Human Geography Commons^™

Gender And Remittances: Lived Experiences Of Women In Oaxaca, Mexico, Araby Smyth

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This dissertation project analyzes the ways that migration and remittances, the money that migrants send to people in their place of origin, intersect with the political and social dynamics in an Indigenous community in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region of Oaxaca, Mexico. Drawing on 16 months of ethnographic fieldwork, which included semi-structured interviews and participant observation alongside historical archival investigation, this dissertation examines the following questions: What international organizations, national government, and private sector policies govern remittances? How does Indigenous collective work and communal governance shape remittance management? How do the responsibilities of family members shift with migration and how …

"It's Not Rainbows And Unicorns": Regulated Commodity And Waste Production In The Alberta Oilsands, Hugh Deaner

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This dissertation examines the regulated oilsands mining industry of Alberta, Canada, widely considered the world’s largest surface mining project. The industrial processes of oilsands mining produce well over one million barrels of petroleum commodities daily, plus even larger quantities of airborne and semisolid waste. The project argues for a critical account of production concretized in the co-constitutional relations of obdurate materiality and labor activity within a framework of regulated petro-capitalism. This pursuit requires multiple methods that combine archives, participant observation, and semi-structured interviews to understand workers’ shift-to-shift relations inside the “black box” of regulated oilsands mining production where materiality co-constitutes …

Undoing Colorblind Ecologies: Redlining And Just Green Enough In The Urban Forest Of Boston's Franklin Park, Chelsea M. Parise

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Urban political ecology research increasingly engages multi-disciplinary methodologies to clarify the role that the botanic plays in creating, maintaining, or subverting ecological geographies of power. Fredrick Law Olmsted intended the forest within Franklin Park to heal the physical degeneration and social disunity he believed resulted from urban living conditions but instead the forest within Franklin Park has grown in contexts of increasingly complex environmental and racial difference. I examine how the urban forest in Boston’s Franklin Park has ecologically manifested racialized power relations through distinct periods of elite nature-making and segregated grassroots stewardship. I utilized archival research, forest surveys, and …

Affective Registers Of Displacement: Eviction And Gentrification In Post-Earthquake Mexico City, Jess Linz

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This dissertation contributes to understandings of the affective and emotional register of urban politics by analyzing how affective dynamics influence struggles over displacement in Mexico City amid rapid gentrification and in the wake of the 2017 earthquake. Drawing primarily on feminist and queer/cuir theory and trauma studies, I aim to show the relevance of an often-overlooked dimension of urban political struggles. This dissertation is based on data collected through ethnographic methods over the course of 2018-2021. The primary source of data is long-form semi-structured interviews, supported by participant observation in meetings, protests, and WhatsApp groups. The dissertation studies the following …

Tracks/Traces: The New Deal Transformation Of Lexington, Kentucky’S Landscapes Of Horseracing And Housing, Piotr Wojcik

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Lexington, Kentucky is a key node in the global thoroughbred horse industry. This archival research examines the transformation of its horseracing and housing geographies during the 1930s by comparing the redevelopment of an old urban racetrack into federal public housing with the simultaneous development of a new racing plant in the nearby countryside. It analyzes the social and economic relations underlying this shift in addition to how these relations were naturalized by the new landscapes they created. Results suggest that a local growth coalition was seeking to emerge from a financial crisis through a spatial fix that capitalized on cultural …

Speaking Of Home Here And There: Everyday Experiences Of Belonging Among Highly Educated Immigrants, Katherine Feske-Kirby

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

This thesis explores how highly educated immigrants articulate a sense of belonging upon relocating to the United States, more specifically to the Lexington, KY area. Engaging with feminist political geography as well as migration and cultural studies, I argue that articulations of belonging are framed through transnational attachments, which respectively expand individuals’ ability to employ everyday forms of belonging. Expressions and understandings of transnational belonging are framed through in-depth interviews on participants’ workplace, relational dynamics, and engagement with the geopolitical discourse on migration. Through these interviews, a broader representation belonging is presented, while questions on highly educated immigrants’ privilege and …

Part-Time Normals: Embodied Trans Geographies Of Homonationalism, Ivy Faye Monroe

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Self-understanding of one’s gender identity both emerges from, and rearticulates into, the ways one experiences and mediates their personal and social relationships with the geographic worlds they inhabit. Trans geographical literature has, to date, created compelling work on the social geographies of trans people in highly-gendered spaces. This thesis extends the existing literature to research how gender is both experienced and performed in the mundane structures of everyday life. Building from theories of cruel optimism and homonationalism, this research examines how the discursive and spatial epistemologies of gender identity inform attachments to structures of normativity. Through archival research of transvestite …

Environmental Racism In Baltimore: A Geographical Study Into The Connections Between Environmental Toxins And Public Health, Genevieve Block

Honors Theses

An investigation into the relationship between environmental toxins and environmental racism in Baltimore City, Maryland.

Wilderness And The Geotag: Exploring The Claim That "Geotagging Ruins Nature" In The Alpine Lakes Wilderness, Wa, Mara Gans

All Master's Theses

This research explores the claim that “geotagging ruins nature” by quantifying and qualifying patterns in geotag use and visitors’ experiences in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness, in Washington, United States. Many have raised concerns that geotags increase recreational visitation to public lands, which subsequently contributes to negative resource impacts. Others, however, claim that geotagging has made the outdoors more accessible to less privileged communities and raise concerns that condemning geotags will perpetuate the exclusion of certain groups from outdoor recreation. This debate is studied within federally designated Wilderness, which is legally defined as “untrammeled by man,” a definition rooted in problematic …

Deep Roots In Eroding Soil: Building Decolonial Resilience Amidst Climate Violence And Displacement In A Louisiana Bayou Indigenous Community, Lia Mcgrath Kahan

Senior Independent Study Theses

The Pointe-au-Chien Indigenous community of coastal Louisiana is fighting for survival as climate change and socio-political factors threaten to displace them from their ancestral home. This project takes an ethnographic and historical approach to exploring how colonization and climate change have influenced Pointe-au-Chien tribal members’ ability to stay on their ancestral land. Climate projections estimate that the bayou this community has lived alongside of for generations will soon be unrecognizable, leading to potential displacement and devastating cultural loss. Due to the increasing severity of climate change, it is crucial to look to the experiences of frontline Indigenous communities to support …

Three Method Tsunami Vulnerability Analysis Of The United States East Coast, Joshua Knolla

Master's Theses or Doctor of Nursing Practice

The East Coast of the United States could be susceptible to tsunamis or even mega tsunamis. With this in mind it becomes essential to answer the question: Where is vulnerability to a tsunami greatest along the East Coast of the United States? To answer this question the following parameters have been set. First, the study will include county level subdivisions along the USEC that have coasts along the Atlantic Ocean. The possible source regions of a tsunami or mega tsunami are also noted. This analysis includes both social and physical factors with nine and five of them considered respectively. Three …

Development And Disparity In Glasgow: The Desirability Of Urban Water Proximity, Brian Morgan

Theses and Dissertations

This study was conducted to examine the possibility that a spatial relationship exists between demographic trends considered to be indicative of gentrification, and ongoing regenerative activity taking place along an urban canal and the adjacent neighborhoods in a northern section of Glasgow, Scotland. Rates of demographic change between the 2001 and 2011 Scottish Census results for the study area were contrasted with the same variables citywide, using the census Output Area (OA) as the aggregate unit. Results were combined to produce an index of gentrification. Positive results towards gentrification were identified in many of the OAs for a significant number …

Political Culture: An Unexplored Factor In Climate Change Diplomacy, Alexander Suen

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

As climate change continues to ravage the world, mitigation efforts continue to be insufficient to rise to the challenge. Inaction on climate change has been traditionally explained by economic incentives, but some of the variability in climate policies cannot be explained by economics alone. Some variations could be accounted for by the deeply rooted national political culture of Anglo-settler colonies. This political culture may inhibit the willingness of such states to cooperate on climate change. In this dissertation, I describe the political philosophy of the Anglo-settler colony, and the histories of domination of its white settlers over the indigenous peoples …

"Ethnic" Some Days, White The Rest: Whittier, Ca As A Case Study In Mexican-American Racialization And Assimilation In Los Angeles County, Maria Gutierrez-Vera

CMC Senior Theses

Per the U.S. Census Bureau, the Latino population in the United States stands at 60.5 million. This thesis tells the story of a few hundred-thousand Mexican-Americans in Southeast Los Angeles County’s suburbs, who live in a region nicknamed the “Mexican Beverly Hills.” This is a unique site of middle-class ethnic affluence, but also a place where questions of “Hispanic” racial identity, assimilation, and belonging are played out. The Mexican Beverly Hills promises residents the fulfillment of their own (Mexican-) American Dream, but also plays into tropes of model minorities, demands assimilation and ethnic betrayal from its residents, and is the …

Tales From A Placeholder: A Relational Journey With Land, Place, People And Self, Kalle O. Fox

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The proposed thesis is a collection of place-based, long- and-short-form creative nonfiction essays. The places of interest are where the author spent different amounts of time in during her twenties, including Iceland, Miami and Seaside, Florida, Butte and Missoula, Montana, and a series of National Parks on the western side of the Continental Divide. This thesis is informed what cultural geographer Yi Fu Tuan coined as topophilia: the affective bond between people and place. “Place” and “sense of place,” while each having their own array of definitions in environmental scholarship, are considered interchangeable in the context of my work. A …

'Indirect Pathways Into Practice': Philippine Internationally Educated Nurses And Their Entry Into Ontario's Nursing Profession, Lualhati Marcelino

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

While there are several studies that highlight the quantitative and statistical profiles of internationally educated nurses (IENs) from the Philippines who migrate to countries throughout Asia, the Middle East, Europe, the United States and Canada, there is little research that delves deeply into the qualitative review and analysis of their experiences in their own words. This study addresses that gap by applying the transnational feminist concept of “global care chains” in a single case study design that explores the experience of nurses who migrated to Ontario through permanent and temporary immigration streams and were interviewed in 2011 to 2012 to …

Exploring The Relationship Between Drought And Population Change On The North American Great Plains, 1970-2010, George Heath

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Through the second half of the 20th century, the North American Great Plains saw widespread rural out-migration, a continuation of trends that began with the Dust Bowl crisis during the Great Depression of the 1930s. As part of a wider academic focus on the roles climate and environmental changes have on migration, this research project sought to understand the relationship between drought conditions and rural population decline on the Great Plains. In this explorative research, census population data for Canada and the US from 1970-2010 were analyzed along with temperature, precipitation, and Palmer Drought Severity Index data for the same …

Bee Cities And More-Than-Human Communities: Protecting Pollinators In The Anthropocene, Jennifer Marshman

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Grounded in political ecology and the ecological humanities, the aim of this research is to examine the Bee City movement as a conservation engagement strategy at the municipal level. While pollinator research occurs from a variety of perspectives – biology, entomology, phylogeny, ecology, and agricultural sciences - social engagement strategies and the human dimensions of pollinator conservation have yet to be widely investigated. This research questions if these strategies put in place, and contribute to, important political and socio-ecological mechanisms in the local context. Through a collective case study methodology, this research points to the Bee City movement as a …

Does Air Pollution Cause Residents Of New Delhi, India To Migrate Internationally?, Snigdha Basu

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Delhi, India, and the surrounding cities of Noida, Gurugram, Faridabad, and Ghaziabad consistently rank among the world's most polluted cities. For many parts of the year, air pollution levels are so high as to cause significant harm to human health, economy and the environment. Despite overwhelming evidence of the severity and consequences of air pollution, institutional measures to control it remain insufficient.

There is growing evidence that environmental degradation has the potential to generate migration of people out of affected areas. However, the links between environmental factors and migration are complex, with migration often being a result of interactions between …

Changes In Reproductive Behavior And Birth Patterns During The Covid-19 Pandemic In Sakartvelo (The Republic Georgia) [რეპროდუქციული ქცევასა და შობადობის ცვლილებები კოვიდ-19 პანდემიის დროს საქართველოში], Nino Mateshvili

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Because of the increased frequency and extent of large-scale disasters, including health events, there is a need to better understand the impacts of these disasters on key demographic processes. In particular, in the European countries, including the Republic of Georgia (Sakartvelo), which already face demographic problems, such as aging population and decreasing birth rates, researchers and policymakers are concerned with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on demographic indicators and processes, such as birth rates and reproductive behavior. That is why it is very timely to collect and analyze initial evidence establishing the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic as a …

Critical Perspectives On Produce Prescription Programs & Us Federal Nutrition Policy, Alanna K. Higgins

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Produce prescription programs, interventions operating at the intersection of food access and public health, are steadily increasing in number across the United States since 2010. I leverage key informant interviews, participant observations, and event ethnographies to form a four-year institutional ethnography of the implementation of produce prescriptions within West Virginia alongside a legal-policy archaeology methodology to understand how produce prescriptions have been institutionalized and funded within the US Farm Bill. While much of produce prescription program growth is attributed to an expansion of federal funding starting in 2014, this dissertation demonstrates that these programs and the federal legislation which has …

Embodied Energy Geographies: An Exploration Of Fracked Landscapes In The Ohio River Valley, Rachael L. Hood

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Methane gas production has boomed across the United States as a result of the development of fracking technology and its associated infrastructures, including pipelines. This production has provoked resistance over a litany of environmental and social concerns at both global and local scales. These concerns are compounded by a history of extractive economies and degradation in the Marcellus shale region of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley. To date, there has been limited research at the intersection of extractive industry and emotional geography, especially around pipelines. This research draws on feminist, emotional, and energy geographies and uses semi-structured interviews and …

Exploring Visitor Perceptions And Behaviours Related To Ticks And Lyme Disease Risk In An Ontario Protected Area, Ryan Brady

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Lyme disease is the most common vector-borne zoonosis in North America and over the past decade, reported cases of the disease have been rapidly increasing in many regions throughout Canada. The relative novelty of this public health threat presents nature-based tourism and recreation organizations with a range of policy and management challenges. Currently, there is a limited understanding of public perceptions and behaviours associated with tick and Lyme disease risk, especially within a Canadian parks and protected areas visitation and visitor experience context. To address this practical and scholarly knowledge gap, this study utilized in-situ surveys to explore visitor perceptions, …

Adaptive Capacity And Mobility In The Bahamas: Examining The Social Costs Of Displacement In Response To Hurricane Dorian, Kearney Coupland

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In 2021, over 30 million people were displaced by disasters, most of which were weather related and nearly half of which were the result of storms. While research on disaster displacement has provided broad observations of post-hurricane human mobility and the socioeconomic and demographic characteristics that influence displacement, few studies examine the factors that influence household mobility decisions after a disaster. My dissertation uses a primarily qualitative research approach to empirically investigate the relationship between mobility and the capacity of displaced households to cope and adapt to the impacts of hurricanes through a detailed examination of Hurricane Dorian displacement in …