Digital Commons Network^™

Enculturation Pedagogy, Robert Lane Rockett

Master of Arts in Professional Writing Capstones

As instructors, it is very clear to us that our students all come from different backgrounds, different places, and different social environments. Some students are returning to college as they change vocations, while others are entering a brand new environment quite different from those they may have encountered in previous scholastic endeavors, whether they come from another country or even a somewhat different part of the United States. Students, like travelers to foreign lands and cultures, enter the university facing new expectations and ideas for which many frequently find themselves ill-prepared. They might struggle as they learn to speak and …

International Student-Athletes' Communication With American Coaches, Vivian Alida Catharina Maria Brandhoff

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

This thesis explored lived experiences of former international student-athletes in communicating with their American coaches through ten qualitative interviews. Despite the large and growing number of international student-athletes within the NCAA, research on this population is scarce. To study this topic is important because the relationship and communication with their coaches' highly impacts student-athletes' performance in many aspects of their collegiate experience and beyond. The study found that cultural differences in training methods and systems, an athlete's English proficiency, a coach's personality traits, and a coach's willingness to adjust to his/her athletes all affected coach-athlete communication.

D-Place: A Global Database Of Cultural, Linguistic And Environmental Diversity, Kathryn R. Kirby, Russell D. Gray, Simon J. Greenhill, Fiona M. Jordan, Stephanie Gomes-Ng, Hans-Jörg Bibiko, Damián E. Blasi, Carlos A. Botero, Claire Bowern, Carol R. Ember, Dan Leehr, Bobbi S. Low, Joe Mccarter, William Divale, Michael C. Gavin

Biology Faculty Research

From the foods we eat and the houses we construct, to our religious practices and political organization, to who we can marry and the types of games we teach our children, the diversity of cultural practices in the world is astounding. Yet, our ability to visualize and understand this diversity is limited by the ways it has been documented and shared: on a culture-by-culture basis, in locally-told stories or difficult-to-access repositories. In this paper we introduce D-PLACE, the Database of Places, Language, Culture, and Environment. This expandable and open-access database (accessible at https://d-place.org) brings together a dispersed corpus of …

Dreaming In Two Worlds And Two Languages: Bilingual Dreams And Acculturation Challenges, Winifred K. Lum, Jenny Wade

International Journal of Transpersonal Studies

This study investigated the significance of first and second languages in the bilingual dreams of immigrant participants. A purposive sample of nine women and six men aged 20 to 71 whose first languages were Spanish, Thai, Italian, Tagalog, and French, and later acquired English, participated in semi-structured, open-ended interviews recalling a dream featuring both languages. Transcripts were thematically analyzed individually and across cases. The most important theme was the ambicultural self in the dream, referring to a culturally flexible dream figure able to speak the dreamer’s first and second languages to bridge between the protagonist’s two cultures to accomplish the …

Discourse On Gender, Religion, And Culture In Pakistani Films: A Narrative Analysis Of Contemporary Independent Films From Pakistan, Mohib Rehman

Communication ETDs

This thesis examines the discourse about gender, religion, and culture in four independent films produced in Pakistan between 2000 and 2013 to advocate for women's empowerment: Silent Water and Good Morning Karachi from female director Sabiha Sumar, and In the Name of God and Speak from male director Shoaib Mansoor. I analyzed plot, characterization, dialogues, and visual images to discuss how the filmmakers represented the dynamics of women's oppression, struggle against oppressive agents, and options or solutions for women's empowerment. Further, this project explored the ideological implications of the narratives constructed in the films within the Pakistani society in the …

Communication Practices In The Us And Syria, Rebecca S. Merkin, Reem Ramadan

Publications and Research

This study highlights Syrian communication practices using comparative tests with the United States communication as a baseline. Additionally, theoretical findings on individualism and collectivism theory are extended to include findings from Syria. Multivariate Analysis of Covariance was used to test culture’s effect in demographically similar (in age, SES, and education) student convenience samples, with the covariate communication adaptability, on dependent variables: empathy, social confirmation, social composure, friendships, non-verbal immediacy, social self-efficacy, and general self-efficacy. Results indicated that Syrians possess more empathy, social confirmation, and perceived general self-efficacy in comparison to U.S. citizens who have greater social composure, friendships, non-verbal immediacy …

The Document: A Multiple Concept, Sabine Roux

Proceedings from the Document Academy

This paper discusses the concept of the document evolved throughout the 20th century in France, particularly through the writings of Robert Escarpit and Jean Meyriat. The document began as a simple notion and then gradually took on new meanings such that it is now seen as a construction of social values. Multiplicity is posited as a fundamental characteristic of the document, which affects its meaning, its interpretation and its social values. Like a rhizome, the document circulates in social spaces with multiple, nomadic associations through attribution, intention, meaning, interpretations and social values (political issues, artistic and aesthetic dimensions, economy, etc.) …

Cultural Competency In The Dental Hygiene Curricula: A Survey, Christina Calleros

Dental Hygiene ETDs

As the population of the nation becomes more diverse, dental hygiene programs must ensure graduates are receiving cultural competency training in entry-level educational programs. The purpose of this study was to establish a baseline for what topics of cultural competency training are or are not being incorporated into dental hygiene schools and to determine if differences exist between topics covered amongst the types of degree-granting institutions. Topics were investigated via survey instrument and data was collected from 76 U.S dental hygiene program directors. Results of this study emphasized the similarities between entry-level dental hygiene programs and illustrated a lack of …

Miles Away, Ziqing Liang

Masters Theses

This thesis investigates cross-cultural and social dynamics between China and the West by challenging and playing with different cultural conventions and restrictions. The work shares the experience of leaving a familiar environment and adapting to a strikingly different culture. The gaps, distances and misunderstandings inherent in communication across cultural divides are used to construct new environments encompassing language, time and space that reconcile these dissonances. In particular, I view daily, yet unfamiliar patterns of learning, eating, sleeping, and longing, map the experience of an international student’s life. Although the form of my works varies, from glass sculpture to participatory projects, …

Examination Of The Effects Of Language And Cultural Barriers On Spanish-Speaking Patients In Health Settings As Observed By Medical Spanish Interpreters, Sarah J. Kraska

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This study aimed to investigate how the Spanish language and culture affects treatment, access to healthcare and perceptions of medical visits within the Hispanic population. This was examined through the viewpoint of medical Spanish interpreters in the Harrisonburg community. Quantitative data served to provide descriptive statistics regarding these interpreters, while qualitative data was used to gather data about themes and subthemes that were developed regarding this topic. Language was found to not be a significant barrier, but culture did have a significant affect. It was found that these barriers affected access to care because of lack of information, education levels …

(Re)Positioning Black: Negotiating Racial Subjectivities In White Discursively Constructed Spaces, Elisa Davidson

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

This thesis is both a personal and social inquiry of the experience of Black students at a predominantly white university. Within this inquiry, I extend Nakayama and Krizek's (1995) concept of whiteness as having "no true essence" to conceptualizations of blackness to assert that blackness is “a pattern of negotiation that takes place in conditions generated by specific discursive formations and social relations” (McLaren, 1999, pg. 40) rather than a fixed, essential category. Viewing blackness as encounter means that it is emergent through specific social and discursive conditions that are constantly constructed and negotiated through interactions with whiteness. I approach …

Cross-Cultural Understanding, Sajjad Haider

Student Research Symposium

This case-study is about the cross-cultural management and how it affects the employee relations and ultimately impacts their performance, if not handled properly. The case delves into different situations where understanding of the other cultural values, norms, work practices and human behavior is critical for foreign managers to succeed.

The case entails how a foreign FMCG company faced with the difficult and challenging situation in China. In order to fix the problems, the corporate headquarter sent three of their bright personnel; Janet, Peter and William to China. They were tasked to improve the HR, marketing & sales and distributions channels. …

Second Language Teaching In The Esl Classroom: The Role Of The Teacher, Ariel Serrell Finlinson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio covers what the author believes to be important teaching practices for a teacher in the English as a Second Language classroom, with a specific emphasis on the role of the teacher. The first section of the portfolio contains the author’s teaching philosophy which describes the author’s beliefs of what constitutes good teaching. The beliefs include the importance of using meaning-bearing and comprehensible input in the classroom, the use of task-based activities to facilitate language learning, and understanding the role of the teacher in the classroom. Following are three artifacts that the author wrote during her time in the …

Latinos And Afro-Latino Legacy In The United States: History, Culture, And Issues Of Identity, Refugio I. Rochin

Professional Agricultural Workers Journal

Introduction

Since my first visit to the campus in 1992, I have looked forward to this event. Tuskegee University is a world famous campus with many firsts in science and higher education. And it gives me great pleasure to speak about Latinos and Afro-Latinos.

My presentation has three objectives: first, to address the historical origins, and challenges facing U.S. Latinos; second, to expand on the national interest in U.S. Latinos and the surfacing issues of our relations with African-Americans, and, third, to advocate coalition building and suggest ways of working together.

I wish to begin by citing a few caveats …

Cultural Appropriation Without Cultural Essentialism?, Erich Hatala Matthes

Faculty Research and Scholarship

Is there something morally wrong with cultural appropriation in the arts? I argue that the little philosophical work on this topic has been overly dismissive of moral objections to cultural appropriation. Nevertheless, I argue that philosophers working on epistemic injustice have developed powerful conceptual tools that can aid in our understanding of objections that have been levied by other scholars and artists. I then consider the relationship between these objections and the harms of cultural essentialism. I argue that focusing on the systematic nature of appropriative harms may allow us to sidestep the problem of essentialism, but not without cost.

The Vibrant Traditions Of Masaya: El Mestizaje As A Culture, A Process, And A State Of Being, Isabelle Lee

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

“The only constant in life is change.” What this old adage leaves out is that the processes that catalyze these changes can occur in vastly different ways which impact the product. In the case of the history of Masaya, Nicaragua, today’s dominant culture of mestizaje is the result of the arrival of the Spaniards to the Americas and the process of racial and cultural blend that followed between Spanish, indigenous and African peoples. But in this mixing process, Spaniards held disproportionate power: most of the changes they imposed were made through violent and deceptive imposition. Yet indigenous and African people …

Small-Scale Societies Exhibit Fundamental Variation In The Role Of Intentions In Moral Judgment, H. C. Barrett, A Bolyanatz, Alyssa Crittenden, D. M.T. Fessler, S. Fitzpatrick, M. Gurven, J. Henrich, M. Kanovsky, G. Kushnick, A. Pisor, B. A. Scelza, S. Stich, C. Von Rueden, W. Zhao, S. Laurence

Anthropology Faculty Research

Intent and mitigating circumstances play a central role in moral and legal assessments in large-scale industrialized societies. Although these features of moral assessment are widely assumed to be universal, to date, they have only been studied in a narrow range of societies. We show that there is substantial cross-cultural variation among eight traditional small-scale societies (ranging from hunter-gatherer to pastoralist to horticulturalist) and two Western societies (one urban, one rural) in the extent to which intent and mitigating circumstances influence moral judgments. Although participants in all societies took such factors into account to some degree, they did so to very …

All Things German: For Arne Koch The Classroom Is Just The Beginning

Colby Magazine

For Arne Koch The Classroom Is Just The Beginning. German Department chair and associate professor Arne Koch discusses anything from soccer and Nazis to the current Greek financial crisis in German or some English/German hybrid.

Through The Linguistic Looking Glass: An Examination Of A Newspaper As Negotiator Of Hybrid Cultural And Linguistic Spaces, Anthony Spencer

Speaker & Gavel

I contend English-language media outlets could and should be viewed as minority-language media outlets as they are cultural negotiators for tourists, sojourners and other transnational migrants. To better understand the cultural and linguistic forces these English-language media outlets exert upon the host cultures and nations in which they exist, I performed three months of ethnographic observations at a newspaper in Costa Rica and conducted in-depth interviews with staffers. I particularly focus on the hybrid identities of the staffers as they in turn instruct their readers how to navigate this hybrid community. I identify and explain the themes, which emerged in …

The Meaning Of Evidence And Nonmaleficence: Cases From Nursing, Chenit Ong-Flaherty Dnp, Angela Banks Phd, Martha Doyle Msn, Claire Olivia Sharifi

Journal of Health Ethics

In our increasingly diverse environment, nurses are obligated to question the meaning of “evidence” when history has shown that our emphasis on the empirical and quantitative data has shaped our biases against knowledge unknown to us. This bias has limited our ability to provide patient or person-centered care, and can be harmful to patients. Nurses are encouraged to reflect on what evidence means in their practice, and to make sure harm is not caused to patients by dismissing evidence yet unknown to us or accepting “truths” not fully understood by us. The authors use composite case studies to share experiences …

Romantic Relationship Experiences From Late Adolescence To Young Adulthood: The Role Of Older Siblings In Mexican-Origin Families, Lorey A. Wheeler, Sarah E. Killoren, Shawn D. Whiteman, Kimberly A. Updegraff, Susan M. Mchale, Adriana J. Umana-Taylor

Nebraska Center for Research on Children, Youth, Families, and Schools: Faculty Publications

Youth's experiences with romantic relationships during adolescence and young adulthood have far reaching implications for future relationships, health, and well-being; yet, although scholars have examined potential peer and parent influences, we know little about the role of siblings in youth's romantic relationships. Accordingly, this study examined the prospective longitudinal links between Mexican-origin older and younger siblings' romantic relationship experiences and variation by sibling structural and relationship characteristics (i.e., sibling age and gender similarity, younger siblings' modeling) and cultural values (i.e., younger siblings' familism values). Data from 246 Mexican-origin families with older (M = 20.65 years; SD = 1.57; 50% …

Baianidade: A Case Study On The Impact Of Afro-Brazilian Ethnic Tourism On Regional Identity And Development In Bahia, Madeleine Yount

Theses & ETDs

Afro-Brazilian identity and its role in Brazilian national identity have been negotiated and renegotiated since the Portuguese first began to enslave African peoples in 1550. Yet in the most economically marginalized region in Brazil, Afro-Brazilian culture is exalted as a major influence on regional identity and, in some ways, development. One of the ways in which Afro-Brazilian identity in the Northeast shapes regional identity and development is through the ethnic tourism industry. The examination of ethnic tourism policies within this marginalized state can point to how Brazil is consolidating Afro-Brazilian identity in their burgeoning democratic nation. Nowhere is state-sponsored Afro-Brazilian …

Tempo Perception Across Cultures: The Beat Is All It Takes, Kendall L. Lyons, Jessica E. Nave-Blodgett, Erin E. Hannon

AANAPISI Poster Presentations

• Dancing to music is a human universal that relies on beat perception.
• Listeners may infer the “tempo” or speed of music from:
• the time interval between beats;
• the density of events;
• higher-level features of musical temporal organization (the meter).
• The “Gabbling Foreigner Illusion” is the observation that listeners perceive unfamiliar languages as being faster than familiar ones.
• Even when music is the same speed, listeners tap faster to unfamiliar music.
• Does culture background impact how we perceive musical tempo?

The System Of Subjectivity: Societal Systems And Literary Pardigms, Alyssa Rittinger

Senior Honors Theses and Projects

Patterns aid in deepening humanity's understanding of the world and what is cultivated within it. Patterns emerge in interactive disciplines such as language, literature, science, visual arts, and even mathematics. The existence of patterns assists the human need to understand a complicated world. Beyond simply seeing patterns as they are presented, I am interested in exploring how these patterns manifest into paradigmatic structures that affect the way in which society. Particularly, I am interested in the socialized perceptions of literature, and the role that systems plays in their interaction and development.

This thesis project: 1) introduces the fundamentals of systems …

Cross–Cultural Generalizability Of The Alternative Five–Factor Model Using The Zuckerman–Kuhlman–Aluja Personality Questionnaire, Jérôme Rossier, Anton Aluja, Angel Blanch, Barry Oumar, Adam W. Stivers

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Several personality models are known for being replicable across cultures, such as the Five–Factor Model (FFM) or Eysenck's Psychoticism–Extraversion–Neuroticism (PEN) model, and are for this reason considered universal. The aim of the current study was to evaluate the cross–cultural replicability of the recently revised Alternative FFM (AFFM). A total of 15 048 participants from 23 cultures completed the Zuckerman–Kuhlman–Aluja Personality Questionnaire (ZKA–PQ) aimed at assessing personality according to this revised AFFM. Internal consistencies, gender differences and correlations with age were similar across cultures for all five factors and facet scales. The AFFM structure was very similar across samples and can …

Mutuality, Inter Organizational Cultural Understanding, And The Efficacy Of Humanitarian Response, Elizabeth Anne Yeomans

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Organizations responding to humanitarian crises often have different organizational cultures and observational lenses, presenting barriers to collaborative efforts at the outset of a crisis. The inherently chaotic nature of these crises exacerbates this problem, slowing the speed of response and the degree of efficacy of the response effort. Researchers have examined these organizational differences but have not defined barriers to mutuality and possible ways to overcome those barriers presenting a gap in knowledge. The purpose of this study was to fill this gap by offering areas to focus on to improve cultural awareness between disparate organizations. The central research question …

Examining Teacher Multicultural Competence In The Classroom: Further Validation Of The Multicultural Teaching Competency Scale, Melissa Jo Hamilton

LSU Master's Theses

The focus of this study is to strengthen the technical adequacy of the Multicultural Teacher Competency Scale (MTCS; Spanierman et al., 2011) self-assessment measure for teacher multicultural competence. This study will also examine the relationship between it and the teacher-student relationship and teacher self-efficacy. Results show that the MTCS shows similar internal consistency reliability with a new demographic of in-service teachers. The MTCS also has predictive significance for teacher self-efficacy and student-teacher relationship scores. Implications of the study include the importance for teachers to be taught and practice this competency, as well as, validation that this construct is related to …

Cultural Adaptation Of Chinese Students In An Undergraduate Business Program In Canada, Wayne Rawcliffe

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Chinese students represent the largest cohort of international students studying at Canadian university business programs. These Chinese students often experience cross-cultural barriers that inhibit their full participation in the business schools' learning culture. The purpose of this case study was to identify the acculturation strategies applied by Chinese students who had successfully adapted to the learning culture in business programs. Mezirow's transformative learning theory and Bennett's intercultural adaptation theory provided the conceptual framework to inform the study. The research questions examined the cultural adaptation experiences of Chinese students and on the barriers and effective strategies for academic success from the …

Impact Of A Rural Public School District On Community Culture, Lynnwood Michael Baade

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Individuals and families often migrate to rural areas anticipating a utopian environment and a school system that supports their beliefs and values. Little qualitative research, however, has been conducted about the impact of rural public school districts on their local communities. Therefore, the purpose of this qualitative study, as reflected in the central research question, was to explore how a rural public school district contributed to community culture. Maslow's motivational theory related to a hierarchy of human needs formed the conceptual framework for this study. A single case study was executed as the method of inquiry. Participants included 6 residents …

Rural Obese African American Women And Depression, Food Culture, And Binge Eating, Tracee Tamiko Smith

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The rural African American population has a high incidence of severe psychosocial problems and a skewed perception of obesity, despite obesity's extremely high prevalence rate in this population. Despite the acknowledgements of these problems, there is a gap in literature relative to the effective treatments for obese African Americans diagnosed with depression. This study measured correlations between obesity and depression, binge eating, and food culture amongst African American women residing in Jefferson County, MS. The health belief model was used to guide an assessment of beliefs, perceptions, susceptibility, cues to action, and self-efficacy. A cross-sectional design was used based on …