Digital Commons Network^™

Climate Justice In The Anthropocene And Its Relationship With Science And Technology: The Importance Of Ethics Of Responsibility, Paolo Davide Farah, Alessio Lo Giudice

Connecticut Law Review

Climate change is a global phenomenon. Therefore, globalization is the necessary hermeneutical horizon to develop an analysis of the metamorphosis climate change could cause at a political, social, and economic level. Within this horizon, this Article shows how the relationship between the concept of the Anthropocene epoch and the request for justice allows for framing a climate-justice and intergenerational equity–focused political interpretation of the effects of climate change. In order to avoid reducing such an interpretation to merely an ideological critique of capitalism, the conception of climate justice needs to be grounded in a rational, ethical model. This Article proposes …

Climate Migration And Displacement: A Case Study Of Puerto Rican Women In Connecticut, Camila Bustos, Bruni Pizarro, Tabitha Sookdeo

Connecticut Law Review

No abstract provided.

Jane Crow Constitutionalism, Evan D. Bernick

College of Law Faculty Publications

On June 24, 2022 The United States Supreme Court issued its decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization; overturning Roe v. Wade, and destroying fifty years of precedent to protect the constitutional right to abortion in the United States. This overturning sets a dangerous, new precedent that reinforces the State’s control of reproduction, and criminalizes a woman’s right to choose, with very few exceptions. In states like Mississippi, Black women are already experiencing the highest rates of maternal mortality, incarceration, and poverty.

This article posits that Dobbs operates to maintain a racialized and gendered underclass, and names this phenomenon …

“Racial Heterosexual Habitus” And Management Of Racial Education Discussions Within Black Female/White Male Romantic Relationships, Marya T. Mtshali

Faculty Journal Articles

Scholars (Steinbugler 2012; Twine 2010) have examined the role that the white racial lens can play in limiting the development of racial literacy for white partners in black/white relationships, while the role of gender ideologies has gone largely unexamined. Through analyzing “racially educational” conversations between 36 members of black female/white male heterosexual couples, I introduce the concept of “racial heterosexual habitus” and its influence in managing these discussions on race. I argue that it generates limits—as well as unique opportunities—for couples during these conversations about race. My findings reveal how black female heterosexual habitus orients black women to navigate these …

Climate Migration And Displacement: A Case Study Of Puerto Rican Women In Connecticut, Camila Bustos, Bruni Pizarro, Tabitha Sookdeo

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

The climate crisis is increasingly forcing people to flee their homes, whether internally or across state borders. However, existing international and domestic law does not provide sufficient protection for those forcibly displaced by extreme weather events. In 2021, the Biden administration issued an executive order and subsequently a report on the impact of climate change on migration, which marked a first step in federal policy toward recognition of the nexus between climate change and displacement. At the local level, Connecticut has already become a destination for climate-displaced people. For instance, after Hurricane Maria landed in Puerto Rico in 2017, approximately …

In The Name Of Riwaj: An Ethnographic Study To Explore The Notion Of Women Empowerment Among Bisp Recipients In Rural Sakhro-Sindh, Pakistan, Qurratulain Nasiruddin, Rozina Karmaliani, Nasim Zahid Shah, Tazeen Saeed Ali

School of Nursing & Midwifery

Women empowerment is a national agenda for Pakistan and, one of its manifestations is the nationwide cash transfer program namely Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP). With the help of Bourdieu methodological paradigm of “habitus” this paper analyses empowerment among BISP recipients in their social settings where various social actors such as her husband and wadera of the village dominate her agency but, at the same time, women herself submits her agency to these social actors under the veil of riwaj (social customs). This ethnographic study reveals that the performance of submission among women follows an inner drive for conformation to …

Talanoa Digital Storytelling As A Culturally Appropriate Method In Palliative Care Health Research: An Evaluation Of The Narratives Of Pacific Families Caring For Older Loved Ones At End Of Life, Ofa Dewes, Kylah Williams, Suamalie Naisali

Pacific Studies

Talanoa is a Pacific concept of dialogue and storytelling that was used as a framework for producing our digital stories. This article sets out an evaluation of a workshop-based process for talanoa digital storytelling (DST) where aiga (family) carers created their own short autobiographic films and injected their voices into the social and public health discourse and knowledge production. Five digital stories were created. Participants were drawn from a cohort of 33 aiga carers in a study investigating the end of life circumstances of Pacific Peoples dying in advanced age, and the experiences faced by their aiga who carry out …

A Review Of Theropithecus Oswaldi With The Proposal Of A New Subspecies, Dagmawit Abebe Getahun, Eric Delson, Chalachew Mesfin Seyoum

Publications and Research

Theropithecus oswaldi darti, as currently understood, is the oldest Theropithecus taxon in the fossil record and the earliest subspecies in the Theropithecus oswaldi lineage. Theropithecus oswaldi darti is typified at the site of Makapansgat in South Africa, and a similar form (T. o. cf. darti) is usually recognized at Hadar, Dikika, some Middle Awash localities, and Woranso-Mille in Ethiopia. This taxon is also tentatively believed to occur in Kenya at Kanam and Koobi Fora and in Member C of the Shungura Formation in Ethiopia. While there is a general consensus that the East African ‘darti’ specimens are …

Intergenerational Peacebuilding Among Women (Case Study: Egypt), Nermine Mounir, Hassnaa Tamam

Kroc IPJ Research and Resources

This case study is part of the Intergenerational Peacebuilding Among Women: Leveraging the Power of Collaboration report created by the Women PeaceMakers program. In this case study, Woman PeaceMaker Fellow Nermine Mounir explores the state of intergenerational peacebuilding for women in Egypt. Day by day, women peacebuilders are discovering new spaces within which to make themselves heard. The power of these women and their impact can be further magnified by joining efforts and drawing on their diversity. This research demonstrates the deep desire women peacebuilders in Egypt have for intergenerational collaboration but also how rare this sort of intergenerational collaboration …

Audible Inhalation As A Practice For Mitigating Systemic Turn-Taking Troubles: A Conjecture, Jeffrey D. Robinson

Communication Faculty Publications and Presentations

Extending Jefferson’s analysis of the limited utility of turn-constructional-unit (TCU)-initial particles in managing overlapping talk, this article limits itself to a similar turn-taking context/position in which current speakers bring TCUs to places of possible completion when it is relevant for next speakers to take a turn of talk. This article examines situations in which current speakers continue to audibly inhale in the transition space, arguing that inhalations (a) are pre-beginning actions; (b) bestow a weaker right to speak next than does talk; (c) are not accountable for obscuring next speakers’ talk (if it eventuates); (d) allow for beginning TCUs while …

Who Needs The State? We Do (Maybe), Deborah M. Weissman

North Carolina Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reproductive Asynchrony Within Social Groups Of Female Eastern Wild Turkeys, Erin E. Ulrey, Michael J. Chamberlain, Bret A. Collier

Faculty Publications

Coordination in timing of reproduction is driven by multiple ecological and sociobiological processes for a wide array of species. Eastern wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo silvestris) use a male dominance polygynous mating system, where males communicate with females via elaborate courtship displays and vocalizations at display sites. Most females prefer to mate with dominant males; therefore, asynchronous breeding and nesting may occur which can disproportionately influence individual fitness within breeding groups. For female wild turkeys, there are reproductive advantages associated with earlier nesting. As such, we evaluated reproductive asynchrony within and between groups of GPS-tagged female eastern wild turkeys based on …

Unh: The Magazine Of The University Of New Hampshire, Summer 2023, Unh Magazine

UNH Magazine

No abstract provided.

The Sociolinguistics Of Code-Switching In Hong Kong’S Digital Landscape: A Mixed-Methods Exploration Of Cantonese-English Alternation Patterns On Whatsapp, Wilkinson Daniel Wong Gonzales, Yuen Man Tsang

Journal of English and Applied Linguistics

This paper examines the prevalence of Cantonese-English code mixing in Hong Kong through an under-researched digital medium. Prior research on this code-alternation practice has often been limited to exploring either the social or linguistic constraints of code-switching in spoken or written communication. Our study takes a holistic approach to analyzing code-switching in a hybrid medium that exhibits features of both spoken and written discourse. We specifically analyze the code-switching patterns of 24 undergraduates from a Hong Kong university on WhatsApp and examine how both social and linguistic factors potentially constrain these patterns. Utilizing a self-compiled sociolinguistic corpus as well as …

Comment, Genevieve Lakier

Hofstra Law Review

The article explores the challenges law schools face in addressing speech norms and the increasing polarization of national politics and culture. It argues that the disagreements over speech norms are part of broader political transformations and should be seen as an inevitable aspect of societal change. The article suggests the need for law schools to navigate these issues by considering the political and pedagogical dimensions, and addressing the distribution of resources and opportunities.

Bi Erasure And Bi Invisibility In Media And Medicine: Moving Beyond, Lacy M. Telles

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This project examines the bisexual erasure and invisibility that is found in film, television, literature, and in the field of reproduction. Even though bisexual people make up a large portion of the LGBTQ community, because of bi invisibility, they tend to get lost in the cause. This website offers information about bi invisibility, highlights obstacles faced by bisexuals, provides resources for bisexuals, and includes some fun topics for bisexual people. It also has a page of bisexual testimonies: real bi people with real bi stories. There is evidence of erasure and invisibility, especially in children’s books and the field of …

A Critical Study Of Contemporary Palestinian Musical Culture, Karl H. Hausmann

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study is concerned with the field of musical culture and practice in Palestine, and the connotations of musical expression, whether as music or songs. It addresses the period extending from the end of the seventies and the beginning of the eighties, through the first intifada of 1987 and then the era of the Oslo Accords until today.

This study deals with the artistic meanings and expressions associated with the music and singing that was produced in that period, assuming that it was created within the socio-political context in which it existed, specifically that music that was associated with the …

Uprooting Patriarchy: Meditations On Gender, Masculinities, And Healing Through Buddhist Practices, Noah Souder-Russo

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Western patriarchal socialization trains men and male-conditioned people to express dominance and power-over self and other. The particularly vicious expression of cis-hetero-white-patriarchal masculinity is a delusional force that continues to uphold all systems of domination, subjugating marginalized bodies and the earth herself. For those of us who have bought in to what bell hooks calls the “patriarchal ideal,” there is much work to be done to heal from the momentum of our conditioning for the well-being and sustainability of the collective. With an awareness of the untenable nature of perpetuating patriarchal dominance, efforts to unpack and uproot this internalization have …

The Anti-Plantation Uprising: Indigenous Kinship, Territories, And Communal Politics In Guatemala, 1966-1982, Sergio G. Palencia Frener

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Indigenous Maya in Guatemala lived through one of Latin America’s most intense conflicts during the second part of the twentieth century. This research focuses on Maya politics, kinship relations, and interethnic experiences in multifarious mobilization through social democratic parties, rural unions, and cooperatives (1966-1974), and the intricacies of Maya indigenous participation in peasant organizations and insurgencies during the war escalation (1976–1982). This work reassesses Maya indigenous communal politics beyond Cold War dichotomies and situates the villages as central loci to grapple with the complexity of indigenous history during the Guatemalan war. Through research in Akateko, Kaqchikel, K’iche’, and Ixil territories, …

Transnational Ritual Poetics Of Blackness In Performance, Nina A. Mercer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, I investigate transnational ritual poetics of Blackness through a historical, cultural, and spatial lens, centering my exploration on the recurrence of circles, the crossroads, and waterways. I show how these formal poetics activate Africana cosmologies, cosmogonies, and mythologies dramaturgically by centering contemporary New York City performance works that bring together dance, theatre, and music. I contextualize NYC performance case studies in relation to performance practices in contemporary Salvador da Bahia. I am particularly interested in how the recurrence of circles, the crossroads, and water as formal poetics catalyze interventions along contested water-ways and landscapes marked by Black …

Only For The Pleasure Of Telling: Filling The Void In Pasolini's Trilogia Della Vita, Courtney Munson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Since Pasolini deliberately cultivated an unrecognizable and illegible public image that embraced incoherence, much of the scholarship surrounding him is plagued by contradictions and mutual exclusivity. For some, Pasolini was a utopian prophet, for others apocalyptic, but most agree that he, through his transmedial and highly self-inscribed life-work, was responding primarily to the crises of neocapitalist consumerism, especially its degenerative effects on sexual conventions and the body. Through an investigation of Pasolini’s controversial essays on film theory, the details of his biography, and the films of the Trilogia della vita, this thesis argues that it is a mistake to …

From Atoll To Mainland: Aging Micronesians In The Context Of Migration, Juliana Flinn

Pacific Studies

A case study of the atoll of Pollap, part of Chuuk State in the Federated States of Micronesia, analyzes changes in the process of aging over the past forty years, in particular as a result of migration of Micronesians to Guam, Hawai‘i, and the mainland United States. Forty years ago, most elderly aged at home surrounded by family to care for them, valued for their knowledge, advice, and even some productive activities. With migration, however, many elderly now live abroad with grown children. Some migrated as young people, found jobs, acquired good English skills, and have made homes in the …

Contextualizing Performers In Circus Route Books: Linked Data Entities And The Open Data Environment, Angela Yon

Faculty and Staff Publications – Milner Library

Focuses on the final phase of the 4-year Council on Library and Information Resources grant project Step Right Up: Digitizing Over 100 Years of Circus Route Books. The digital humanities exhibit, Agency through Otherness: Portraits of Performers in Circus Route Books 1875-1925, features essays, images, interactive timelines, and map data visualizations of circus routes with Native Lands, historical railroads, and population data. The study examines the project’s planning and data methodologies alongside the integration of technology tools and digital storytelling with complex histories to elevate underrepresented voices and exemplify the diverse historical record.

A Poetically Embodied Out-Of-Body Experience, Natalie Sunseri

Honors Theses

The choreographic project Euphoric Dysphoria emerged as a response to the choreographer’s gender dysphoria and personal observations about the way that feminine-presenting people are perceived and approached in dance spaces, particularly in comparison to masculine-presenting people. The dance originated as a choreographic exploration of extreme femininity and masculinity, and it evolved into a manifestation of performative gender and experiential gender. The choreographer was guided by her poem “Uneven Envy” when developing movement and building relationships among the dancers. She considered the contributions of Judith Butler, a scholar who writes about gender manifesting in the body due to socialization, and Laura …

Cultural Folk, Political Lore: The Politics Of Folklore During The United States Occupation Of Haiti From 1915 To 1934, Cheyla G. Muñoz Ramos

Honors Theses

My project focuses on Haitian folklore in the early twentieth century in connection to the first United States’ occupation of Haiti. The United States’ Marine Corps occupied Haiti from 1915 to 1934. This nineteenth-year occupation brought violence and racial stereotypes towards the Haitian population, especially the peasantry. United States Americans coming to Haiti intensified these stereotypes. During this period, Haitian upper-and middle-class members heavily politized Haitian folklore and used it to defend Haiti against these stereotypes. Scholars have long discussed the anthropological works of ethno-anthropologist Jean Price-Mars as someone who tried to show the value of Haitian folklore, especially the …

All The Rumors Are True: Verification, Actual Malice, And Celebrity Gossip, Jasmine E. Mcnealy

Missouri Law Review

More than half of Americans get their news from social media. These spaces – social media platforms, video and audio recommender systems, social news and gossip boards – have their own fact-checking and editorial cultures that, although not the exact same as those found in newsrooms, offer similar controls for the distribution of information. While imperfect, just like the controls of traditional media, these fact-checking cultures may offer a response to recent US judicial rejection of actual malice and provide a route of inquiry for courts examining evidence to determine if a defamation plaintiff has met the heightened standard. This …

Dna Ancestry Testing And Racial Discourse In Higher Education: How The (Re)Biologization Of Race (Un)Settles Monoracialism For Graduate Students, Orkideh Mohajeri, Marc P. Johnston-Guerrero, Anita K. Foeman, Bessie Lee Lawton

Communication and Media Faculty Publications

The recent proliferation of DNA testing in both popular culture and higher education calls to question whether such testing reifies race as a biological construct and, in particular, whether or not it disrupts or reinforces monoracial categorizations. Graduate students, who are often at a point in their educational journeys to further question and critique commonly held ideas, provide a unique lens through which to investigate discourses surrounding DNA testing. In this qualitative study, we analyze data from four focus groups with 22 racially diverse U.S. graduate students who had recently completed an ancestry test. We identify two specific discourses that …

Jane Crow Constitutionalism, Evan D. Bernick

Northern Illinois University Law Review

On June 24, 2022 The United States Supreme Court issued its decision on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization; overturning Roe v. Wade, and destroying fifty years of precedent to protect the constitutional right to abortion in the United States. This overturning sets a dangerous, new precedent that reinforces the State’s control of reproduction, and criminalizes a woman’s right to choose, with very few exceptions. In states like Mississippi, Black women are already experiencing the highest rates of maternal mortality, incarceration, and poverty.

This article posits that Dobbs operates to maintain a racialized and gendered underclass, and names this phenomenon …

Introduction, Marama Muru-Lanning, Hilary Lapsley

Pacific Studies

This special issue of Pacific Studies focuses on well-being amongst indigenous Pacific elders. Well-being is a widely used concept, but research is lacking on how well-being is understood in Oceania. This issue involves studies on the well-being of elders from Rotuma, Papua New Guinea and Pollap, as well as Māori and Pacific peoples in Aotearoa/New Zealand.

Our collection emphasizes two pou, or posts, supporting well-being amongst Pacific elders. The first, aging in place, has a Pacific twist, where homeplaces are whenua, ancestral places of deep connection imbued with cultural and relational significance. Vā, meaning relational space, is a related concept. …

Vol. 46 No. 1 (2023): Pacific Studies Full Issue, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Pacific Studies is published two times a year by The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies, Brigham Young University Hawai‘i #1979, 55–220 Kulanui Street, Lā ‘ie, Hawai‘i 96762, but responsibility for opinions expressed in the articles rests with the authors alone. Subscription rate is US$40.00 yearly, payable to The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies. The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies (formerly The Pacific Institute) is an organization funded by Brigham Young University Hawai‘i. The Center assists the University in meeting its cultural and educational goals by undertaking a program of teaching, research, …