International and Area Studies Commons^™

Book Review: Empowerment Of North American Indian Girls: Ritual Expressions At Puberty By Carol A. Markstrom, Le Anne E. Silvey

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Carol Markstrom's study, written from the perspective of a developmental psychologist specializing in adolescence, recognizes the cultural strengths essential to the coming-of-age ceremonies of Indigenous female adolescents at menarche. Motivated by a desire to bring proper recognition to the life-affirming rituals of North American Indian cultures, Markstrom takes you along on her journey of examining the history and impact of colonization on sociocultural expressions of puberty among Great Plains and Southwest tribes, exploring themes of renewal and regeneration in contemporary ritual expressions. While special attention is given to female puberty rituals in the Apache, Navajo, Lakota, and Ojibwa communities, what …

Producer Responses To Carbon Sequestration Incentives In The Northern Great Plains, Dean A. Bangsund, F. Larry Leistritz

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Agricultural lands can be used as a terrestrial sink for atmospheric CO₂ by changing their management and/or use. The goal of this study was to evaluate the economic potential of carbon sequestration on cropland in the spring wheat producing region of the northern Great Plains. In order to provide a more realistic assessment of the economic potential for agricultural carbon sequestration, this study reflects regional trends in land management practices, incorporates the value of co-products from the conversion of cropland to permanent grass, and considers producer differences in crop production profitability. The economic model compared the expected net present …

Review Of Inconstant Companions: Archaeology And North American Indian Oral Traditions. By Ronald J. Mason, Rodger Echo-Hawk

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Science and scholarship are valuable academic endeavors because they offer a transcendent perspective on human doings. In other words, these modes of inquiry establish a kind of common ground that crosses cultural boundaries. If any common ground exists among varying culture-specific oral traditions, and if any shared truths exist between the study of oral traditions and archaeological inquiry, conscientious scholarship ought to look for them. Inconstant Companions offers no help to those scholars who want to know whether oral tradition and archaeology can conjointly shed light on ancient human history. Clearly, Mason wants us to accept his position that this …

Review Of Drinking And Sobriety Among The Lakota Sioux. By Beatrice Medicine., Teresa Milbrodt

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Depicting alcohol use among Lakotas as both complex and culturally-specific, Beatrice Medicine's book is an important addition to Native American and Great Plains studies. Medicine emphasizes that to comprehend its social, psychological, and economic dimensions fully, one must understand Lakota customs and two hundred years of history.

Review Of The Geography Of American Poverty: Is There A Need For Place-Based Policies? By Mark D. Partridge And Dan S. Rickman., David J. Peters

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

This book is a comprehensive examination of poverty in the United States from 1969 to 1999. Its three main objectives are to document the uneven distribution of poverty, to explore its underlying demographic and economic determinants, and to offer policy prescriptions for its amelioration. The analysis of rural poverty is likely to be of most interest to readers of Great Plains Research.

The Geography of American Poverty authoritatively documents the trends and determinants of American poverty across both space and time. Its strength is in its quantitative analysis, but what interests poverty researchers may be tedious for nontechnical audiences. Its …

Book Review: Twilight Of The Texas Democrats: The 1978 Governor's Race By Kenneth Bridges, Sean P. Cunningham

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

The political earth shook in 1978 when, for the first time since Reconstruction, a Republican won Texas's most coveted electoral prize, the governorship. In his new book, Twilight of the Texas Democrats, historian Kenneth Bridges provides what for years to come will be undoubtedly the most well-written and comprehensive account of this critical moment. Bridges's book is a fast-paced, traditional political narrative. Though the author briefly contextualizes the political culture of the late 1970s by retracing Texas history from the Civil War to the modern era, the book's primary focus and major characters are the candidates and campaign managers …

Review Of Greener Pastures: Decentralizing The Regulation Of Agricultural Pollution. By Elizabeth Brubaker, Eva Pip

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Greener Pastures chronicles the proliferation of intensive hog production in Canada. Exploring the history of right-to-farm legislation, Elizabeth Brubaker focuses on the experiences of Manitoba, New Brunswick, and Ontario, although parallel situations may be found throughout the country. Starting with Manitoba's notorious 1976 Nuisance Act, which paved the way for similar industryshielding legislation in all other provinces, this book follows the devious evolution of laws that protect barn operators from environmental and public health liabilities, erode citizens' rights to seek relief and compensation through the judicial system, and remove decision-making powers from the communities that will be most affected. The …

Moving To The Rural Great Plains: Point Of Origin Differences In The Decision-Making Process, Randolph L. Cantrell, Cheryl A. Burkhart-Kriesel, Bruce B. Johnson, Charlotte Narjes, Rebecca J. Vogt

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Census data demonstrate that the movement of population in the rural Great Plains is not one-way. People do indeed move into as well as out of the region. Past research has identified perceptions of the quality of life in rural areas as an important consideration in the decision to migrate to such areas. However, those studies have not segmented the population of migrants in such a way as to fully inform efforts to recruit new residents. Using data collected from a survey of new Nebraska Panhandle residents, this study describes the motivations of recent migrants from both metropolitan and nonmetropolitan …

Review Of Doing Science And Doing Good: A History Of The Bureau Of Child Research And The Schiefelbusch Institute For Life Span Studies At The University Of Kansas. Edited By Richard L. Schiefelbusch And Stephen R. Schroeder., Warren J. White

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Stating "I grow weary knowing about the yearly increase in appropriations for research on the care and feeding of livestock knowing that we appropriate nothing for research on the care and nurture of children," Dr. Florence Brown Sherbon in 1921 convinced the Kansas Legislature to pass a statute forming the Bureau of Child Research (BCR). From that beginning grew one of the most remarkable research centers in the United States focusing on children with mental retardation. Doing Science and Doing Good tells the story of how a small group of visionary researchers and administrators at the University of Kansas and …

Great Plains Reasearch: A Journal Of Natural And Social Sciences Volume 18, Number 1, Spring 2008: Table Of Contents

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

NATURAL SCIENCES

Engineer Cantonment, Missouri Territory, 1819-1820: America's First Biodiversity Inventory (Hugh H. Genoways and Brett C. Ratcliffe)

Testing Multigenerational Colonization of Carrion by Blow Flies in the Great Plains (Timothy E. Huntington, David O. Carter, and Leon G. Higley)

Mapping Agricultural Land Cover for Hydrologic Modeling in the Platte River Watershed of Nebraska (Patti R. Dappen, Ian C. Ratcliffe, Cullen R. Robbins, and James W. Merchant)

SOCIAL SCIENCES

Using Schools to Map the Frontier of Settlement on the Canadian Prairies (John C. Lehr and Brian McGregor)

Mapping the Dispossession: Scandinavian Homesteading at Fort Totten, 1900-1930 (Karen V. Hansen and …

Book Review: Influenza 1918: Disease, Death, And Struggle In Winnipeg By Esyllt W. Jones, Mark Osborne Humphries

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Jone's argument is convincing, even if the book relies a little too heavily on newspaper accounts. On the other hand, the author makes use of the unmined files of the Manitoba Mothers' Allowance and the Winnipeg Children's Home to catch a rare and fleeting glimpse of familial life during the pandemic.

On the whole, Influenza 1918 is a stylistically mature, well-documented, and engaging book that delivers cogent and insightful analysis on a timely topic. It is the new standard for studies of the flu and epidemics in Canada and will serve as an excellent model for some time to come.

Mapping The Dispossession: Scandinavian Homesteading At Fort Totten, 1900-1930, Karen V. Hansen, Mignon Duffy

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Once Spirit Lake Dakota Reservation was opened to white homesteading in 1904, the turnover of land from Dakota to Euro-American hands was rapid. Scandinavians, the largest foreign-born group in the state, took advantage of this land-taking opportunity and moved onto the reservation in great numbers, acquiring approximately 25% of the land within six years. In effect, while the Scandinavians lived as neighbors with the Dakota, they also became the harbinger of the dispossession of Dakota land.

Using quantitative analysis oflandownership specified in plat maps of the reservation in 1910, this article analyzes the gender and ethnicity of the landowners. Oral …

Investigating Psychosocial Well-Being Among Ethnically Diverse Rural Women: Expect The Unexpected, Rochelle L. Dalla, Catherine Huddleston-Casas, Maria León

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

The purpose of this study was to examine patterns of similarity and difference in psychosocial well-being among 42 first-generation, Spanish-speaking Latinas, 23 second-generation, English-speaking Latinas, and 25 English-speaking Caucasian women residing in five unique rural Nebraska communities. Participants completed a series of self-report survey instruments to assess indices of psychosocial health, including: marital satisfaction, marital communication, family communication, social support, and depression. Spanishspeaking Latinas and English-speaking Caucasians evidenced the greatest similarity in patterns of experience. Twenty-eight percent of the total sample (n = 25) scored above the clinical cutoff for depression. Implications and suggestions for future work are discussed.

Historic And Recent Distributions Of Elk In Nebraska, Kent A. Fricke, Michael A. Cover, Scott E. Hygnstrom, Scott R. Groepper, Hugh H. Genoways, Kit M. Hams, Kurt C. Vercauteren

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Elk (Cervus elaphus) were historically found throughout North America but were extirpated from Nebraska and much of the Great Plains in the 1880s due to consumptive uses by settlers, miners, market hunters, and others. Elk began to reappear in Nebraska in the 1950s and 1960s, and established a stable, nonmigratory population that currently consists of seven herds and an estimated 1,400 individuals throughout western and central Nebraska. The reappearance and subsequent persistence of elk in Nebraska suggests there is adequate habitat to support a self-sustaining population. The general movement of elk eastward may lead to an eventual statewide …

Book Review: Zhorna: Material Culture Of The Ukrainian Pioneers By Roman Paul Fodchuk, Svitlana P. Kukharenko

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

For Roman Paul Fodchuk the zhorna, or stone quem mills, symbolically represent the hardships early Ukrainian pioneers in Alberta experienced and successfully overcame while adapting to their new life. The book covers a broad range of the material culture topics-from pioneers' clothing and house utensils to house building and agricultural technology. Throughout its six chapters, the author presents the pioneers' chronological "becoming" through the lenses of material culture objects, both those brought with them at the end ofthe 19th century and also objects made in Canada.

Book Review: Aryan Cowboys: White Supremacists And The Search For A New Frontier, 1970-2000 By Evelyn A. Schlatter, Mark S. Hamm

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Drawing from diverse sources-historical, journalistic, the Internet, and interviews with several imprisoned members of the Order-Schlatter offers a panoramic view of the American white supremacy movement. In many ways, this movement is emblematic of late modernity's defining trait: a world always in flux, awash in marginality and exclusion. Schlatter argues that the eccentric beliefs of white supremacy groups are sewn together from the threads of previous movements. The Klan of the 1920s and William Dudley Pelly's Silver Shirts of the German Nazi era are threaded to the millennialism of Aryan Nations, the Posse Comitatus, and Timothy McVeigh through Protestant agrarianism …

Review Of Genetically Engineered Crops: Interim Policies, Uncertain Legislation. Edited By Lain E.P. Taylor, Rene C. Van Acker

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Taylor has compiled a range of informed perspectives on ways to advance the regulation of GE crops, with examples from around the world. M. Korthals argues in chapter 6 for mechanisms that would allow for a coevolution of society and GE development, since the broadest benefits from GE crops, he holds, can only be realized if the fundamental basis for their regulations resides in societal participation. Tn chapter 7, Taylor echoes this call and asks what traits society might seek in GE crops and to what extent social desires would differ from the agroindustrial traits currently available or being developed. …

Book Review: Slipping Backward: A History Of The Nebraska Supreme Court By James W. Hewitt., Cloyd Clark

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

James W. Hewitt answers that question and many more in his history of the Nebraska Supreme Court, Slipping Backward, which covers the court and its judges from 1938 through 1995. It is the first history of the Nebraska Supreme Court and the first book-length study of a Great Plains supreme court. Hewitt approached his task by reading each of the 14,335 cases decided by the Nebraska Supreme Court during those years, then artfully organizing his history around four Chief Justices of the court: Robert G. Simmons (1938-63), Paul W. White (1963-78), Norman Krivosha (1978-87), and William C. Hastings (1987-95). This …

Assessment Of Conservation Reserve Program Fields Within The Current Distribution Of Lesser Prairie-Chicken, Dana Ripper, Megan Mclachlan, Theodore Toombs, Tammy Vercauteren

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Populations of lesser prairie-chicken (Tympanuchus pallidicinctus) have declined by more than 90%, due primarily to the conversion of sand-sage and mixed-grass prairie to agriculture, overgrazing by domestic livestock, juniper encroachment, and fossil-fuel development. Degradation of native habitats has made restored cropland through the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) potentially one ofthe best management options for lesser prairie-chicken. An estimated 1.4 million hectares of CRP exist within the lesser prairie-chicken range. We assessed 1,019 CRP fields representing more than 51,000 hectares within the current distribution of the lesser prairie-chicken. We sampled various grassland plantings including Farm Service Agency conservation practices …

Book Review: America: Our Next Chapter: Tough Questions, Straight Answers By Chuck Hagel With Peter Kaminsk, Charlyne Berens

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

In America: Our Next Chapter, Hagel presents his take on where the nation stands and where he thinks it is-and should be-headed. The volume reflects his interest in history, his Nebraska heritage, and the insider knowledge he's gained as a member of the Senate and its Foreign Relations Committee. More than half the book addresses international relations and U.S. foreign policy, one of Hagel's longtime and most intense interests. It criticizes America's invasion of Iraq and the way the Bush administration handled the war. Hagel voted for the resolution authorizing the invasion but writes that the president and his …

Mapping Agricultural Land Cover For Hydrologic Modeling In The Platte River Watershed Of Nebraska, Patti R. Dappen, Ian C. Ratcliffe, Cullen R. Robbins, James W. Merchant

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Throughout the western United States, natural resources managers are attempting to address the growing, and often competing, demands that municipal, agricultural and environmental interests have for water. The Platte River Cooperative Hydrology Study (COHYST) is a multi-agency effort that seeks to improve understanding of the ecology, geology, and hydrology of the Platte River watershed in central and western Nebraska. Information regarding the types, areal extent, and locations of crops (especially irrigated crops) is critical for estimating consumptive use of water. Digital land-cover and land-use datasets of the central and western Platte River valley have been prepared for four years: 1982, …

Book Review: The Liberals' Moment: The Mcgovern Insurgency And The Identity Crisis Of The Democratic Party By Bruce Miroff, William D. Anderson

Great Plains Research: A Journal of Natural and Social Sciences (through 2013)

Bruce Miroff's The Liberals' Moment uses rich historical research and a trove of interviews with nearly 50 McGovern campaign staffers and activists to argue similarly that the campaigns of 1968 and particularly 1972 shaped the Republican Party's resurgence in American politics. Miroff's rationale for why this is so is entirely different, however: South Dakota Senator George McGovern's 1972 presidential election defeat exposed an ideologically fractured Democratic Party that, nearly 40 years later, is still struggling to find its identity.

Miroff supports his argument by carefully documenting McGovern's campaign and the efforts of his staff of upstart politicos that included Gary …

Eric Pianowski On Trafficking In Humans: Social, Cultural And Political Dimensions Edited By Sally Cameron And Edward Newman. New York: United Nations University Press, 2008. 284 Pp., Eric Pianowski

Human Rights & Human Welfare

A review of:

Trafficking in Humans: Social, Cultural and Political Dimensions edited by Sally Cameron and Edward Newman. New York: United Nations University Press, 2008. 284 pp.

Contract Enslavement Of Female Migrant Domestic Workers In Saudi Arabia And The United Arab Emirates, Romina Halabi

Human Rights & Human Welfare

Slavery was not abolished in Saudi Arabia until 1962, and in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) until 1963. It is unsurprising, then, that contract slavery of domestic servants continues to thrive in much of the Persian Gulf, where local economies prosper on the immigration of foreign workers. Economic incentives on the part of the sending and receiving nations encourage the migration of female workers from their home countries to Saudi Arabia and to the UAE. These incentives, coupled with restrictive contract systems, bind the female domestic worker to her employer and create an environment conducive to exploitation and involuntary servitude.

The Dark Side Of Labor In China, Karine Lepillez

Human Rights & Human Welfare

With a population of 1.3 billion and a gross domestic product growing at an impressive rate of 10 percent per year, China has quickly become one of the largest contributors to the global market. Deng Xiaoping’s reforms of the late 1970s and early 1980s vastly improved the country’s standard of living and made economic development possible; unfortunately, China’s remarkable growth has a dark side: the forced labor of men, women and children. The country’s unique combination of Communist ideology and decentralized economic power has contributed to the use of both state-sanctioned and unsanctioned forced labor, the latter of which is …

Crude Birth Rates Among New York City’S Racial/Ethnic Groups And Latino Nationalities In 2002, Victoria Stone

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

Introduction: This report analyzes crude birth rates among women in the three primary racial/ethnic groups, White, Black, and Latina, and further examines birth rates by age-specific groups in the five boroughs of New York City in 2002. In addition, this report presents the crude birth rates for six Latino nationalities: Mexican, Ecuadorian, Dominican, Colombian, Puerto Rican and Cuban.

Methods: The data examined here was derived from the NYC Vital Statistics 2002 Report and the Census 2000 SF4 table on Sex by Age by race and Latino nationality. The birth rates were calculated by dividing live birth numbers (Vital Statistics report) …

Sino-American Relations In The 21st Century: The Political, Social And Economic Realities Of China's Rise, Larry Buster Stewart

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This paper examines the political, social and economic realities of Chinas rise in an effort to better understand the potential evolution of Sino-American relations. Engagement reasons a prosperous China will become democratic and socially pluralistic, but by observing the development of freedom and rule of law in China and comparing their relationship with economic growth, trade and investment, this analysis challenges the idea that China will have to democratize to meet the pressures of globalization. Economic growth has legitimatized the authoritarian regime in China, freedom is not related to decisions of trade and investment, and the Chinese people have not …

International Elections Experts, Monitors, And Representations In The Arab World, Sheila Carapico

Political Science Faculty Publications

Elections are sites of festivity, celebrity, and sometimes dramatic suspense, unique occasions for the simultaneous nationwide engagement of candidates, campaign volunteers, poll-workers, voters, and even abstainers and school-children in the quintessential patriotic experience. Yet in an era of globalization, national elections are not necessarily purely domestic affairs; a large cadre of expatriate consultants, trainer-trainers, and monitors often participate directly. This paper considers two alternative understandings of the role of North American, European, and international democracy brokers in Arab elections since the early nineteen nineties. The usual story is that Western democracies set aside democratic altruism to protect vital interests, allies, …

The Penguins' Revolution: An Analysis Of Student Response To The Multi-Dimensional Chilean Educational Crisis, Abigail Hall

Honors Theses

Through exploration and analysis of economic, historical and political factors stemming from the authoritarian period (1973-1990) to the present day, this project offers an interdisciplinary explanation of the emergence of the "Penguin's Revolution" in Chile. In May-June 2006, 700,000 high school students paralyzed the Chilean education system by protesting in the streets, taking over schools and not attending classes. Students organized under the Coordinating Assembly of Secondary Students (ACES) demanded that the government take responsibility for providing universal high quality and equal education. The roots of student discontent lie in the multi-dimensional education crisis, generated by the semi-privatized, decentralized educational …

Advocating At The Margins: Women’S Ngos In China, Ling U

Honors Theses

The development of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in China has been unprecedented in the past fifteen years. The 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women (FWCW) and parallel NGO Forum in Beijing, China, opened the door for the first time for the establishment of women’s NGOs in China. This paper examines the development of Chinese women’s NGOs with a particular focus on two organizations in Beijing for marginalized female populations: one focusing on lesbians and the other helping women with HIV/AIDS. I examine the structure and growth of each NGO; however, on a more personal level and perhaps more importantly, I use …