Sociology Commons^™

[Review Of] Gustavo Leclerc, Raúl Villa, And Michael J. Dear (Eds.). Urban Latino Cultures: La Vida Latina En La., Catherine S. Ramirez

Ethnic Studies Review

Throughout the twentieth century (and now the twenty-first), the specter of a Latina/o past, present, and future has haunted the myth of Los Angeles as a sunny, bucolic paradise. At the same time it has loomed behind narratives of the city as a dystopic, urban nightmare. In the 1940s Carey McWilliams pointed to the fabrication of a "Spanish fantasy heritage" that made Los Angeles the bygone home of fair señoritas, genteel caballeros and benevolent mission padres. Meanwhile, the dominant Angeleno press invented a "zoot" (read Mexican-American) crime wave. Unlike the aristocratic, European Californias/os of lore, the Mexican/American "gangsters" of the …

Strategies Of Resistance And Disengagement In An Ethnic Enclave: Ei Barrio In Aurora, Illinois, Jack Thornburg

Ethnic Studies Review

This paper is a case study of a small city undergoing a process of demographic and ethnic change in community, empowerment, and political participation. For the dominant ethnic group these changes are threatening, but resisting the Latino community that they fear tends to set in motion the very conditions that exacerbate the growing prevalence of poverty and the attendant problems of gangs, domestic violence, and school drop-out rates. For the Latino community the challenge to such resistance is through community organizing and bringing pressure upon the city for inclusion in the political structure to influence policy regarding these problems.

[Review Of] Rey Chow. Ethics After Idealism, Andrew Walzer

Ethnic Studies Review

I am largely sympathetic to Rey Chow's stated purpose of bringing together cultural studies with critical theory. Chow is critical of the gap that has been created between the two. She accuses critical theorists of believing that theory is superior to cultural studies and suggests racialization is implicit in this claim. But her real ire is reserved for cultural theorists who, in the name of recognizing and celebrating "otherness," reject theory and idealize and thus reify non-Western cultures. She argues that we need to portray non-Western cultures with the same kind of complexity and theoretical analysis as Western cultures. This …

[Review Of] Alaina Lemon. Between Two Fires: Gypsy Performance And Romani Memory From Pushkin To Post-Socialism, Cynthia R. Kasee

Ethnic Studies Review

When most people hear the word "Gypsy," images are automatically conjured up of nomadic caravans of colorfully attired, swarthy-complected romantic souls, accompanied, of course, by the mournful strains of a violin. Others think of fortune tellers, confidence swindlers, even nefarious home improvement crews, painting driveways with black paint and charging for blacktopping. Whichever stereotype comes to mind, it is the conjurer's assertion that this is the real thing, the authentic reality of Gypsy life.

[Review Of] Stewart E. Tolnay. The Bottom Rung: African American Family Life On Southern Farms, Clarence Spigner

Ethnic Studies Review

Stewart E. Tolnay has a message to deliver. In his excellent historical treatise on the family life of African American sharecroppers he counters current belief that rural Southern blacks who migrated North brought with them a dysfunctional family structure, a view espoused today by scholars as politically disparate as the liberal Daniel Patrick Moynihan and the conservative Charles Murray. Through the use of interview data gathered from the New Dears Federal Writers Project and with statistical analysis of U. S. Census data, Tolnay's seven chapters and epilogue span the years 1910-1940 from the post-Slavery period and the era of Jim …

[Review Of] Chon A. Noriega. Shot In America: Television, The State, And The Rise Of Chicano Cinema, Elsa O. Valdez

Ethnic Studies Review

Shot in America provides the reader with a complex historical examination of the representation and exclusion of Chicano filmmakers within the American film and television industry. This comprehensive study covers a forty-year period of political activism by Chicano media makers. Noriega's powerful analysis begins with the relationship between Chicano "poetic consciousness" and social movements, the state, and mass media; follows the protests against the Frito Bandito commercials in the 1960s, the media reform movement, the emergence and decline of Chino public affairs programming, and the rise of Chicano professionalism within the independent sector; and concludes with a brief overview of …

Critical Multiculturalism And The Globalization Of Capital: Some Implications For A Politics Of Resistance, Peter Mclaren, Ramin Farahmandpur

Education Faculty Articles and Research

"Despite the historic defeat of Marxism and constant attempts by so-called progressive educators to exorcize any residual Marxist discourse from the literature on multiculturalism, the contradictions of capital playing themselves out in the theater of contemporary social relations are beckoning Marx's spectre to return and further trouble those theories proclaiming that the "end of ideology" is upon us and that all we need to do in order to rescue humanity is to heed the clarion call of diversity. Too often overlooked in the debates over multiculturalism at present engulfing the academy are the myriad ways in which globalization is shaping …

Front Cover

The Bridge

No abstract provided.

Completing The Demographic Transition, John Bongaarts, Rodolfo A. Bulatao

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Despite ongoing declines in fertility in many countries, the population of the world is experiencing a period of rapid expansion, and its size is expected to exceed 10 billion by the end of the demographic transition. Three causes of this growth are identified and quantified: 1) fertility above the replacement level of two surviving children per woman, 2) continuing declines in mortality, and 3) population momentum resulting from a young age structure. A set of simple analytic expressions is proposed for estimating these factors from standard demographic indicators. Population momentum is shown to be the main cause of future growth …

Aprendiendo Sobre Sexualidad: Una Manera Practica De Comenzar, Sondra Zeidenstein, Kirsten Moore

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

“Aprendiendo sobre sexualidad” está dividido en tres partes principales. La primera parte incluye los enfoques que algunos proveedores/as, activistas e investigadoras/es están utilizando para comprender las experiencias de las personas en relación a la sexualidad. La segunda explora las conexiones explícitas e implícitas entre la búsqueda de la salud, las prácticas anticonceptivas, la salud reproductiva y la sexualidad. Los capítulos de la tercera parte se centran en actividades que desafían actitudes y conductas arraigadas en cuanto a la sexualidad, cuyos efectos son real y potencialmente dañinos para la salud reproductiva de mujeres y hombres. El libro presenta programas y trabajos …

The Fertility Impact Of Changes In The Timing Of Childbearing In The Developing World, John Bongaarts

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This study examines the role of tempo effects in the fertility declines of developing countries. These effects temporarily inflate the total fertility rate (relative to the actual fertility of cohorts of women) during periods when the age at childbearing declines and they deflate it when childbearing is postponed. An analysis of data from the World Fertility Surveys and the Demographic and Health Surveys demonstrates that fertility trends observed in many developing countries are likely to be distorted by changes in the timing of childbearing. In most countries women are delaying childbearing, which implies that observed fertility is lower than it …

Population Weights In The International Order, Geoffrey Mcnicoll

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Population relativities play little part in the international system. A nation’s economic and military power is influenced by population size, but as one factor among many. Formal relations among states exclude population from consideration by the principle of sovereign equality. Three sources of possible change in this situation are explored, in which states would be “population-weighted” to a greater degree than before. Convergence of productivity levels around the world, expected by many, would bring the economic and population rankings of states more into line. Such convergence is occurring, but selectively and for the most part quite slowly. Anticipation of its …

Premarital Sex And School Dropout In Kenya: Can Schools Make A Difference?, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Annabel Erulkar

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Although an overall decline has occurred in adolescent fertility in Kenya, the proportion of births to teenagers that takes place prior to marriage is rising. At the same time that premarital sex and childbearing have increased, educational participation has expanded considerably, especially for girls. Using data from nearly 600 adolescents aged 12-19 in combination with data collected from 33 primary schools that the adolescents attended, this paper explores whether certain aspects of the school environment affect the likelihood of early and unprotected sex among adolescent girls and boys in three districts of Kenya. Because of the concern with “schoolgirl pregnancy” …

Mortality Decline And The Demographic Response: Toward A New Agenda, Mark R. Montgomery

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

A central proposition of demographic transition theory is that declines in infant and child mortality can encourage subsequent declines in fertility. Even the earliest formulations of the theory recognized that fertility decline would occur only with a lag, but neither theory nor empirical work has explored the length of such lags. This paper urges that individual perceptions and beliefs about mortality risks, conspicuously absent from the demographic research agenda, be studied directly. It proceeds to link mortality perceptions to health care decisionmaking and investments in children. The paper concludes by calling for a new agenda on mortality decline. This agenda …

The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation, Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Female circumcision is widespread in Egypt. Research suggests that the practice persists because of a belief that circumcision will moderate female sexuality, that it will assure a girl’s marriageability, and that it is sanctioned by Islam. Using data from a nationally representative survey of adolescents, this paper investigates the prevalence and social correlates of circumcision among girls aged 10-19, the circumstances surrounding the procedure, and the attitudes of adolescents towards it. While the vast majority of adolescents are circumcised, a life table analysis indicates that girls today are at least 10 percentage points less likely to undergo female circumcision than …

The Spread Of Primary Schooling In Sub-Saharan Africa: Implications For Fertility Change, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Carol E. Kaufman, Paul C. Hewett

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Caldwell has hypothesized that the onset of the fertility transition would be linked with the achievement of “mass formal schooling.” In sub-Saharan Africa, a region where some countries have begun the fertility transition but many have not, the extent of progress toward mass schooling has not yet been assessed. This paper fills a gap in the literature using newly available Demographic and Health Survey data to assess schooling patterns and trends for 17 sub-Saharan African countries. As background to that assessment, the paper includes a literature review, an overview of the recent history of African education, and an evaluation of …

Fertility Preferences And Contraceptive Change In Developing Countries, Bamikale J. Feyisetan, John B. Casterline

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Fertility has declined substantially in developing countries in the period since 1960, primarily as the result of increases in contraceptive prevalence. Little dispute is found on this point, but considerable debate has arisen about the causes of the increase in contraceptive prevalence. One unresolved issue is the causal contribution of changes in fertility desires. The sources of increase in contraceptive prevalence are analyzed in 22 countries in Latin America, Asia, and Africa in the period from the 1970s to the 1990s, using World Fertility Surveys and Demographic and Health Surveys data. Through regression decomposition, change in prevalence is attributed to …

Urban Growth In Developing Countries: A Review Of Projections And Predictions, Martin Brockerhoff

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Comparison of the United Nations’ earliest and most recent projections to the year 2000 suggests that urban and city growth in developing regions has occurred much more slowly than was anticipated as recently as 1980. A modified “urban population explosion” in developing countries since the 1970s conforms to explanatory models of urban growth developed by economists around 1980. Trends in productivity and terms of trade, in particular, have been highly favorable to agriculture as compared to manufacturing, presumably slowing migration to urban centers. Increases in national population growth rates have produced less than commensurate in rates of city growth, further …

Measuring Living Standards With Proxy Variables, Mark R. Montgomery, Michele Gragnolati, Kathleen A. Burke, Edmundo Paredes

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Very few demographic surveys in developing countries gather information on household income or consumption expenditure, despite the theoretical importance of these measures. Consequently, researchers have been forced to rely on ad hoc collections of proxy measures for living standards, and the properties of these proxies have not been systematically analyzed. In this research, we ask what hypotheses can be tested using proxy variables, and evaluate the performance of proxy measures in relation to consumption expenditures per adult, our preferred measure of living standards. We find that the proxy variables commonly employed in demographic research are very weak predictors of consumption …

The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation [Arabic], Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Female circumcision is widespread in Egypt. Research suggests that the practice persists because of a belief that circumcision will moderate female sexuality, that it will assure a girl’s marriageability, and that it is sanctioned by Islam. Using data from a nationally representative survey of adolescents, this paper investigates the prevalence and social correlates of circumcision among girls aged 10-19, the circumstances surrounding the procedure, and the attitudes of adolescents towards it. While the vast majority of adolescents are circumcised, a life table analysis indicates that girls today are at least 10 percentage points less likely to undergo female circumcision than …

Rural Nebraska Tomorrow: The Gap Between The Preferred And Expected Future, Rebecca J. Vogt

Nebraska Rural Poll

Rural Nebraskans’ Perceptions of Tax Restructuring and Local Schools

Tools For Inclusion: Networking: A Consumer Guide To An Effective Job Search, Cecilia Gandolfo

Tools for Inclusion Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Based on an ICI training workshop, this brief teaches job seekers with disabilities how to become more proactive in their job search.

Cultural Impact On The Perception Of Family Planning, Dalia Moustafa Ramadan

Archived Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Designing Collaborations Between Community Based Organizations And Schools To Produce Curriculum Models For Service- Learning Programs (Richardson Nature Center), Richardson Nature Center

Guides

Richardson Nature Center, located in Bloomington, Minnesota, is part of the Hennepin Parks System. Richardson Nature Center is working in collaboration with local fourth and fifth grade classrooms to teach environmental education in a variety of ways. Students in these classrooms learn about the environment through classroom lessons and experiences at Richardson. Teachers and Richardson naturalists team teach the lessons. The main goal of this program is to impart knowledge, awareness and positive values about the environment to students. Another goal is to familiarize students with Richardson Nature Center, in hopes that they will visit the center after having an …

Long-Term Effects Of Volunteerism During The Undergraduate Years, Alexander W. Astin, Linda J. Sax, Juan Avalos

Higher Education

A growing number of colleges and universities in the United States have become actively engaged in encouraging their undergraduate students to participate in some form of volunteer service (Cohen & Kinsey, 1994; Levine, 1994; Markus, Howard, & King, 1993; O'Brien, 1993). Further, service is increasingly being incorporated into the curriculums of major and general education courses (Cohen & Kinsey, 1994; Levine, 1994). While relatively few colleges include service learning or volunteer service as a curricular requirement, the number is growing and such a requirement has become an increasingly frequent topic of debate (Markus, Howard, & King, 1993). That the top …

Recent Dissertations On Service And Service-Learning Topics, Robert D. Shumer, Ann Treacy, Madeleine S. Hengel, Lily O'Donnell

Bibliographies

Rumor has it that there is very little research on service and service-leaming. A brief literature review of dissertations from 1990 onward revealed that over 110 studies have been completed on service and related topics. So much for the rumor!

Our intent in performing this literature review is to identify academic studies that have been completed in the past several years on issues related to service-learning. Covering a variety of interest areas and related topics, the National Service-Learning Clearinghouse is initially interested in identifying studies that add to the knowledge base on service-learning. The collection of titles, authors, and abstract …

What Place For Family Privacy?, Martha Albertson Fineman

Faculty Articles

This nuclear unit is thought to be in "crisis" because of the tendency of many marriages to dissemble and dissolve. Some people claim that society is also in a state of crisis as a result of marital instability. Many are concerned by the assembling of "deviant" and competing intimate entities claiming entitlement to the benefits and privileges previously extended to marriage." The family has become the symbolic terrain for the cultural war in which our society is increasingly mired. If one believes the family is not inherently limited to any essential or natural form, but is as contrived as any …

Beyond The Rhetoric Of Dirty Laundry: Examining The Value Of Internal Criticism Within Progressive Social Movements And Oppressed Communities, Darren L. Hutchinson

Faculty Articles

Several historical reasons explain opposition to the airing of internal criticism by scholars and activists within progressive social movements and by members of subordinate communities. Opponents often contend that such criticism might reinforce negative stereotypes of subordinate individuals and that reactionary movements and activists might appropriate and misuse negative portrayals of the oppressed. A related fear holds that internal criticism will dismantle political unity within oppressed communities and progressive social movements, thereby forestalling social change. While these concerns provide some context for understanding the resistance to internal criticism within progressive social movements, I argue in this essay that they do …

Gay Rights For Gay Whites: Race, Sexual Identity, And Equal Protection Discourse, Darren L. Hutchinson

Faculty Articles

My argument proceeds in four parts. Part I situates my discussion of the synergistic relationship among race, class, gender, and sexuality within a broader body of research on the "intersectionality'' of systems of oppression and of identity categories. Part I then examines how my scholarship attempts to advance this literature both substantively and conceptually. Part II expounds my claim that the comparative and essentialist treatment of race and sexuality within pro-gay and lesbian theory and politics marginalizes gay, lesbian, bisexual, and trans­gendered persons of color and constructs and reinforces the notion that the gay and lesbian community is uniformly white …

An Understanding Of Selected Familial Dynamics As They Relate To The Prevention Of Substance Use Among Youth From St. Martin, Vincent A. David

Dissertations

Problem. Various studies examined the relationship between youth, drug use, and the role that families play in influencing such use. Thus, it is evident that youth use drugs, and thereasons for their drug use vary widely. However, there have not been widespread research done on the youth who do not use drugs, particularly from a family perspective. Also, no research study has been known to be conducted on St. Martin of such nature.

Purpose. This study sought to gain an understanding on how selected familial dynamics functioned within three families in deterring their youth from becoming involved in …