Sociology Commons^™

Crime Legends In Old And New Media, Pamela Donovan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This project explores the contemporary meanings and persistence of the "crime legend." A case study approach was used: three crime legends with a considerable history of public debunking were chosen. These cases were: the market in snuff films, the theft of vital organs for black-market transplant, and the abduction of children from theme park restrooms. Current versions circulating in Internet newsgroups and via electronic mail lists were collected. Discussions in Internet newsgroups were examined and twenty regular newsgroup participants were interviewed. The public newsgroup communication environment is such that salience is established by the interlocutors themselves, rather than by the …

Private 'I'S: Investigating Men's Experiences With Pornographies, Michael Charles Putnam

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This presentation of original research on men's experiences with pornography draws on various theoretical approaches, including the social construction of gender and sexualities, pro-feminist men's studies, queer theory, and cultural studies. The research consists of lengthy, qualitative interviews with 64 pornography fans in the New York metropolitan area. The purpose of the study was to describe men's experiences with pornography and to test the hypothesis that the current literature on pornography does not represent their experience. The impetus for this argument is that there is a vast literature on pornography, but no data on the experiences of bisexual, gay, and …

Redemption And Recovery: An Ethnographic Comparison Of Two Drug Rehabilitation Programs, A Faith Community And A Therapeutic Community, Daniel E. Hood

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This ethnography of long-term residential programs for drug users compares a therapeutic community (TC) with an evangelical Christian "training program." Using participant observation and life history interviews, it pursues three themes. The first is comparative and descriptive. It poses a basic similarity between the ideologically disparate programs. Parallels in program process and personal experience of "identity transformation" (conversion) are described. Despite the religious/secular divide, important similarities in anthropological assumptions are also identified. Contrary to earlier research, the singularity of the clientele is demonstrated. Other parallels include the ritual function of prayer and encounter, the centrality of selective biographical reconstruction, and …

Juergen Habermas And Marx: Critique Of An Incipient Public Sphere, Russell Lee Rockwell

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines the relationship of Jurgen Habermas's ideas to those of Marx. A close reading of Habermas's major works, in conjunction with a close reading as well of the Marx texts he analyzes, comprises the thematically first part. The Habermas texts include the following, with original German publication dates: "Between Philosophy and Science: Marxism as Critique" (1960); Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (1962); Knowledge and Human Interests (1968); Legitimation Crisis (1973); "Reconstruction of Historical Materialism" (1975); and, The Theory of Communicative Action (1981). These texts are shown to contain a two decade-long argument that, (a) the relevance of …

In The Face Of Violence: Rape Crisis Workers Talk About Their Lives, Shantih E. Clemans

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Rape, sexual assault, and domestic violence as social problems have been studied extensively in the literature. However, the experiences of workers who counsel these clients have been given little written attention. The purpose of this study was to explore—in depth—how a group of 21 women rape crisis center workers experienced their jobs. What areas presented challenges and which offered particular satisfaction? Open-ended qualitative interviews were used to generate data on this phenomenon of rape crisis center employment.

Findings suggest that, although social work with clients affected by rape, incest, and domestic violence presented workers with a host of challenges, such …

Gatekeepers To The Franchise: Election Administration And Voter Participation In New York, Ronald Joseph Hayduk

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Political scientists continue to debate the causes, consequences and remedies for America's exceptionally low voter turnout. While scholarly investigation has focused on several factors which produce low voter turnout, the machinery that administers elections in the U.S. has been ignored. Nor have the political influences and environments that determine these agencies' procedures and their place in the electoral system been adequately analyzed. There is, nevertheless, good reason to believe boards of elections play a greater role in shaping participation than is generally appreciated. Evidence indicates that in conducting elections and in implementing electoral rules–such as voter registration procedures–boards of elections …

Child Sexual Abuse, Moral Panic, And The Mass Media: A Case Study In The Social Construction Of Deviance, Steven M. Gorelick

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This is a case study of newswork in a moral panic. Specifically, Stanley Cohen's concept of "moral panic" is used to examine the practices of a group of reporters who covered a widely publicized case of alleged child sexual abuse in a day-care center. Moral panics occur when a perceived threat to the social order emerges with such force, and with such little overt warning, that routine discourse about right and wrong gives way to a flood of indignation about an extraordinary breach of normal moral boundaries. Suspending normal rules governing social control, officials rush to crack down on the …

Social Consequences Of Delayed Childbearing And Infertility, Joan Liebmann-Smith

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This is a qualitative longitudinal study of delayed childbearing and infertility. The initial sample consisted of 35 women. Although they knew they might never have biological children, most did not regret postponing parenthood.

Because infertility is a socially defined illness, the doctor-patient relationship was fraught with conflict. It tended to follow a set pattern: from dependency to disappointment to discord to dissociation. The optimal doctor-patient relationship was mutual participation.

Infertility adversely affected marriages. The "medicalization of masturbation" and intercourse caused many marital problems. Couples also argued over how often and with whom to discuss infertility, when to stop treatment and …

Saving The Environment: Science And Social Action, Patricia D'Andrade

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation analyzes environmental arguments for their stance toward science. It is a sociology of knowledge investigation of arguments made primarily by environmental scientists in the United States in the 1960s and 70s.

The environmental crisis puts science in question but at the same time looks to science for information and solutions. Thus, science is a center of contention around which arguments develop and oppositions are established. Science is beginning to take the place of political thought in providing legitimating concepts for arguments intended to effect social change. Major environmental books and articles by American authors of the 1960s and …

The Psychological Determinants Of Occupational And Non-Occupational Risk-Taking Among Law Enforcement Officers, William F. Mccarthy

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The goal of this study was to identify and statistically examine the psychological determinants of risk-taking among law enforcement officers. This study was conceptualized and designed on a rather simple premise that risk-taking in one's leisure would have a dramatic and predominant influence on the grouping of subjects into definable personality trait categories. The suspicion regarding these categories was that subjects who engaged in risk-taking in their leisure time would be distinctively different from all other emerging groups, with regard to the 16 PF Cattell factors. It was also suspected that this leisure time risk-taking group's personality profile would be …

Taxi Driving: A Study Of Leasing In New York City, Allen Russell Stevens

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study uses ethnography, survey research and organizational analysis to examine the impact that taxicab leasing has had upon the occupational, social and personal lives of fleet taxicab drivers. Ethnography has been conducted at the Yellow Taxi Company (a pseudonym for a major taxicab fleet garage in New York City); 408 surveys were completed by fleet drivers, and 50 interviews were conducted (30 with lessees 10 with management at various garages and 10 with local 3036 taxi union personnel). And organizational analysis was used in the description of how the shift from the commission remuneration system to the lease remuneration …

The Dynamics Of Program Development: A Case Study In Urban Mental Health Services, John Kastan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study describes the planning, development and implementation of the on-site school mental health program, an innovative mental health services program for schoolchildren in New York City. The program, developed jointly by the New York City Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation, and Alcoholism Services and the New York City Board of Education in 1982, was fully implemented in 1986. This study uses data gathered via the method of participant-observation (the author was employed by the Department of Mental Health), supplemented by the review of documents and discussions with key individuals.

The study begins by providing background on the two …

Children's Video Usage: A Comparative Study Of Nine To Eleven-Year-Olds Living In London And New York, Seth P. Welins

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The goal of this cross-cultural study identifies which video and non-video related activities are selected by nine-to-eleven year old children living in New York and London, England. Four hundred children were surveyed and interviewed about their television and VCR viewing habits and their use of computers and computer/video games as well their after-school, non-video activities.

A uses-gratifications approach provides a general framework for the analyses of the data. These data show that there is a complex interplay between children's activity choices and the occupational status of the child's parents, the child's race/ethnicity, gender, ecological environment, family structure and social structure. …

Viewers' Perceptions Of Gender Roles On Television, Susan Barbara Prager

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation develops and applies a method for studying viewers' perceptions of gender roles on television. Two hypotheses–selective perception and oversocialization–were tested. In contrast to other studies which rely on subjects' long-term memories, subjects were shown a tape of One Day at a Time, a popular television show, immediately prior to responding to a questionnaire on the show. Subjects were also asked for demographic data and administered the Demplewolff Sex Role Attitude Test. T-Tests and correlations were done, using groups formed around the sex role attitudes of the subjects (as measured by the Demplewolff Sex Role Attitude Test), as …

Trouble-Shooters And Trouble-Makers: Witchfinding And Traditional Malawian Medicine, Arnold Paul Wendroff

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation describes and analyzes the system of traditional medicine operating in northeastern Malawi, especially those beliefs in witchcraft and spirit possession which cause people to seek out traditional rather than Western healers. Although a wide range of illustrative material is presented, the discussion focuses on an analysis of client correspondence to traditional herbalists (nganga) and diviner-witchdoctors (nchimi). Such correspondence is apparently the first reported in the anthropological literature of central and eastern Africa, and the letters that comprise it are used to elucidate the role of traditional healers and the nature of the healer-client relationship. An examination is also …

A Path Model For Black And White Educational Achievement, David George Null

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This research is an attempt to further develop intergenerational research in educational achievement by refining the "Wisconsin Model of Socioeconomic Achievement." The data source was the 1972 wave of the "Panel Study of Income Dynamics" (popularly known as the "5,000 Families") collected by the Survey Research Center of the University of Michigan. This data, which contained families originally sampled and "spin-off" families that were created by the establishment of a new family by a member of a sample family, was reprogrammed so that the parental characteristics were linked with those of their offspring. The subsample was of all spin-off male …