International and Area Studies Commons^™

Jules Verne Constructs America: From Utopia To Dystopia, Dana L. Radu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In my dissertation, I examine visions of the United States in Jules Verne’s (1828-1905) Voyages extraordinaires (1863-1905). Of the sixty-four novels that make up that series, twenty-three, over one-third, feature American characters or take place on American soil. I demonstrate that in his early novels (1863-1886), he presents the United States in an optimistic and utopian light, while in his later novels (1887-1905), his depictions of the United States take on a pessimistic and dystopian aspect. In also showing that Verne had been influenced by utopian socialists Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825), Charles Fourier (1772-1837) and Étienne Cabet (1788-1856), I provide …

Post-Apartheid Citizenship And The Politics Of Evictions In Inner City Johannesburg, Anthony Johnson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Based in Johannesburg, South Africa, this ethnographic study examines the phenomenon of eviction within the context of the post-apartheid constitutional right to housing and legal protections against evictions. Rather than view evictions as a singular event, evictions are treated as a lived experience intrinsically linked to the historical, political, and economic life of inner city Johannesburg and more broadly South Africa. I address how South Africa’s constitution creates both a platform for housing advocates to contest evictions and also allows property owners to evict tenants. To analyze evictions, I collected data through participant observation, media sources, archives, interviews, and legal …

Boundaries Of Home And Work: Social Reproduction And Home-Based Workers In Ahmedabad, India, Natascia Boeri

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation critically questions the use of women’s labor in international development and global capitalism by examining women’s participation in the informal economy, a significant source of work for women in the Global South. Based on ten months of fieldwork in Ahmedabad, India, this study considers women’s experiences with informality when they participate in home-based work, the production of goods for the market in one’s own home. I ask how women’s place-based activities redefine their roles and positions across three spheres of social life: the family, the economy, and civil society (through their participation in a non-governmental organization, or NGO). …

Transnational Indigenous Migration: Racialized Geographies And Power In Southern Highland Ecuador, Victoria Stone-Cadena

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines the shifting landscape of social and economic inequalities in the remittance-dominated region of southern highland Ecuador, focusing on the transformations brought about by increased international migration since the early 2000s. The broader question is whether or not transnational migration has facilitated political and social upward mobility among indigenous communities. More specifically I ask: in what ways does indigenous identity figure in contemporary international migration practices, how does transnational indigenous migration complicate bounded notions of rural indigenous life, and how might the strategies employed by indigenous migrants transform social and economic inequalities in two small towns in the …

A Comparative Perspective Between Farc Guerrilleras And Chechen Black Widows, Denise Rivera

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper will explore the similar and different characteristics between Colombian female combatants who are members of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolutionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), and the Chechen female suicide bombers who joined the Chechen insurgency movement. It shall provide a brief historical background of how the FARC, a leftist guerrilla group, and the Chechen insurgency movement ascended into prominence during civil conflicts in Colombia and Chechnya respectively. It will discuss how many women in both countries would pursue a different form of activism and defy patriarchal norms by engaging in acts of violence in the name …

Performing El Rap El ʿArabi 2005-2015: Feeling Politics Amid Neoliberal Incursions In Ramallah, Amman, And Beirut, Rayya S. El Zein

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study is about politics in Arabic rap. Specifically, it is about affective dynamics and material negotiations during rap concerts in three cities in the Levant. I analyze Arab hip hop culture in the context of three different but related histories of cosmopolitan, middle class growth, and gentrification. Using an ethnomusicological framework rooted in participant observation and performance theory, I compare concert conditions, audience behavior, and accessibility of music production in Ramallah, Amman, and Beirut.

In Chapter One, I elaborate the discursive and theoretical frameworks that have pinned the political valences of Arab youth, Arab artists, and Arab rappers in …

The South African Elderly: Neglect, Social Contribution And The Hiv/Aids Epidemic, Alessia Frisoli

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

With a slowing fertility rate and an increasing longevity, the world population is aging. Both developed and developing countries have seen their elderly become more numerous with an increasing burden on their financial, medical and social system. Many scholars have suggested immediate change of policies to contain the predicted crisis that will affect the health care and the pension schemes in the next decades. However, few have investigated the positive role that the seniors play contributing to society, beyond the complications caused to the economy and welfare system. This thesis will support the argument that the elderly, if appropriately cared …

Loans’ Impact On International Relations: Venezuela As Lender And Borrower, Leonela C. Medina Baez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Foreign aid can be allocated through grants and loans each of them having different repercussions in the hierarchical relations between donor/recipient and lender/borrower. This study focuses on the effects of bilateral loans in international relations. The relation created through bilateral loans is conditioned by the payment or cancellation of the debt: a client-patron relationship between lender and borrower remains when there is not debt payment, conversely, when the borrower pays off its debt to the lender on time, the relation of domination does not take place. However, how the relation is transformed if one state is both lender and borrower? …

Struggling To Learn, Learning To Struggle: Strategy And Structure In The 2010-11 University Of Puerto Rico Student Strike, José A. Laguarta Ramírez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

From April 2010 to March 2011, the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) underwent a two-phase strike sequence against neoliberal austerity measures. Altogether, that process resulted in the eventual concession of all of the students’ main demands, an unprecedented feat at the UPR, and a rare one in Puerto Rican history in general. In this dissertation I seek to cast light on this improbable event by examining, first, how neoliberalization patterned and contoured the choices facing the century-old UPR student movement. Second, I explore how interactions within the movement, including the framing contest among leadership teams and their interaction with the …

Patterns Of Growth And The Economic Development Of China, Adam C. Watson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

By looking at the historical rise of modern China, starting with the end of the First Opium War (1842) through to the start of the war with Japan (1937), and then from the beginning of Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms (1979) to the present, this work reveals the striking similarities between the earlier and the later periods of capitalist development. If the country had not been able to draw on the deep-rooted knowledge and skills which originated in Shanghai and the port cities in the mid-nineteenth century, and instead pursued only uninformed free market principles without the training to make these …

Childhood Poverty Rates In The United States, 1990 - 2014, Sebastián Villamizar-Santamaría

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report investigates the trends in childhood poverty rates between 1990 and 2014 in the United States.

Methods: Data were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey, reorganized for public use by the Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota, IPUMSusa. Trends in childhood poverty rates are examined by children’s sex, race/ethnicity, nativity, and among the five largest Latino national subgroups. This report also compares current state-level childhood poverty rates using the most recent data available from the U.S. Census Bureau. These 2014 state-level childhood poverty rates are mapped to illustrate the distribution of childhood poverty rates across …

The Relationship Between Food Insecurity And Weight In The United States, 2011 – 2014, Sebastián Villamizar-Santamaría

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report examines the relation between weight and food insecurity in the United States between 2011 and 2014.

Methods: The data used in this report come from the Integrated Health Interview Services (IHIS) and its food security index. Weight is assessed by body mass index, and the population is divided into four weight groups based on body mass index ranges.

Results: First, food insecurity rates declined among the general population of Latinos between 2011 and 2014, however, food insecurity rates rose dramatically among underweight Latinos over that time period. Second, food insecurity rates were greatest among the obese and …

A Profile Of The Linguistic Status Among Latinos In The United States Between 1980 And 2014, Karen Okigbo

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report examines trends in linguistic status — Spanish monolingual, English monolingual, or bilingual — among Latinos between 1980 and 2014.

Methods: Data were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey, reorganized for public use by the Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota, IPUMSusa. Linguistic status is defined using three categories: Spanish monolingual, English monolingual, and bilingual.

Results: First, the highest percentage of Latinos in the United States were bilingual, and that finding remained stable between 1980 (67%) and 2014 (66%). Second, Latinos who were Spanish monolingual had substantially lower levels of educational attainment than bilingual Latinos …

Trends In Receipt Of Public Assistance And Poverty Status, 1970 – 2014, Justine Calcagno

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report examines comparative trends in receipt of public assistance and poverty rates between 1970 and 2014.

Methods: This study uses the American Community Survey PUMS (Public Use Microdata Series) data for all years considered here released by the Census Bureau and reorganized for public use by the Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota, IPUMSusa. Receipt of public assistance is defined by receiving any amount of one’s income in the previous year from public assistance funds or not. Poverty status is defined by living below the federal poverty line in the previous year or not.

Results: There was an …

A Profile Of Latino Citizenship In The United States: Demographic, Educational And Economic Trends Between 1990 And 2013, Karen Okigbo

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report examines trends in citizenship status between 1990 and 2013.

Methods: Data were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey, reorganized for public use by the Minnesota Population Center, University of Minnesota, IPUMSusa. Citizenship status is defined using three categories: citizen by birth, naturalized citizen, and not a citizen. In addition, educational attainment was computed for those age 25 and older, while the remaining outcomes of income, employment status, usual hours worked, and poverty status were computed for those between the ages of 16 and 64. Cases in the data set were weighted and analyzed to …

Sociodemographic And Geospatial Correlates Of Stillbirths And Neonatal Mortality In Indonesia (1993–2007), Alka Dev

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Little research has focused on the determinants of stillbirth and neonatal mortality in Indonesia despite the fact that the country has one of the highest rates of stillbirths in the world and one of the highest rates of neonatal mortality in Asia. Several areas have not been explored due to data limitations, such as shared risk factors and measurement challenges, which can inform health policy and interventions and guide future research. This dissertation addresses this gap by comparing measurement challenges for stillbirth and neonatal mortality and identifying risk factors for both using Indonesian reproductive health survey data. Differences in estimates …

"They Have Sold The Clouds": Queering Indigenous Politics In Colombia, Taylor O. Ramsey

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In a study of Colombian politics, I use a queer theoretical lens to explore the relationship between the state and two specific indigenous groups from Northern Colombia to better understand the state and power relations embedded in it. I look for queer temporalities, spaces, and nonnormative practices that arise out of how the law interrogates and interacts with indigenous people using a queer theoretical lens as a critical methodology. I argue that the Colombian state's interactions with indigenous groups create queer spaces/conceptual borders, particularly with regard to law and the state's ability to biopolitically regulate its citizens. It is within …

The Changing Demographics Of Florida’S Latino Electorate: Latino Party Affiliation And Voter Registration Rates In The State, Central Florida, And South Florida, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This special report in partnership with CNN en Espanol examines characteristics of Florida -- where the Latino electorate could very well determine victory in the 2016 presidential election.

Methods: Data were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau, Voting and Registration, as a part of the Current Population Survey data from the November Voter Supplements. The 2016 estimates were derived by using the yearly percentage rate of increase between 2004 and 2012. Additional data were derived from an analysis of the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) American Community Survey (ACS).

Results: The Latino population of Florida soared between 1990 …

Indigenous Ecuadorian Mobility Strategies In The Clandestine Migration Journey, Victoria Stone-Cadena

Publications and Research

Based on testimonials of migration journeys of indigenous Cañaris from southern highland Ecuador, this paper examines strategies of mobility and social networking employed by migrants and facilitators in the human smuggling market. Following a series of economic crises in the late 1990s, Ecuadorian transnational migration increased significantly, with a 55.5 percent increase to the United States between 2000 and 2008, and staggering 12,150 percent increase to Spain between 1998 and 2005. This article focuses on the growth of a regional migration industry in the southern high-land region, and pays special attention to the roles of indigenous Cañari migrants and migration …

Could Latinos Choose The Next President? States In Which Latinos Could Determine The Margin Of Victory In The 2016 Presidential Election, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

This special report in partnership with CNN en Espanol examines characteristics of states in which the Latino electorate could determine victory in the 2016 presidential election. Methods: Data were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau, Voting and Registration, as a part of the Current Population Survey data from the November Voter Supplements. The 2016 estimates were derived by using the yearly percentage rate of increase between 2004 and 2012. Additional data were derived from an analysis of the Integrated Public Use Microdata Series (IPUMS) American Community Survey (ACS). Results: In Florida Latinos comprise a large share of the electorate and …

Empowerment From Within: Supporting Palestinian Women’S Struggle Against Violence, Ortal Bensky

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Recent reports by the United Nations and local non-governmental organizations present a troubling increase in incidents of violence against Palestinian women in Palestine. These are cases of domestic violence, where the attackers are Palestinians, and political violence, where the attackers are Israeli settlers and soldiers. These violent incidents include attacks on body and property. Most incidents are neither dealt with by the Palestinian authorities nor by the Israeli government and judicial system. There is not sufficient international pressure to enforce justice. The purpose of this study is to offer alternative ways to prevent violent crimes, enforce relevant laws, and provide …

The Hermeneutics Of International Trade Conflicts: U.S. Punitive Trade Policy Towards China And Japan, Barry F. Murdaco

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation analyzes punitive trade conflicts between the U.S. and two trading partners: China and Japan. Punitive trade conflicts can be defined as trade wars between two states, retaliatory tariffs, or other forms of conflict, e.g. preventing the acquisition of foreign assets or sanctions for an undervalued exchange rate. I will examine several trade conflicts between the U.S. and Japan in the 1980s and several trade conflicts between the U.S. and China from 2001 to the present. This study is situated within a larger debate concerning the resolution of four theoretical "puzzles" in political science. The first concerns the dispute …

Millets From The Margins: Value, Knowledge And The Subaltern Practice Of Biodiversity In Uttarakhand, India, Priya R. Chandrasekaran

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Millets from the Margins: Value, Knowledge and the Subaltern Practice of Biodiversity in Uttarakhand, India analyzes what is at stake for small-scale, predominantly women, farmers as local varieties of rainfed food grains such as finger millet are being newly commodified and valued as a biodiversity resource. With support from a Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant from the National Science Foundation, I conducted seventeen months of ethnographic research with farmers, activists, scientists, NGO leaders, government officials, transnational functionaries and agribusiness representatives in segregated yet interconnected realms ranging from a village in the Himalayan foothills to transnational institutions in Rome.

This work demonstrates …

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. …

Universalizing Primary Education In Sierra Leone: Promises And Pitfalls On The Path To Equity, Grace Pai

Publications and Research

What barriers remain in the progress towards achieving Universal Primary Education (UPE), and how does the UPE agenda affect out-of-school children? Through a mixture of historical, quantitative and qualitative methods of analysis, this study examines these questions using the developing context of Sierra Leone as a case study.

Findings from over 100 interviews show that first of all, the most salient barrier that prevents children from participating in primary school is the fact that school is not free de facto in spite of the national abolishment of primary school fees in 2004. Rather than commonly cited constraints such as a …

Reconstructing Education In Post-Conflict Sierra Leone, Grace Pai

Publications and Research

This study finds that by prioritizing universal development programmes instead of employing a conflict-sensitive approach rooted in attending to the specific inequities present in Sierra Leone, the current education system is ignoring the needs and desires of certain subpopulations of youth. Specifically, although the state has been very successful in increasing overall access to basic education for both boys and girls in rural Sierra Leone, the current focus on improving the quality of academic education has sidelined the growth of technical and vocational education that many youth desire. Instead, sectors such as tertiary education are prioritized above all else.

Furthermore, …

Afroreggae And Grupo Cultural Afro Reggae: A Study Of The Early Years, Sarah S. Ohmer

Publications and Research

The following study of AfroReggae and Grupo Cultural Afro Reggae (GCAR) calls attention to Brazilian presence and community organizing in the field of Hip Hop studies with a long memory framework: placing AfroReggae and GCAR in a long history of Africana resistance through music in Latin America. !990s GCAR group arises when reggae and Hip Hop music had become new global forms of solidarity among urban marginalized youths worldwide, making use of old and new strategies of social healing (Fernandes 2011). A close look at lyrics from the Hip Hop fusion band and the associated nonprofit organization shape the concepts …

The Latino Voter Registration Dilemma, Laird W. Bergad

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

This special report in partnership with CNN en Espanol examined changes in the Latino electorate, registered voters, and voters in the U.S. and key swing states between 1992 and 2016. Methods: Data were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau, Voting and Registration, as a part of the Current Population Survey data from the November Voter Supplements. The 2016 estimates were derived by using the yearly percentage rate of increase between 2004 and 2012. Results: The absolute number of Latinos eligible to vote, registered, and who voted grew dramatically. Yet the rates of Latino voter registration were almost exactly the same …

Estudios Agrarios Críticos: Tierras, Semillas, Soberanía Alimentaria Y Los Derechos De Las Y Los Campesinos, Marc Edelman

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

The Effect Of Chinese Industrial Investment Projects In Central Africa On The Perception Of China’S Commercial Diplomacy In Foreign Policy, Jason Ackerman

Dissertations and Theses

China is emerging as the premier economic partner to the Global South. Through the ability to loan large amounts of hard currency, supply inexpensive industrial and consumer products, and diversify their economic interests, China plays a key role in the new global marketplace. The Chinese system of investment diversification forms the foundation of their commercial diplomacy. One advantage China enjoys is a general lack of proselytization on issues such as good-governance and environmental safety standards. This makes for more lucrative business partnerships with many states increasingly dissatisfied with the burdens of “over regulation.” As China extends its reach into commercial …