Digital Commons Network^™

Raising Teachers’ Cultural Knowledge Of Middle Eastern Students In The Classroom, Hassan J. Alnawar

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

A large number of researchers have investigated the impact culturally aware and conscious teachers have in creating a better learning environment for students, especially those who are from different academic and ethnic backgrounds. However, limited studies have been conducted to inspect how teachers’ attitudes toward the cultural background of their students from the Middle East, and how they perceive and interact with them. Using qualitative research methods this study will examine elementary teachers’ conceptions and attitudes toward their Middle-Eastern students. In comparison to other immigrant groups, Middle Eastern students, the focus of this study, face additional challenges as a result …

African Initiated Churches : The Case Of The Igreja Evangelica Amor De Deus, Romanos 5 : 5, Em Mocambique : (Love Of God Evangelical Church, Romans 5 : 5, In Mozambique), Philip H. Troutman

ATS Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Visions Of Public Space: Reproducing And Resisting Social Hierarchies In A Community Garden, Sofya Aptekar

Publications and Research

Urban public spaces are sites of struggles over gentrification. In increasingly diverse cities, these public spaces also host interactions among people of different class, race, ethnicity, and immigration status. How do people share public spaces in contexts of diversity and gentrification? I analyze the conflicting ways of imagining shared spaces by drawing on an ethnographic study of a community garden in a diverse and gentrifying neighborhood in New York City, conducted between 2011 and 2013. I examine how conflicts among gardeners about the aesthetics of the garden and norms of conduct reproduce larger gentrification struggles over culture and resources. Those …

Potential Worldview And Behavioral Transformation Within The Ugandan Lgbt And Evangelical Context, Phil Smart

Doctor of Ministry

To fulfill the mission entrusted to believers by God and shown through the incarnation of Jesus Christ, the same principle of loving others unconditionally is the Church’s mandate. Unfortunately, Ugandan traditional worldviews, compounded by outside influences, have contributed to bringing this self-proclaimed, Christian nation to a point of worldwide recognition and reprimand because of its destructive anti-gay legislation and oppression of the LGBT community.1 Focusing on the struggle between Ugandan evangelical leaders and their response to those with same-sex orientation, this dissertation seeks to investigate the use of Cultural Intelligence (CQ) as a tool for mitigating the destructive attitudes and …

The Role Of Culture In Comics Of The Quotidian, Frank Bramlett

English Faculty Publications

Studies of the quotidian often start from a social sciences perspective that daily life is made up of routine practices and ingrained assumptions. This is also found in studies of literature, art and economics. The premise of the quotidian, however, must be examined through a lens of culture. This essay explores how the notion of the quotidian in comics rests on culture, which in turn comprises various nexus of practice. Drawing evidence from Exit Wounds (by Rutu Modan) and Questionable Content (by Jeph Jacques), the essay extends the notion of the quotidian from a specific reference to ‘slice of life …

The Daily Gamecock, Friday, January 16, 2015, University Of South Carolina, Office Of Student Media

January

No abstract provided.

Knowledge Management And The Nigerian Culture – A Round Peg In A Square Hole?, Adeola Bamgboje-Ayodele, Leonie Ellis

The African Journal of Information Systems

Knowledge Management (KM) is a key strategy which many organizations have been leveraging upon because of its potential in achieving competitive advantage. However, factors such as the national culture can impact the efficacy of this strategy. Hence, the aim of this paper is to provide insight into how Nigerian culture influences organizational culture, which in turn influences KM practices in Nigerian organizations. Based on a post-positivist stance, this research employs a descriptive survey approach for the data collection and analysis while also incorporating Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. The findings suggest that the hierarchical nature of the society in Nigeria supports centralized …

In The Wake Of Pure Farsi-Muslim Culture And Ideology Through Translating Anthems In “The Kite Runner”, A. Amirdabbaghian, S. Solimany

Research Publications (2011 to 2015)

Since the 11th of September, 2001, the media and American public have been obsessed by all things Islamic and Middle Eastern, as the war on terrorism has been essentially engaged against various countries and peoples believed to be terrorists, including Afghanistan. Since America’s declaration of war on terrorism, people have been flocking to bookstores to find and read up on topics like Islam, terrorism, the conflict in the Middle East, and more. While there have been many documentaries published on the Taliban, Osama Bin Laden, and women’s rights in the region, there were still no works of fiction in English …

Fear Of Fatherhood, Deborah Weatherspoon, Wendy Sponsler, Christopher Weatherspoon, Dorothy Campbell

Walden Faculty and Staff Publications

The fatherhood role is influenced by culture, religion, social factors, and economic norms. In Jamaica pregnancy is often treated as a female only event. Women are left to visit their clinics alone and have support from female family members. The man’s focus is providing financial support. In the past fathers were subjected to migrant labor and left their families for long periods. This tradition remained even when they were not working. Today, men are taking on more of the role of fatherhood, becoming involved and supportive and experiencing the privilege of pregnancy though of a secondary nature through their partner’s …

“We Kill Her, But We Do Not Kill Her:” A Translation And Staged Production Of Antígona Furiosa By Griselda Gambaro, Miranda Margolis

Theses & ETDs

This thesis studies the nature of translation and adaptation, specifically regarding Griselda Gambaro’s Antígona Furiosa. It considers the historical, cultural and linguistic elements of translation, as well as the challenges of performance within the context of translation. The second chapter of the thesis consists of an original translation of Gambaro’s Antígona Furiosa, and the third chapter is a discussion of its performance. A copy of that performance is included on a DVD.

Teaching Culture In Foreign Language Classrooms Of International Baccalaureate, Marlene Cabrera Culpepper

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

There is an increasing number of International Baccalaureate programs in the United States that require instruction in an additional language to prepare culturally responsive global citizens, but there is little research on how the teaching of culture is addressed in elementary additional language programs. This study was guided by Vygotsky's and Dewey's social constructivism and investigated how the teaching of culture is integrated in additional foreign language classrooms in the State of Georgia's International Baccalaureate Primary Years Programs (IB PYP). It also investigated how personal, professional, or organizational factors such as values, beliefs, teacher training, or time constraints impact the …

The “Social Magic” Of Merit: Diversity, Equity, And Inclusion In The English And Welsh Legal Profession, Hilary Sommerlad

Fordham Law Review

The discourse of merit is central to the “boundary” practices deployed by the white male elite of the English legal profession to exclude outsiders. The official discourse of government and regulatory body reports presents merit as an objectively verifiable and quantifiable property, synonymous with “excellence,” the salience of which in the recruitment process is indicative of the modernization of the profession. In this form it is mobilized to deflect criticism of the slow progress toward diversity. Critical interrogation of the discourse of merit reveals that it operates rather differently as a key structuring principle of the profession. The alternative meaning …

Imagination And Aspiration: Flames Of Possibility For Migrant Background High School Students And Their Parents, Loshini Naidoo

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper aims to show how imagination is an important tool in the formation of aspiration and ethnic capital for young high school students and their parents in the city of Blacktown, New South Wales, Australia. Through semi-structured focus group interviews with parents teachers and students, the data from the demographic space of the school revealed that despite the limitations in economic capital there was social and cultural capital in migrant families, which provided reinforcement for the realisation of various goals, especially through education and “hard work”. The students from migrant backgrounds had an opportunity to aspire and imagine a …

Overcoming Gender: The Impact Of The Persian Language On Iranian Women’S Confessional Literature, Farideh Dayanim Goldin

English Faculty Publications

[From the Introduction] The idea that language embodies patriarchal thought processes, severing women writers from the written language and from their own words, was first elaborated by the French feminist theorists Luce Irigaray and Hélène Cixous. Irigaray argues, for example, that language generally denies women a distinct subjectivity, with the result that the voice of women has largely been excluded from mainstream cultural discourse (Donovan). In this chapter, I juxtapose this theory to the obstacles faced by Iranian women writers of life narratives. Is it possible that Persian could have impeded Iranian women’s literary aspirations, especially in the genre of …

Colloquia Education: An Examination Of Roman Second Language Education For Social Implications, Jennifer Newton

HIM 1990-2015

The expansion of the Roman Empire had compelled disparate cultures to mingle and assimilate. In relation to education this fact meant that teachers used a variety of curricula to convey an amalgamation of cultural dynamics. Evidence for this phenomenon is found in the content Colloquia, a fourth-century elementary language textbook, which displays aspects Greek and Roman culture through the explicit and implicit instruction of the text. The existence of this mixture education displays the motivations of the author, as well as information about the values of the contemporary culture.

Comic Art And Humor In The Workplace: An Exploratory Study ...Zzzzzz, Kella Brown

Theses and Dissertations

This study is a qualitative, exploratory examination of the phenomena of humor in the workplace. The purpose is to derive a better understanding of how real people enact humor in the workplace by examining the humor depicted by and through fictional characters in comic art. The body of work of cartoonist, Scott Adams, was the primary source of data. The study relies on what the imaginary characters of Dilbert find absurd, funny, and ridiculous about an imaginary workplace, the employee-employer relationship, the content of the characters' jobs, or in the social relationships of fictional characters. It involves analyzing specific cultural …

Selection Into Mixed Marriages: Evidence From North Carolina, 1894-1906, Matthew T. Gregg

Business Faculty Publications

Using a novel dataset from agricultural censuses and geological sources, I examine the selec- tion into mixed marriages between whites and Cherokee Indians in North Carolina during the late nineteenth century. I find that the well-documented wealth advantage of Cherokee Indian households containing white husbands is driven mostly by positive selection. Thus, once family fixed effects are controlled for, the observed intermarriage premium is completely eliminated. (JEL D03, N31, O12.)

The Culture Of Nature In Tolkien's The Lord Of The Rings, Allison Kerley

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis examines the intersection of culture and the environment in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, through a study and analysis of the Elves of Lothlórien, the Ents of Fangorn, and their respective landscapes.

Reconsidering The Influence Of Islam On Yoruba Cultural Heritage, 1930-1987, Akeem Abiodun Oladiti

Khazar Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

Previous studies on the activities of Islam have focused on the contribution of the religion to state building (Last, 1967, p. 4 ), the nineteenth century jihad (Smith, 1961, p. 45) and the phenomenal growth of Islam during the colonial period (Gbadamosi, 1978, p. 77). However, no specific attention has been paid to how Islam affected Yoruba culture negatively with specific focus on the area of religion education and language. This study intends to fill this obvious gap in the historiography of influential cultural invasion of Islam from 1930, when colonial political structures allowed the Muslims to maintain a physical …

Early Contexts Of Learning: Family And Community Socialization During Infancy And Toddlerhood, Carolyn P. Edwards, Lixin Ren, Jill Brown

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

The contexts of early learning and socialization are diverse and complex but not without some predictability. The tension between predictability and variation fascinates researchers interested in childhood and culture and motivates careful exploration of different developmental niches to better understand socialization during infancy, toddlerhood, and early childhood. Contexts of early socialization vary in the people and activities present, and the beliefs and norms of caregivers and daily companions. The chapter utilizes anthropological constructs (household structure and composition, settlement patterns and subsistence level, mothers’ workload, gender division of labor, intimacy levels between husbands and wives, and cultural roles and norms pertaining …

The Lady On Angel Hill: Mary Jane Folsom And Movement In The Nineteenth Century St. Croix River Valley, Taylor M. Yetter

Departmental Honors Projects

Mary Jane Folsom’s life in the St. Croix River Valley demonstrates the previously uninvestigated complexities of life on the American Frontier in the nineteenth century. Previous scholars of the Frontier have all assumed the traditional East to West model of movement, but this model fails to recognize the many directions people took to reach their final destinations or the influences they brought with them. Before further research is conducted on the American Frontier, scholars must answer the question of how people, objects, and ideas actually travelled through the Frontier. This paper uses Mary Jane’s correspondence with her family to investigate …

Reflections On Effectively Implementing Culture In The Foreign Language Classroom, Alyssa N. Petsche

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The purpose of this research project is to explore the perceptions and attitudes of past and current foreign language students regarding the relevancy of culture within foreign language education. The first portion of this paper contains a literature review from a variety of international research articles discussing the necessity, implementation methods, and assessment techniques for implementing culture within the foreign language classroom setting. While the research from the literature review emphasizes for researchers and educators the importance of including culture within the foreign language curriculum, very little research has been recorded regarding the perceptions and beliefs of foreign language learners. …

The Risk Of Losing National Identity In The Twenty-First Century Romania, Or National Identity From Adaptation To Self-Censorship, Andreia-Irina Suciu, Mihaela Culea

Khazar Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

In the contemporary world of extremely dynamic movements in the fields of territorial state reconfiguration, economic “colonization”, globalization, Europeanization, migration of population, borrowing of cultural values and intensified cultural exchange or transfer, defining national identity has become a process which registers numerous changes and encounters various challenges. The classical features that assisted this process of defining national identity in the past – a historic territory, common myths, historical memories and values, a common public culture, common legal rights and duties, a common economy with territorial mobility (A. D. Smith 1991: 14) – undergo significant transformations each decade and the definition …

Arab 102: First-Year Arabic Language—A Peer Review Of Teaching Project Benchmark Portfolio, Abla Hasan

UNL Faculty Course Portfolios

Goals of the class are derived from goals nationally recognized and agreed upon for low intermediate Arabic learners .This systematic consistency with the nationally recognized standards -albeit can be more challenging- insures students' ability to pursue national major programs in Arabic or their ability to compete for national grants, scholarships and study abroad programs. The standers adopted by ACTFL and STARTALK equally consider the linguistic as well as the cultural content of teaching Arabic. These standers known as the five C's are: Communication, Cultures, Connections, Comparisons, and Community. The cultural content of learning Arabic is part of the international and …

The Effect Of Nationality Differences On The Emotional Intelligence Of Leaders, Hossein Reza Nikoui

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Previous studies related to manager effectiveness and organizational culture have determined that emotional intelligence (EI) is a critical predictor of intercultural adjustment and business success. However, few investigators have examined the relationship between EI and nationality differences. In today's globalized business environment, such understanding is crucial to the development of more effective leadership programs for international workers. This quantitative study explored the degrees to which the EI of organizational managers varied across nationalities. A theoretical framework, provided by several theories related to personality, leadership, and types of intelligence, created a lens through which to analyze study results. The Trait Emotional …

0 To 100…Not So Quick, Hannah Halusker

Tigra scientifica

No abstract provided.

Was It Something They Said? Stand-Up Comedy And Progressive Social Change, David M. Jenkins

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

From our earliest origins in every civilization across the globe, comic performances have fulfilled an important social function. Yet stand-up comedy has not attracted the serious academic inquiry one might expect. This dissertation argues that in the absence of public intellectuals stand-up comics are important to how we talk about and negotiate complicated issues like gender and race. These comic texts are sites of cultural critique, public discourse, tools for articulation, a means of persuasion, and serve to galvanize communities.

This dissertation argues that stand-up comedy performances are a vital part of modern American intellectual and social life and are …

A Tale Of Two Cultures: A Qualitative Narrative Of Nigerian Immigrant Parenting In The United States, Chinwe Onwujuba

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Current demographic estimates indicate that the foreign-born population makes up about 13% (40 million) of the total U.S. population. This number consists of immigrants from all over the world, with a larger majority originating from Latin America and Asia. Research in the area of immigrant adaptation is robust and compelling; however, it is replete with studies on immigrants from the cultural regions identified above, and not as much on other regions with relatively less numerical representation, specifically Africa. From this region, Nigerian individuals and families make up a larger portion of this immigrant group. This study employs a qualitative research …

Beauty Is Precious, Knowledge Is Power, And Innovation Is Progress: Widely Held Beliefs In Policy Narratives About Oil Spills, Brenda Gale Mason

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Scholars from diverse perspectives have sought to understand the features and mechanisms that influence the design and implementation of public policy. Some (realists) have emphasized the role that material interests have played while others (idealists) have emphasized the influence of subjective ideas on ‘how policy means’ (Yanow 1996). Recently, observers in both camps have demonstrated curiosity in the influence of culture on policymaking and its consequences. Regrettably, this shared concern has not resulted in much collaboration across epistemological divides.

I argue that narrative analysis provides a way to bridge the divides by specifying an interpretive approach that identifies culture as …

Tales That Tell All: A Political Analysis Of Folktales Of Iran, Yass Alizadeh

Doctoral Dissertations

This research presents an analytical study of the rewritten folktales of Iran in 20^th century, and investigates the ideological omissions and revisions of oral tales as textual productions in modern Iran. Focusing on the problematic role of folktales as tales about the unreal and the fantastic serving a political purpose, this study traces the creative exercises of Iranian storytellers who apply ideological codes and meanings to popular folk language. The works of Mirzadeh Eshqi (1893-1924), Sadegh Hedayat (1903-1951), Samad Behrangi (1939-1968) and Bijan Mofid (1935-1984) are examples of a larger collection of creative writing in Iran that through the …