Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies Commons^™

Enduring Resilience: An Exploration Of Puerto Rican Colonization, Hurricane Maria, And Ongoing Healing Through Cultural Rituals, Jasmin Isabel Torrejón

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

This thesis seeks to illuminate the economic, cultural and social subjugation of Puerto Rico, and its people, through the stripping of personal and political self-determination imposed by U.S. colonization. This research explores historic examples of Puerto Rican perseverance and analyzes psychologically protective factors supporting survivorship and resilience, such as familism and ontological security. The effects of Hurricane Maria on mental health are highlighted in the research, as is the correlation between a lack of electrical power and adverse health/wellness outcomes. Models for collective liberation and social justice are discussed and exemplified through the case study of a march that took …

Humanizing The Enslaved Of Fort Monroe’S Arc Of Freedom, William R. Kelly Jr.

Journal of Contemporary Archival Studies

Fort Monroe, located in Hampton, Virginia, was a United States Army post until its deactivation in 2011. President Barack Obama proclaimed Fort Monroe a national monument due to its complex history, including its ties to slavery and emancipation. This paper outlines an ongoing research project designed to identify and humanize both the enslaved who helped build the fort and those who were declared as contraband there during the American Civil War. Housed in the National Archives and Records Administration in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the United States Army Engineer Records from 1819 to 1866 is the main area of focus for this …

Kumain Na Tayo! Exploring The Role Of Food In Communicating Tradition And Instilling Familial Values, Aaron Negrillo

Student Research

As a core part of Asian values, family plays a huge role in developing the individual’s identity. Family strongly contributes to the passing down of traditions and values. The expression of cultural values can be observed through many surface-level interactions such as food and meal rituals. This auto-ethnography explores the link between food and culture, specifically how it serves as a vehicle of communication that passes down traditions and values. The underlying core values of hospitality, respect, and sacrifice stand emerged from the thematic analysis conducted. Overall, food can be understood as a tangible expression of love: creating something for …

Damming The Columbia River And Its Impact On Celilo Falls, Dalton R. Stormo

Young Historians Conference

This paper discusses the history of Native Americans at Celilo Falls and in the Dalles Area, as well as the impact of white settlers moving there. It focuses on the impact this had on the river itself, through fisheries and various damming projects, and how it affected the lives of the various tribes surrounding the river. It examines the impacts of damming the Columbia River at various points along the river, and what that did to life for the River Tribes. The thesis of this paper is that the flooding of Celilo Falls by the Dalles Dam was a final …

Extra-Activism: Counter-Mapping And Data Justice, Dorothy Kidd

Media Studies

Neither big data, nor data justice are particularly new. Data collection, in the form of land surveys and mapping, was key to successive projects of European imperialist and then capitalist extraction of natural resources. Geo-spatial instruments have been used since the fifteenth century to highlight potential sites of mineral, oil, and gas extraction, and inscribe European economic, cultural and political control across indigenous territories. Although indigenous groups consistently challenged maintained their territorial sovereignty, and resisted corporate and state surveillance practices, they were largely unable to withstand the combined onslaught of surveyors, armed personnel, missionaries and government bureaucrats. This article examines …

“Flowing Along The Wall”: Anarcha-Feminist Bioethics And Resistance In Octavia E. Butler’S Dawn 2019., Theresa Mendez

Master's Theses

Science fiction (sf) texts conversant with the temporal play between past, present, and future push readers to imagine the extremes of human and environmental existence, interaction, and potential. Simultaneously, despite the sf genre’s tendency to traffic in extremes, these texts provoke readers to consider the ways in which these imagined worlds are grounded in history as well as in the contemporary social moment. As Donna Haraway has argued, “the boundary between science fiction and social reality is an optical illusion” (306). This illusory boundary must continue to be traversed in order to consider how sf literatures, particularly those which imagine …

Native Americans, The California Missions, And The Long-Term Effects Of Colonization, Jasminder Bains

Library Diversity Fellows Publications

This historical essay re-centers the narrative about the California Mission period on the Native American perspective. Areas of focus include the Ohlone, the ecological changes to Santa Clara Valley, cultural hegemony, oppression, and modern-day connections.

Jesse Routte: Using Style To Signify Injustice, Emma Nordmeyer

Race, Ethnicity, & Religion

Jesse Routte, first African-American student to graduate Augustana, made national headlines in 1947 for wearing a turban on a visit to Alabama. In this paper, I explore how Routte's stylistic choices uprooted and questioned the racism of the Jim Crow era.

Inlp Newsletter, May 2019, Indigenous Nations Library Program

Monthly Newsletters

Contents

- Academic Service Hours

• University Libraries 2019 Spring Finals Prep and Finals
• Ethnic Centers Tutoring Hours
• CAPS Learning Strategies Workshops

- Congratulations Graduates & INLP Graduation Party

- Kiva Club and Native Americans at the University of New Mexico Oral History Project

- Native American Policy & Community Building Forum

- Edward Wemytewa Pop-up Display

- Michael & Enokena Olson Memorial Scholarship Recipients

• Lora Church
• Cheryl Yazzie

Pastoral Leadership In A Cross-Cultural, Multicultural, Conflict-Driven Congregation: A Filipino Case Study, Ed Volfe

Doctor of Ministry Projects and Theses

Pastoral Leadership in a Cross-Cultural, Multicultural, Conflict-Driven Congregation: A Filipino Case Study

Christ Redeemer was a Cross-Cultural, Multicultural church where the majority of the members were Filipinos. The church experienced way too many conflicts that distracted everyone in the congregation from the real calling to “make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.”[1] The ethos of Christ Redeemer seemed to be driven by conflict, regardless of whether the leadership provided came from a Filipino or a non-Filipino pastor. The congregation fed conflict upon conflict, creating a cycle of tension with little engagement in critical issues in the …

Resolving Conflict Between Canada’S Indigenous Peoples And The Crown Through Modern Treaties: Yukon Case History, Kirk Cameron

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article presents an example of how modern treaties with Yukon First Nations have created a foundation for co-relational involvement in the direction and control of land and resource management throughout Canada’s subnational region of Yukon, approximately 470,000 square kilometers in size. The modern treaties with eleven of the fourteen Yukon First Nations create assessment and management structures where appointment to these bodies are nominations not only from the territorial and federal governments but from the Yukon First Nations. The rights captured in the treaties are protected under Canada’s supreme law, the Constitution Act, 1982. The treaty relationship has effectively …

Contextualizing Approaches To Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences Of Intractable Conflict, Michele A. Sam

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article contextualizes intractable conflict within the lived experiences and worldviews of an Indigenous person, imbued with academic and scholarly research. The text illustrates how intractable conflict is experienced within the “developed world,” resulting in both freedom and fragmentation. Whether intractable conflict stems from colonial and postcolonial development and influences current Indigenous Peoples’ self-development efforts in Canada, specifically, and possibly across British colonies in general seems to be a new inquiry. The author relates her intergenerational experiences of contact, unpacking research and development in its many forms alongside the characteristics of intractable conflict and related federal Indian and social policy. …

Becoming Legible: The Racial Making Of The Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole People In The Coahuila–Texas Borderland, Rocío Gil Martínez De Escobar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This historical ethnography analyzes the making of the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole people as part of the production of the Coahuila-Texas borderland. In the quest to become legible to improve their living conditions and maintain a sense of dignity, Negros Mascogos/Black Seminoles use history and racialization as tools of negotiation between themselves and the two nation-states where they live: Mexico and the United States. I analyze the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole people as a case of racialization that illustrates the ongoing mechanisms of settler colonialism (dispossession, exploitation, and elimination via genocide or assimilation), as they play out in specific socio-historical contexts.

The …

Hearing/S: Will In The Carceral Archive, Kayla Morse

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This long-form poetry project follows the human will — in this case the “criminal,” or captive will — as it is manhandled through an archive of reverends, wardens and superintendents narrating the future of prison reform. Drawing primarily from National Prison Association Conference archives between the years 1874 and 1895, these documents saturate the work with a will resistant but compelled towards subjugation by the state — as it appears within the text across forced labor economies, eugenic prison science that dictates starvation, classification, and isolation as the rule, the dehumanization of banal bureaucratic processes, the visceral and spectacular violence …

Italian/Americans And The American Racial System: Contadini To Settler Colonists?, Stephen J. Cerulli

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis explores the relationship between ethnicity and race, “whiteness,” in the American racial system through the lens of Italian/Americans. Firstly, it overviews the current scholarship on Italian/Americans and whiteness. Secondly, it analyzes methodologies that are useful for understanding race in an American context. Thirdly, it presents a case study on the Columbus symbol and the battle over identity that arose out of, and continues over, this symbol. Finally, this thesis provides suggestions using the case study and methodologies to open up new ways of understanding Italian/Americans and the American racial system.

Racial Microaggressions Cohort Differences., Shayla R. Thompson

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses

This study examines the relationship between racial microaggressions and psychological distress and anger rumination among younger and older cohorts who belong to a racial or ethnic group other than White or European-American. The purpose of this study was to compare these relationships between older and younger cohorts. The hypotheses were that age will moderate the relationship between racial microaggressions and psychological distress and that age will moderate the relationship between racial microaggressions and anger rumination. A survey method was used to test the two hypotheses. Participants were recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk and were compensated $1 for their participation. The …

Perceptions Of The North American Free Trade Agreement And Mexican Migration: “What Is The Relationship Between Trade Liberalization And Labor Mobility?”, Colin Gonzalez

Political Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

In an effort to understand the effectiveness of the North American Free Trade Agreement, the author uses previous academic literature to assesses the success of the North American Free Trade Agreement’s primary and peripheral goals. To understand how North American citizens, perceive NAFTA and their future relationship with one another, the author uses survey data to analyze attitudes of American and Mexican citizens towards trade liberalization (NAFTA) and labor mobility. Regression analysis reveals that there is a positive relationship between labor mobility and trade liberalization for Mexican citizens but not for American citizens. This is a significant finding that contributes …

Does Family Income Determine A Children Future Educational Attainment Level?, Diaisha T. Richards

Applied Economics Theses

Family income and education have been a major concern in a variety of researches, and as a topic in society. These two components are a major concern because they are known to be key elements in determining future success for an individual. Various studies investigated the significance, correlations and impacts these two factors have on one another. It is common for the amount of family income obtained to determine how much education one will receive in the future. This study focuses on testing the hypothesis that family income determines how much education a child will receive in the future. By …

Socially Constructing Marijuana Policy And Target Populations In The News Media, Jonathan Taylor Langner

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research focuses on different aspects of the co-construction African Americans and marijuana in the news. First, the historical background of modern drug laws, including marijuana prohibition, and how this was dependent on racialized fears in the wake of the abolition of slavery. Next, the prevalence and variety of marijuana constructions in a national newspaper, with careful attention paid to associations with racial identifiers. Finally, how African American athletes and marijuana are co-constructed in an exemplary article.

Chapter 2 describes how racial fears relate to the social construction of disadvantaged population in the media. We first describe the current situation …

They Soon Forgot Their Words - Documentary, Karen Paulk

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This documentary film, They Soon Forgot Their Words, is about the language issues that threaten the Kaqchikel Mayan language spoken in Guatemala. It is one of 21 Mayan languages spoken in the country and is one of the most widely used with more than 500,000 speakers. Unfortunately, however, scholars have noticed that Kaqchikel is in a state of “shift” a process where one language combines with another in speech. As is the case with many Mayan languages in Guatemala, Kaqchikel is often combined with Spanish in speech. The colloquial name used for the combining of these two languages is “kaqchinol.” …

The Farmers’ Federation: Regional Racial Mythologies As Agricultural Capital, Jama Mcmurtery Grove

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In 1927, the Farmers’ Federation agricultural cooperative in Western North Carolina launched an organization to solicit funds from wealthy donors. The money raised through philanthropic campaigns enabled the cooperative to fund large-scale agricultural projects, which helped members navigate the dramatic agricultural transformations of the early twentieth century. Although the cooperative advocated a progressive program of business-minded, scientific farming, its leadership modified programs to reflect farmer members’ limited resources and the realities of mountain production. As a result, the co-op provided a crucial bridge between white farmers and new methods of agricultural production that reached deep into peoples’ familial and productive …

An Exploratory Study Of The Impact Of Acculturation On Fashion Consumption Among Hispanic Immigrants In The U.S., Laura Toloza

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

With a population of 58 million in 2016, the Hispanic immigrant population in the U.S. is expected to grow nearly 30% by 2060 (Hispanic influence, 2016). Immigrants are affected by acculturation and often have difficulty maintaining their culture of origin. Prior studies have revealed acculturation influences on consumer behaviors, but despite the increased population and purchasing power of Hispanic immigrants in the U.S., few studies have explored the ways in which acculturation influences shopping behaviors for fashion products among Hispanic consumers. The purpose of this study is to explore the general attitude related to shopping (i.e., shopping orientation) of Hispanic …

Black Female Graduate Students' Experiences Of Racial Microaggressions At A Southern University, Kendra Elizabeth Shoge

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Researchers have found that microaggressions can cause psychological distress, frustration, avoidance, confusion, resentment, hopelessness, and fear. Previous studies from Southern universities have addressed the adjustment experiences of Black women in graduate programs, obstacles faced by Black women in higher education and strategies to overcome those obstacles, and factors associated with Black student motivation and achievement. Discrimination and racism are factors identified in those studies, however, there is little research on the experiences of Black women in graduate programs and the impact of racial microaggressions on them.

The purpose of this study was to examine Black female graduate students’ experiences of …

Promise And Practice: Toward An Expanded, Integrated, Collaborative Narrative On American Indians In Our National Parks, Bethany Hope Henry

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Managed by the National Park Service, the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail, established in 1987, was developed to preserve physical segments of land and water routes, but also sites of memory such as unmarked graves and internment camps. Because the foundation of the national trail was the result of successful partnership of Cherokee grassroots efforts and multiple trail and federal advocates, the evolution of that collaboration merits consideration after thirty years to evaluate the application of standards for consultation, co-management, and heritage tourism. While the national trail preserves and marks the various routes, this study examines how three national …

Losing Louisiana: Race, Techno-Science, And The Disappearing Geographies Of The Lower Mississippi River Delta, Monica Patrice Barra

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Based on eighteen months of ethnographic and historical research in southeast coastal Louisiana (USA), this dissertation explores the racial histories, engineering and scientific practices, and geophysical processes that have shaped land loss and coastal restoration in the lower Mississippi River Delta. Rather than treating land loss simply as a natural process or matter of environmental restoration, this ethnography examines its cultural, material, and political dimensions, especially for communities of color that have already experienced long histories of loss — of property, livelihood, and political rights. A focus on the geophysical transformations of the river - dictating land growth, sinking, and …

Racial Becoming: How Agentic (Self-Initiated) Encounter Events Inform Racial Identity Refinement, Devin A. Heyward

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Racial identity literature has typically focused on identity formation through a series of stages. It also has centered how the experience of negative encounter events informs racial identity formation. With the advent of new genealogical and genomic technology, it is imperative to expand the focus of identity literatures to include encounter events, which participants elect to experience (i.e. self-initiated or agentic encounter events). By using this frame, identity processes become fluid and informed by individual life experiences. In the context of this study, direct to consumer genetic ancestry tests (DTC-GAT) are operationalized as a self-initiated encounter event. Participants were …

Contested Development: A Poor People's Movement For A Better Los Angeles, 1960–2018, Deshonay R. Dozier

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Zooming in on the historical development of Downtown Los Angeles’s (LA) Skid Row, this dissertation traces a continuity of abolitionist alternatives made by homeless and poor Angelinos from the 1960s to our present day. Skid Row is an important entry way into Los Angeles urban politics, particularly with respect to how forms of difference, at the axis of race, gender, class, and ability shape regional relations of property and the built environment. I show how these relations shape Downtown Los Angeles’s geography through carceral practices. These carceral practices, made by social services and policing, shape space by routinely containing and …

Poetic Representation Of Immigrant Bengali Women From Queens, New York: A Qualitative Exploration Of Narrative In Relation To Physical And Cultural Migration, Tabashshum J. Islam

Publications and Research

Poetic Representation of Immigrant Bengali Women from Queens, New York: A Qualitative Exploration of Narrative in Relation to Physical and Cultural Migration is a qualitative poetic inquiry and collaborative creative writing project. Five participants were interviewed and invited to engage in a collaborative writing process with the themes of immigration, cultural negotiation, and oral family history. All participants identified as college-educated Bengali women with a connection to Queens, New York, as well as being an immigrant or relative of an immigrant in the United States. From transcriptions of one-on-one interviews and personal notes, research-poetry was created to center on the …

The Unsung Hero Character: A Harbinger Device Of Misfortune, Eutimio Talavera

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis introduces an obscure storytelling device, The Unsung Hero character, as one way of examining how movies function as stories. This character is often overlooked, as it frequently cloaks its idiosyncrasies, thus it lacks any apparent signs of internal conflict. This analysis foregrounds the character’s overall functionality, found only in rare instances and typically in the story of a movie. With effective implementation in a story, as a functional harbinger device, brief appearances of The Unsung Hero character demonstrate flashpoints or disclosures of a forthcoming misfortune in the story. This movie analysis shows how The Unsung Hero character functions …

Set In Stone: Recontextualizing The Lithic Assemblage Of A Seventeenth-Century Storage Cellar In Charlestown, Massachusetts, Anna M. Greco

Graduate Masters Theses

Feature 43 is a domestic structure that belonged to the wealthy seventeenth-century merchant community of Charlestown, Massachusetts, and was excavated in the early 1980s as part of the Maudlin Archaeological District. The extant collection has remained in storage for the last thirty years, demanding a recontextualization of the site, both in provenience and in historical context. Primary sources portray an image of a predominantly European settler household; however, a counter-narrative emerges from lithics found within the assemblage. While the ultimate goal is to analyze the patterns of lithic sourcing and production in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the findings hinge on …