African Languages and Societies Commons^™

The Knowledge Of Ideophones In Multilingual Contexts: A West African Pilot Study, George Tucker Childs

Applied Linguistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

This presentation examines the ubiquity of multilingualism and its somewhat uncertain characterization; the claim for linguistic repertoires vs. languages; how to evaluate and document a linguistic repertoire, economically and expeditiously; ideophones as functionally areal but formally local, thus a control for borrowings; and, is there any sharing in highly multilingual areas? Are ideophones less local than has been empirically shown?

The Knowledge Of Ideophones And Multilingualism: A West African Pilot Study, George Tucker Childs

Applied Linguistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

Expressive language such as ideophones and mimetics have provided an important index of social and cultural features. On the continent of Africa, where the word category is generally known as ideophones, such words appear in every major phylum and in most families. They even appear in the continent’s pidgins and creoles, thus representing a language function of some considerable areality. The one place they do not appear, however, is in the colonizing languages when they have not been appropriated by local communities. When the European languages become every day varieties, however, ideophones are regularly used just as they would in …

La Colonisation, L’Identité Et L’Ambition Dans Deux Romans Francophones, Abdulameer Waly

Department of Modern Languages and Literatures: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cette étude se focalise sur la crise d’identité dans deux textes africains, écrit en français, Une vie de boy, de Ferdinand Oyono, et L’ex-père de la nation d’Aminata Sow Fall. Les personnages principaux de ces deux romans se trouvent dans des situations compliquées à cause des traces laissés par l’époque coloniale. Ils se trouvent déchirés entre le désir de garder leurs modes de vie traditionnelles, et la nécessité de se modifier avec la nouvelle culture qui s’impose et change irrévocablement la vie de ces personnages. Ils n’arrivent pas à concilier leurs rêves, ou leurs ambitions, avec la réalité de leurs …

Songs Of Passage And Sacrifice: Gabriella Ghermandi’S Stories In Performance, Laura Dolp, Eveljn Ferraro

Modern Languages & Literature

In this time and on this page, Spivak's island seems an apt place to begin a discussion about storytelling, resistance, and belonging. This chapter documents a conversation originating from two disciplinary perspectives-literature (Ferraro) and music (Dolp). We explore how spoken-word performance in a global context can facilitate social empowerment, craft a cultural past, and invigorate political consciousness. Although our analytical strategies and some of our conclusions differ, we share the assertion that the notion of artistic citizenship as it is defined elsewhere in this collection is considerably complicated, and even requires redefinition, in the context of non-Western cultures. Our present …

Nit Nitay Garabame: Analyzing Mental Illness And Art Therapy Within Dakar’S Atelier D’Ex-Pression Artistique, Alaina Orr

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

As mental health issues are usually given low priority in countries of sub-Saharan Africa, including Senegal, mental illness continues to be an emerging topic of discourse (Rand 2015). In Dakar, the practice of art therapy has been used for decades to provide those living with mental illness or going through trauma with a method for selfexpression when words fail to articulate their situations or mental states. Situated within Hôpital Fann’s psychiatric hospital, Clinique Moussa Diop, is an art therapy workshop known as l’Atelier d’EX-PRESSION Artistique1, which provides the space, structure, and material for persons with mental illness to work with …

Give A Man A Fish: A Narrative Approach To A Case Study Of Soup Kitchens In The Wentworth Community, Evelyn Shen

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This study uses a narrative approach to explore the role of soup kitchens in the predominantly Coloured and English-speaking Wentworth community. Many of the community’s churches1 and non-profit organizations host soup kitchens regularly, rotating so that there is a meal available each day of the week.

Qualitative data was gathered through volunteering with the soup kitchens as a participant observer and having conversations and open-ended interviews with soup kitchen guests and hosts. Institutional context was provided by interviews with the Convener of the War Room and the Ward Councillor, and representatives of three non-profits in the community. In order to …

A Neocolonial Warp Of Outmoded Hierarchies, Curricula And Disciplinary Technologies In Trinidad’S Educational System, Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams

Africana Studies Faculty Publications

I re-appropriate the image of a space-time warp and its notion of disorientation to argue that colonialism created a warp in Trinidad’s educational system. Through an analysis of school violence and the wider network of structural violence in which it is steeped, I focus on three outmoded aspects as evidence of this warp--hierarchies, curricula and disciplinary technologies--by using data (interviews, documents and observations) from a longitudinal case study at a secondary school in Trinidad. Colonialism was about exclusion, alienation, violence, control and order, and this functionalism persists today; I therefore contend that hierarchies, curricula and disciplinary technologies are all enforcers …

Negotiating Globalization From Below: Social Entrepreneurship, Neoliberalism, And The Making Of The New South African Subject, Oceane Jasor

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Neoliberal globalization can threaten the growth of a global civil society that sanctions power-sharing arrangements. Yet, scholarship that focuses unidirectionally on global processes may in effect eviscerate the transformative power of the local. To counter this tendency, this dissertation examines the interrelationships between contextualized and historically-specific experiences in South Africa and transnational processes through a case study of social entrepreneurship, an emerging global justice movement. Drawing on a 12-months institutional ethnography of Sonke Gender Justice, a transnational social entrepreneurship NGO working to achieve gender equality, prevent gender-based violence and reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS in Southern Africa, this dissertation explores …

The Definite Article In Mel, George Tucker Childs

Applied Linguistics Faculty Publications and Presentations

As a function word, the definite article is subject to some attrition in the course of language change, usually originating in a a form with fuller phonetic substance such as a demonstrative, e.g., Greenberg 1978. This generalization holds true for the Mel languages, spoken in the countries of Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia. These languages were formerly part of the southern branch of Atlantic but are now thought to constitute an independent, e.g., Segerer Forthcoming. The reconstructed form of the Mel definite article is likely *lɛ (tone uncertain). In some dialects of Bom-Kim and the Dema dialect of Sherbro its …

Outliving Love: Marital Estrangement In An African Insurance Market, Casey Golomski

Anthropology

Marital estrangement and formal divorce are vital conjunctures for married women’s kinship relations and life course, where a horizon of future possibilities are revalued and negotiated at the interstices of custom, law, and social and ritual obligations. In this article, after delineating the forms of customary and civil marriage and the possibilities for divorce or estrangement from each, I describe how some married women in Swaziland and South Africa mediate this complex social field for their children and families through pensions and continuing to pay for their partners’ insurance coverage. This was not solely out of avarice to reap future …

Reconsidering The Orphan Problem: The Emergence Of Male Caregivers In Lesotho, Ellen Block

Sociology Faculty Publications

Care for AIDS orphans in southern Africa is frequently characterized as a "crisis", where kin-based networks of care are thought to be on the edge of collapse. Yet these care networks, though strained by AIDS, are still the primary mechanisms for orphan care, in large part because of the essential role grandmothers play in responding to the needs of orphans. Ongoing demographic shifts as a result of HIV/AIDS and an increasingly feminized labor market continue to disrupt and alter networks of care for orphans and vulnerable children. This paper examines the emergence of a small but growing number of male …

Tapez Le Tam-Tam And The People Will Come: A Study Of Theater For Social Justice In Kaolack, Senegal, Emily Schwerdtfeger

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of theater to create social change and raise awareness of social issues as used by the troupe Bamtaare in Kaolack, Senegal. Further study was done to determine why theater was successful and whether this type of theater can be implemented in the United States. I spent four weeks in Kaolack working with the troupe to understand their methods. While in Kaolack, I observed rehearsals and performances, conducted interview with actors and audience members, and reviewed relevant literature. My research showed that Bamtaare’s performances in urban neighborhoods and rural villages did …

World Churches Vertical File, Mcgarvey Ice

Center for Restoration Studies Vertical Files Finding Aids

This set of files is especially useful to scholars of the history missions, particularly among Churches of Christ in the twentieth century. Students and researchers interested in applied missiology among Restorationist traditions, Stone-Campbell movements, and Churches of Christ will also find them helpful. For assistance with specific files or items, contact Mac Ice - mac.ice@acu.edu, or 325.674.2144.

Social Context Surrounding Hiv Diagnosis And Construction Of Masculinity: A Qualitative Study Of Stigma Experiences Of Heterosexual Hiv Positive Men In Southwest Nigeria, Titilayo A. Okoror, Catherine O. Falade, Mary O. Walker, Agaptus Anaele

Africana Studies Faculty Scholarship

Background: Though research has documented experiences of stigma and its effects on the lives of women living with HIV/AIDS, there is limited research on heterosexual positive HIV men experience of stigma in Nigeria. This study explored how social context surrounding HIV diagnosis impacts stigma experiences of heterosexual HIV positive men and their construction of masculinity in southwest Nigeria.

Methods: Using purposive sampling, 17 heterosexual HIV positive men were recruited through community based organization to participate in two hours focus group discussions or 45 min in-depth interviews that were audio-recorded. Without using the word stigma, discussions and interviews were guided by …

Intercultural Communication Within A Multigenerational Afghan Family, Sarah Sultan

Senior Honors Projects

“If you were in Afghanistan would you have to wear a hijab?” After being asked that question all of my life, I focused my entire honor’s project on bringing light to the misconceptions regarding Afghanistan and its people. I do this through extensive research into a diaspora of an Afghan families and the creation of an instructional video. . There are many ways in which Afghanistan and the United States are similar, but also different, which is also showcased by Afghans throughout the video. Afghan members from different generations have shared their perspective, experiences, and lifestyles and explained how Afghanistan …

The Effect Of Past Institutional Structures On Current Economic Development Levels: The Former French African Colonies, Ana May Jerolamon

Senior Honors Projects

By the early 1960’s, most of the French colonies in Africa had gained independence. Since then, these former colonies have reached economic development levels that vary widely by country. This project will argue that while most of these countries were official colonies for less than one hundred years, the institutions that were created during the colonial period still have an effect on the current economic development of such countries. Since political institutions become intertwined with the culture and structure of a country,

they are extremely hard to modify; therefore, we can expect to find the presence of institutions that are …

Protecting The Right To Life Of The Internally Displaced: An Examination Of Encampment And Its Effects On The Communities In Unyama And Koro Sub-Counties In Gulu District, Northern Uganda, Ashley Alessandra

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This study examines the period of encampment in Northern Uganda, as related to the Lord’s Resistance Army conflict, and the effects that encampment has had on communities in Gulu District through present day. The objectives of this study include; to examine the process of displacement, to analyze whether displaced persons were accorded the right to security during the encampment period, to analyze the effects that encampment has had on communities during the return period, through present day, and to examine the ways in which various actors have attempted to address such effects. This analysis is conducted through a human rights …

Accessibility And Quality Of Education For Refugees: A Case Study Of Kyangwali Refugee Settlement, Meital Kupfer

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Education is a tool critical for a good future and success in an individual’s life. Without education, opportunities are lost. For vulnerable populations, including refugees, education is often not an indivisible right; living in a foreign country fleeing violence and persecution creates a difficult situation for learning. In Uganda, where there are over 600,000 refugees, hundreds of thousands of children are disregarded in the quality of their education. Kyangwali Refugee Settlement is one of ten Ugandan refugee settlements in Hoima district, housing over 40,000 Congolese and Sudanese refugees.

This research combined a practicum with Action Africa Help – Uganda, as …

Trauma And Recovery In Post-Conflict Northern Uganda: An Analysis Of Trauma And Its Effects On The Family, Shelby Logan

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Trauma in Northern Uganda stems from the atrocities that occurred during the Lord’s Resistance Army conflict. Because of this, thousands of victims were left traumatized by their experiences with disparities in aid to help them with their trauma. Utilizing the rural and urban areas in Kitgum and Gulu Municipality, this research seeks to understand how trauma presents itself in the Northern Uganda region and how it is defined by the population who treat it. This includes a list of disorders resulting from trauma and their symptoms. In addition, the efforts towards trauma healing and recovery are analyzed, including the different …

South African Marriage In Policy And Practice: A Dynamic Story, Michael W. Yarbrough

Publications and Research

Law forms one of the major structural contexts within which family lives play out, yet the precise dynamics connecting these two foundational institutions are still poorly understood. This article attempts to help bridge this gap by applying sociolegal concepts to empirical findings about state law's role in family, and especially in marriage, drawn from across several decades and disciplines of South Africanist scholarly research. I sketch the broad outlines of a nuanced theoretical approach for analysing the law-family relationship, which insists that the relationship entails a contingent and dynamic interplay between relatively powerful regulating institutions and relatively powerless regulated populations. …

The Origin And Development Of Tigrinya Language Publications (1886 - 1991) Volume One, Abraham Negash

Staff publications, research, and presentations

Tigrinya is a Semitic language spoken in Eritrea and in the Tigray Region of Northern Ethiopia. Tigrinya is one of the nine languages in Eritrea. It was one of Eritrea's official languages (along with Arabic) during the short-lived federation with Ethiopia (1952-1962). When Ethiopia officially annexed Eritrea in 1962, Amharic also formally replaced Tigrinya and Arabic; and was established as an official language by the imperial government of Ethiopia. In 1993, when Eritrea officially declared its independence through referendum. Tigrinya regained its status as a working language.

Tigrinya has its own alphabet of 32 letters adopted from Ge'ez, a language …

Casting Sound: Modality And Poetics In Gabriella Ghermandi’S Regina Di Fiori E Di Perle, Laura Dolp, Eveljn Ferraro

Modern Languages & Literature

This article investigates Gabriella Ghermandi’s novel Regina di fiori e di perle (2007) through two disciplinary perspectives: the first considers music as a historical and social practice through historical observation of Ghermandi’s characters who reference Ethiopian oral traditions; the second explores the contemporary dynamics of migration and transnational identity through textual analysis that critiques how storytelling practices are carried into an Italian context. We argue that the novel reflects a dissemination of oral memory across generations and gender and into a postcolonial setting, and that its characters reflect adaptations to institutional and twentieth-century technological change. Crucially, and more specifically, the …

Untitled, Chuck Barrett

Creative Works

This artwork featuring African currency stems from both a hobby of collecting and a desire to display some of the most colorful currency in the world in a media that is intriguing and informative.

Project Summary And Developmental Programs For Ishew, Lindsey Lequia, Dallas Rohraff

Honors Projects

On a seemingly normal day during my study abroad in Ghana, we noticed that the sun was shining in a sky that seemed to have no clouds. We were taking a trip to visit the water source of a community that contained nearly 1,000 people. Although it amazed us to think that that many people were fetching water each day from a river, we understood that others do not have access to the purified, city water that we are fortunate to have at home. When we pulled into the community, the reality of their lifestyle contrasted with what we had …

Staging (Within) Violence: A Conversation With Frank Wilderson And Jaye Austin Williams, Jaye Austin Williams

Faculty Journal Articles

No abstract provided.