

African Diaspora ISPs

World famous for their gold ornaments, I chose to examine the evolution of Akan jewelry production in "Asante Indigenous Goldsmithing: The Impact of Contemporary Culture on Akan Jewelry". It was through an apprenticeship with local indigenous goldsmith and several interviews that I was able to gain insight into not only the techniques and tools used, but the discrepancies that devide those who work in the traditional manner from goldsmiths who incorporate more contemporary machinery. After three weeks of field research in Kumase, I realized it is a very ambigous line that separates the two.Further literary research encouraged me to write …