Sociology Commons^™

[Review Of] Jon Michael Spencer. Sacred Symphony: The Chanted Sermon Of The Black Preacher, Angela M. S. Nelson

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

In his latest book to date, Sacred Symphony; The Chanted Sermon of the Black Preacher, Spencer states in the introduction that there are seven musical elements that make up the "chanted sermon" and these include melody, rhythm, call and response, harmony, counterpoint, form, and improvisation. He not only states that these musical components appear in the chanted sermons, but he illustrates how they are manifested in the sermon event through sermons and/or testimonies of white male and female observers, ex-slaves, ministers, and scholars of black preaching.

[Review Of] H. Nigel Thomas. From Folklore To Fiction: A Study Of Folk Heroes And Rituals In The Black American Novel, Harriet Ottenheimer

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

The complex and important relationship between African American folklore and African American literature is the focus of this thoughtful, well-written book. Many African American writers have drawn from folklore, and Thomas sets out to demonstrate--by analyzing specific examples--some of the traditions that have developed in the use of folklore in African American writing.

[Review Of] Robert D. Bullard, Ed. In Search Of The New South: The Black Urban Experience In The 1970s And The 1980s, W. M. Akalou

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

This book is part of a growing list of published materials on the prospect and dilemma of black urban life in America. Drawing from the experiences of blacks in six Southern cities, In Search of the New South is essentially concerned with the status of blacks in the South between 1970 and 1980. While some qualitative changes have been noted, the book, as a whole, paints a bleak picture about the condition of blacks in the South. In fact, if one were to use the time-worn argument of the glass half-filled with water, it is clear that the authors have …

[Review Of] John F. Crawford, William Balassi, And Annie O. Eysturoy, Eds. This Is About Vision: Interviews With Southwestern Writers, Jennifer L. Scoutten

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

This Is About Vision: Interviews with Southwestern Writers is a compilation of sixteen interviews. The writers are ordered chronologically by date of birth, and there is a strong sense of movement from older ideas about the Southwest represented by authors such as Frank Waters to the development of new cultural values and ideas with younger writers like Rudolfo Anaya and Luci Tapahonso. Each of the interviews is prefaced by biographic information as well as a selected bibliography. Crawford's introduction to the book is thorough and provides a "map" or guide to the thematic development of the interviews.

[Review Of] Diana Der Hovanessian. About Time, Margaret Bedrosian

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

As Armenian American literature matures, the impact of the massacres and dispersion of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915 widens in meaning and relevance. A recently published collection of poetry by Diana Der Hovanessian suggests how issues raised by those long-ago events permeate the imagination of contempory [contemporary] Armenian American writers, giving poignant focus to their work. Diana Der Hovanessian, the foremost translator of Armenian poetry into English, demonstrated this most memorably in her Anthology of Armenian Poetry. Her first volume, How to Choose Your Past (1978, Ararat Press) displayed her wit and concern with the transmission of …

[Review Of] Richard H. Thompson. Theories Of Ethnicity: A Critical Appraisal, Johnny Washington

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

This work is a systematic attempt to identify certain major theories that govern our discourse and analyses of issues pertaining to ethnicity and race. Sociobiology, primordialism, assimilationism, world-system theory and neo-Marxism are among the theories included.

[Review Of] Allen L. Woll And Randall M. Miller. Ethnic And Racial Images In American Film And Television: Historical Essays And Bibliography, Angela M. S. Nelson

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Allen Woll and Randall Miller in Ethnic and Racial Images in American Film and Television have compiled in one volume the writings about the images of ethnic and racial groups in American television and film. Woll and Miller state in their Introduction that the purpose of their book was to "attempt to unite the work (the nature and importance of mass media stereotypes and their effects on society) from a wide variety of disciplines, languages and fields of study in order to expand the vistas of scholarly research in this area." Ethnic and Racial Images is divided into twelve chapters, …

The "New Age Movement": A Case Study, Zachary Grant Goodell

Theses and Dissertations

Within the last two decades, the United States has witnessed the growth of a phenomenon which the media has referred to as "The New Age Movement". This multi-faceted social pattern includes astrology, meditation, mysticism, and eastern philosophies, the popularity of which have increased significantly in the 1980's. This thesis is a case study of the "New Age Movement". First, I develop a descriptive model of the key ideological themes and organizational structures of this social pattern. Subsequently, I organize this model in terms of several sociologically based theoretical frameworks including activity fads, social movements, and sociocultural shifts, in order to …

Expression Of An Expectation Of A Future Desire To Move By Older Community-Dwelling Adults, Brenda K. Goodman

Theses and Dissertations

Empirical evidence in the gerontological literature supports the commonly held belief that older adults, overwhelmingly, prefer to remain in their own homes. Despite this fact, older adults residing in the community often express an expectation that they will move in the future.

There is a paucity of empirical findings on those factors which are most influential on the expression of an expectation of a future desire to move. Logistic regression was used to analyze data from the third wave of a longitudinal study of elderly Massachusetts residents residing in the community to identify possible antecedents to the expression of an …

[Review Of] Ernesto Juan Fonfrias. Five Women In The Life Of Jesus, Luis L. Pinto

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Religious themes, especially the Marian, had an increasingly high number of publications last year all over the Christian World because 1987 was a Marian year. One of the most exciting and intriguing titles on this theme is this Puerto Rican poligraph.

[Review Of] Ella Cara Deloria. Waterlily, Franchot Ballinger

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Waterlily is a fictional rendering of a typical Teton woman's life in the nineteenth century, at the time the Sioux were first experiencing contact with the invading white world. The perspective from which the work was written (in the 1940s) is unique on two counts. First, its author was herself Sioux (albeit Yankton, not Teton) which allowed her to bring to the work an understanding and empathy not available to the mostly male Euro-American ethnographers also writing about the Sioux

[Review Of] Marina E. Espina. Filipinos In Louisiana, William Oandasan

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Marina E. Espina's Filipinos in Louisiana is her long awaited, first collection; it is also an announcement of her book on eighteenth-century Filipino settlement in Louisiana and the United States, Manilamen in the New World. The chapters of Filipinos in Louisiana are Espina's articles in chronological order covering two decades of research, all of which were published between 1976 and 1981 in Philippine News, New Orleans Ethnic Cultures and Perspectives on Ethnicity in New Orleans. Filipinos in Louisiana opens a little-known compartment in the history of the Filipino-American community. Espina, as a professional librarian, has had access to archival resources …

[Review Of] Peter Kwong. The New Chinatown, Jim Schnell

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Peter Kwong presents a provocative portrait of Chinese-Americans in The New Chinatown. This book describes aspects which have been the basis for the development of Chinese-American culture. However, the book does not (as the title indicates) clearly differentiate between a "new" Chinatown and an "old" Chinatown. Thus, an initial review left this reader wondering why the book is titled as such.

[Review Of] William N. Fenton. The False Faces Of The Iroquois, David M. Gradwohl

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

This scientific and artistic tome on Iroquois Indian masks, literally a "coffee table book," has been a long time in production. It is the culmination of over sixty years of interest and study by William N. Fenton, deservedly acknowledged as the dean of Iroquois studies. The author's interest in the subject began during his childhood when he spent summers at his family's farm in up-state New York. His grandfather, W.T. Fenton, had obtained two masks from Amos Snow, an Iroquois friend and neighbor, during the mid-nineteenth century. His father, J. W. Fenton, acquired more than a dozen additional masks as …

[Review Of] James S. Frideres, Ed. Multiculturalism And Intergroup Relations, Hartwig Isernhagen

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

A volume of the policy and concept of multiculturalism is particularly welcome at a moment when the issue of minority vs. majority rights is once again flaring up in academics and politics. Canada is at the center of this discussion; but comparisons with the US (and Israel) are frequently made, and the US-American situation is explored at length in two essays by Rose. Also, the editor's introduction, though dealing explicitly only with Canada, raises basic issues of the ambivalent view of ethnic difference in liberal thought that transcend national boundaries.

[Review Of] Paul C. P. Siu. The Chinese Laundryman: A Study Of Social Isolation, Susie Ling

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

There are two tales behind Paul Siu's The Chinese Laundryman: A Study of Social Isolation. It is his detailed insider's description and analysis of the Chinese Americans who were commonly tracked into this occupation prior to World War II. The immigrant laundrymen of Chinatown worked long hours for low wages and predominantly remained isolated from mainstream Anglo society. This recent publication of Siu's 1953 dissertation is also the story of a son of a Chinese laundryman who immigrated to the United States in 1927 and became a student of Ernest Burgess at the University of Chicago School of Sociology dominated …

Table Of Contents

Explorations in Ethnic Studies

Table of contents for Explorations in Ethnic Studies, Number 12, Issue 2, 1989

Critique [Of American Medical And Intellectual Reaction To African Health Issues, 1850-1960: From Racialism To Cross-Cultural Medicine By David Mcbride], Helen M. Castillo

Explorations in Ethnic Studies

David McBride unravels an informative set of historical events linking blacks and the prevailing health care beliefs and practices during the 110 years between 1850 and 1960. That true and empirical medico-sociological research was unavailable in the late 1800s and early 1900s is well recognized, and one need only to review these dates and the literature available on this topic to find these major research limitations.

Critique [Of National Newspaper Analysis Of The Press Coverage Of Jesse Jackson's 1984 Presidential Campaign: The Confirmation Of The Candidate By J. Gregory Payne, Scott C. Ratzan, And Robert A. Baukus], James Bracy

Explorations in Ethnic Studies

The issue of journalistic tradition in campaign reporting of minority candidates is a serious one. The essence of this research article appears to this reader to be one of gradual accumulation of evidence that 'yes,' being a minority (and/or woman) may affect a campaigner's coverage by the newspaper media. The jury is still out, however, as to what extent such coverage influences voters and other media, as well as what effect, if any, such media coverage has on the final election.

[Review Of] Aurora Levins Morales And Rosario Morales. Getting Home Alive, Margarita Tavera Rivera

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

How does one get home when being home is not safe? Or how does one get home alive when the spirit can be killed in the journey there? Getting home alive means searching for the sacred place from which all life emanates. This search is an all consuming passion for both Aurora Levins Morales and Rosario Morales.

[Review Of] Mark Mathabane. Kaffir Boy, Mary Ann Busch

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Few middle and upper class Americans, whether they are black or white, can fathom the extent of humiliation, suffering, and brutality that black people are currently enduring as a result of the South African apartheid policy. Mark Mathabane's autobiographical book Kaffir Boy documents the inhumane treatment of blacks in that society and relates the "meaning of this policy in human terms." The book gives the reader insight into the daily life of a black family struggling to survive in the midst of hatred and bigotry.

[Review Of] Bernard W. Bell. The Afro-American Novel And Its Tradition, Doris J. Davenport

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

According to Bell, his book is "a comprehensive sociopsychological, sociocultural interpretive history of the Afro-American novel. It seeks to unearth, identify, describe, and analyze some of the major thematic, stylistic, and structural characteristics of the Afro-American novel from its beginning in 1853 to 1983." This quotation about the book's scope and intention, as well as its title, are indicative of the strengths and weaknesses (mainly the latter) of the entire study. For one thing, it is an understood fact that just as there are African-American experiences, there are also literary traditions. Whereas one study of one tradition (such as Barbara …

[Review Of] Joseph Bruchac, Ed. Survival This Way: Interviews With American Indian Poets, Kristin Herzog

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

It is risky for an editor to compose a book of twenty-one interviews , each being centered in the same type of questions: What started you writing? Who were your models? What role does your tradition play in your work? How do you relate to mainstream poetry? The amazing result of reading this book is the recognition that it is neither repetitious nor dull, but highly informative and a pleasure to read. The reason for this outcome lies not only in the poetic sensibility, literary knowledge, and psychological skill of the interviewer, but in the quality of the poets selected …

[Review Of] Kofi Awoonor. Until The Morning After: Collected Poems, 1963-1985, Charlotte H. Bruner

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Until the Morning After represents a large share of the poetry and the life of Ghanaian poet Kofi Awoonor. The poems are grouped by sections, titles of earlier volumes arranged sequentially. Much of Awoonor's rather stormy life, including his political protest, strategic self-exile, and incarceration is reflected in this collection. But there are central themes: a love of land, an ethnic pride, a desire to perpetuate local expressions and natural beauties. Despite his years abroad and extensive travels, Awoonor's poetry is very African. In fact, it is a celebration of Africanness. Characteristically, although he signed his earlier work as George …

[Review Of] E. Jane Gay. With The Nez Perces: A Lice Fletcher In The Field, 1889-92, Gretchen Harvey

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Persons interested in Indian history will not want to overlook this collection of E. Jane Gay's letters written from Nez Perce (Nimipu) country between 1889-1892. On four separate trips to the West, Gay accompanied her friend, special agent and anthropologist Alice Fletcher, whose job it was to coordinate the allotment of the Nez Perce reservation in Idaho. While "Her Majesty" (Gay's endearment for Fletcher) figures prominently in the correspondence, the letters tell us less about Fletcher than the subtitle suggests. What they do provide, however, is an insightful account of the allotment process at the local level, and herein lies …

[Review Of] Ivan Light And Edna Bonacich. Immigrant Entrepreneurs: Koreans In Los Angeles, 1965-1982, Evelyn Hu-Dehart

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

This latest study of immigrant entrepreneurs to come out of the collaborative efforts of sociologists Light and Bonacich is another significant contribution to Asian American Studies specifically, but also to ethnic studies, immigrant studies, urban studies , and business-economic studies in general. It contributes to our understanding of the history of Los Angeles, and it constitutes an important companion piece to existing studies of Korean Americans, such as Illsoo Kim's work on Koreans in New York City. As a case study, it also elaborates on the related theoretical models of "middlemen minorities" and "immigrant entrepreneurs," and how, in this case, …

[Review Of] Ruth Kirk. Tradition And Change On The Northwest Coast: The Makah,Nuu-Chah-Nulth, Southern Kwakiutl, And Nuxalt, David M. Gradwohl

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

Much has been written about the traditional social organization, art, and technology of the Northwest Coast Indians whose settlements stretch from the state of Washington, through British Columbia, and into southern Alaska. In this volume, writer-photographer Ruth Kirk summarizes the historic and present-day culture of four native groups in the southern part of this region: the Makah, Southern Kwakiutl, and people who call themselves Nuu-chah-nulth and Nuxalk. Until recently, the latter two groups were referred to, respectively, as the Nootka and the Bella Coola. Kirk's task, undertaken with the sponsorship of the Royal British Columbia Museum, was to update information …

[Review Of] August Wilson. Fences, Robert L. Gilbert

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

At the turn of the century, playwrights wrestled with realism and wrought a new theater capable of great poetic and symbolic force. It was an exciting time because artists turned their talents to subjects which had never been deemed fit for the stage. The classic requirements of rank and verse were swept aside as audiences learned that even illiterates could make music with their tongues, and that eloquent, serious exploration of the human condition extended well beyond the provinces of kings and queens.

[Review Of] Russell Thornton. American Indian Holocaust And Survival: A Population History Since 1492, Elmer R. Rusco

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

A sociologist, Thornton has written a thorough and balanced demographic account of Native American societies in what became the United States from before the arrival of Europeans to the present.

[Review Of] D.C. Poole. Among The Sioux Of Dakota: Eighteen Months Experience As An Indian Agent, 1869-70, Julian Rice

Explorations in Sights and Sounds

From 1869 to 1870 many Oglala and Brule Sioux lived together on their first reservation, the Whetstone Agency, on the Missouri river near Fort Randall, South Dakota. Poole was the reservation agent from 1869-70, and his memoir of that period (published in 1881) introduces the drama of cultural conflict that persists to the present day. The agent had been ordered to use persuasion of every possible kind to induce the Lakota to abandon their way of life and to turn to farming. He had been instructed to regard his wards as children, but he often expresses admiration in many of …