Race and Ethnicity Commons^™

Minority Women In Stem: A Valuable Resource In The Global Economy, Ezella Mcpherson, Diane R. Fuselier-Thompson

Journal of the International Association for the Study of the Global Achievement Gap (Archived)

While there is an expected demographic shift of the ethnic minority population in the United States to become the majority population by 2020, few minority women successfully attain baccalaureate degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematical (STEM) fields. To address this gap, this article employs critical race feminism and narrative analysis methods to examine minority women’s challenges while pursuing undergraduate STEM degrees. Findings suggest that limited access to the field, isolation and alienation, and affordability create barriers that result in many minority women leaving STEM majors. Implications for practice include targeted institutional efforts to increase recruitment and retention efforts towards …

The Voices And Choices Of Women In The Academy, Ramona Ortega, Brenda L. H. Marina, Lena Boustani Darwich, Eunju Rho, Isa Rodriquez-Soto, Rajade Berry-James

Journal of the International Association for the Study of the Global Achievement Gap (Archived)

While it is clear that gender inequity still exists, this situation is compounded by race, ethnicity and sexism. The daily experiences of women confirm that racism and sexism is alive and well. This article presents and examines the experiences of Latino, Black, Arab, and Asian professional women and the consequences of their career decisions. Synthesized with literature, conceptual patterns of significance are noted for young girls and women of color aspiring and pursuing professional careers in education. The strategies utilized by these diverse professional women to cope with the trials and tribulations of contemporary educational and professional challenges are reviewed. …

Dismantling Glass Ceilings: Ethical Challenges To Impasse In The Academy, Debora Y. Fonteneau

Journal of the International Association for the Study of the Global Achievement Gap (Archived)

This article uses numeric and qualitative data to interrogate the impact of affirmative action policies on shattering glass ceilings and resolving impasse in the academic lives of African Americans. This work takes its trajectory from previous research on glass ceilings (Marina and Fonteneau, 2012). Two brief case studies from both PWIs and HBCUs are mentioned to ponder complex attitudes toward race, gender and power. In extracting meaning from the policies, practices, and cases, it became clear that attitudes toward power and authority are influenced by context, but even more, by an individual’s sense of right and wrong. This work is …

Women Faculty Of Color: Success Stories From The Margins, Bridget Turner Kelly, Kristin Mccann

Journal of the International Association for the Study of the Global Achievement Gap (Archived)

Based on data from a larger, longitudinal study of 22 women faculty on the tenure track, this qualitative study examines the socialization experiences of four women faculty of color (WFOC) who earned tenure at two public, research extensive, predominantly White institutions (PWIs) in the U.S. This study gives voice to WFOC who broke through the glass ceiling of tenure and were promoted to associate professor. Although these women earned tenure, their adjustment as newcomers to the academy was fraught with marginalization for being both women and persons of color. Specifically, the WFOC experienced challenges to their role clarity, self-efficacy and …

Changes In The White-Black House Value Distribution Gap From 1997 To 2005, Eric Fesselmeyer, Kien T. Le, Kiat Ying Seah

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

This paper examines the white-black house value gap across the entire value distribution. Instead of using standard conditional mean analysis and decomposition methods (via OLS regression), we estimate and decompose the changes in the white-black house value gap from 1997 to 2005 using quantile regression. We find that the racial gap in 1997 and 2005 is mostly explained by differences in housing characteristics of white- and black-owned houses but that the variation in the racial gap is explained by racial differences in implicit prices of housing characteristics. Our results show that analysis at the conditional mean masks variations at the …

Racial And Ethnic Health Disparities In Incarcerated Populations, Meghan E. Borysova, Ojmarrh Mitchell, Dawood H. Sultan, Arthur R. Williams

Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice

Alarming disparities in population health and wellness in the United States have led to multi-disciplinary research efforts to create health equity. Identifying disparities, elucidating the etiological bases of disparities, and implementing solutions to eliminate disparities are part of the U.S. national health agenda. Racial and ethnic disparities have been identified throughout the cancer control continuum, in cardiovascular disease, diabetes and a multitude of other conditions. The causes of disparities are complex, condition specific, and conjectured to result from combinations of biological and socio-behavioral factors. Racial and ethnic health disparities within the vast incarcerated communities have been excluded from most studies, …

Hungry For Respect: Discrimination Among Adults Using Emergency Food Services, Gilbert C. Gee, Kathryn J. Lively, Larissa Larsen, Jennifer Keith, Jana Stone, Kara Macleod

Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice

Objectives: We examined how adults using emergency food services report discrimination and how these reports may be associated with well-being.

Methods: Data come from a survey (n=318) and from five focus groups of adults using emergency food services, conducted between 2003-2004. The survey included measures derived from the Everyday Discrimination Scale and the Centers for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Focus groups were analyzed with content analysis.

Results: The survey data suggest that everyday discrimination was associated with the CES-D, conditional on covariates. Focus group data are consistent with the survey results and suggest several avenues for future research, including …

Racism In The Criminal Justice System, Nichole Griffith

Social Sciences

This paper examines racism in the criminal justice system. The criminal justice system creates and perpetuates racial hierarchy in the United States. African Americans are criminalized and targeted because of their skin color. I analyze the Reagan administration, the War on Drugs, corrupt police practices, media, inner city enforcement, police discretion, racial profiling, and sentencing to reveal this racism and unfair treatment of African Americans. These victims of racism face lifelong marginalization and exclusion because they were criminalized. I also draw a link between the criminal justice system and slavery and Jim Crow. This racism explains why there are so …

Differential Effects Of Race And Poverty On Ambulatory Care Sensitive Conditions, Farrukh B. Hakeem, Daniel L. Howard, Timothy S. Carey, Yhenneko J. Taylor

Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice

This study is a continuation of an earlier study that examined hospitalization rates for ambulatory care sensitive (ACS) conditions, as a proxy for quality of care, and found evidence of a racial disparity among African American and White Medicare beneficiaries. The current study sought to determine whether neighborhood socioeconomic status (SES) explained this disparity. Differences in rates of ACS hospitalizations by race were assessed using Cochran-Mantel Haenszel tests and Poisson regression. Unadjusted rate ratios for ACS hospitalization for African Americans vs. Whites were found to be higher in low poverty areas (rate ratio (RR)=1.13; 95% CI (1.08, 1.17)) than in …

Seeds For Change: Examining The Association Between Race, Food Security, And Urban Agriculture, Komal Razvi

Honors College Theses

Access to healthy, nutritious food is one of the most basic human needs. Unfortunately, a large portion of the global population, including that of the United States, has limited access to such food, hence putting families in a state of food insecurity. Food insecurity occurs when households are unable to (or struggle to) provide adequate food to all household members due to lack of funds or food resources. This phenomenon is considered to be a major concern in many urban settings such as Detroit, as it is a characteristic of societal distress. Interestingly, research has shown that while food insecurity …

Applying Indices Post-Grutter To Monitor Progress Toward Attaining A Diverse Student Body, Roger W. Reinsch, Sonia Goltz, Hong Chen, Joel C. Tuoriniemi

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

The Supreme Court decision in Grutter v. Bollinger provided more definitive guidance for institutions of higher education desiring to use racial preferences in an effort to achieve a diverse student body. This Article first examines Grutter and other relevant cases to set forth the parameters established by the Supreme Court concerning how university preferences, including but not limited to race, may be used in an admissions policy. This Article then provides a framework for creating and using diversity indices that can help institutions implement the guidelines found in these court decisions and monitor whether or not the goal of diversity …

Factors That Influence Helping Behaviors: Does Race And Socioeconomic Status Of A Victim Influence Whether Others Help?, M’Keba Barksdale

Undergraduate Theses and Capstone Projects

Personal Factors that Influence Helping Behaviors The murder of Kitty Genovese played an historic role in promoting research on helping behavior (Manning, Levine & Collins, 2007). For many years research articles, psychology books, and other references about the murder of Kitty Genovese informed people that she was stabbed to death in front of her home while 37 witnesses watched and did not help. However, more recent research has shown that this research was not accurate (Manning, Levine & Collins 2007). There were actually 38 witnesses and some who testified at the murder trial, that at a first glimpse it did …

The Significance Of Race For Neighborhood Social Cohesion: Perceived Difficulty Of Collective Action In Majority Black Neighborhoods, Tamara Leech, Tara Hobson-Prater

Department of Public Health Scholarship and Creative Works

This article explores William Julius Wilson's contentions about community cultural traits by examining racial differences in middle class neighborhoods' levels of social cohesion. Specifically, we explore the perceived difficulty of these actions-as opposed to general pessimism about their outcomes-as a potential explanation for low levels of instrumental collective action in Black middle class neighborhoods. Our results indicate that, regardless of other neighborhood factors, majority Black neighborhoods have low levels of social cohesion. We also find that this racial disparity is statistically explained by shared perceptions about the amount of effort required to engage in group action in different neighborhoods. These …

Moving Beyond Dichotomies: How The Intersection Of Race, Class And Place Impacts High School Graduation Rates For African American Students, Heather L. Storer, Joseph A. Mienko, Yu-Ling Chang, Ji Young Kang, Christina Miyawaki, Katie Schultz

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Over thirty years ago, William Julius Wilson declared that class trumped race as the more significant determinant of social mobility and economic opportunity. Despite the acclaim and scrutiny for Wilson's work, the United States has grown increasingly divided by intersecting factors of race, class and other demographic factors such as place (Massey, 2007). These divisions are especially evident in the public education system. We analyze how race, class and place interact to predict high school graduation rates in a national sample of schools and students. Results confirm that a singular focus on race, class, or locale is insufficient to explain …

"Waiting For The White Man To Fix Things:" Rebuilding Black Poverty In New Orleans, Robert L. Hawkins, Katherine Maurer

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

This paper revisits William Julius Wilson's thesis that class has surpassed race in significance of impact on African Americans. Our study uses qualitative data from a three-year ethnographic study of 40 largely low-income families in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. We also include a review of the recent U.S. Census study assessing New Orleans's current economic state. Participants in our study viewed race and class as major factors in four areas: (1) immediately following the devastation; (2) during relocation to other communities; (3) during the rebuilding process; and (4) historically and structurally throughout New Orleans. Our analysis concludes that racism …

A Household-Level Decomposition Of The White-Black Homeownership Gap, Eric Fesselmeyer, Kien T. Le, Kiat Ying Seah

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

This paper uses a semiparametric homeownership model to estimate and to decompose the household-level white-black homeownership gap into an endowment component and a residual component across the distribution of homeownership rates. We find that the racial gap differs across homeownership rates and that studies that examine the gap only at the mean may be misleading. We also find that although household characteristics explain the homeownership gap for most households, there is a substantial portion of the gap that remains unexplained for households with a very low propensity to own homes. A comparison of the estimates from the semiparametric model and …

Power, Race, And The Neglect Of Science: The Hiv Epidemics In Sub-Saharan Africa, Eileen Stillwaggon, Larry Sawers

Economics Faculty Publications

This work addresses racial stereotyping and the effect it has in distorting AIDS policy for sub-Saharan Africa.

Free Your Mind: Contemporary Racial Attitudes And Post Racial Theory, Lakeyta M. Bonnette, Sarah M. Gershon, Precious D. Hall

Ethnic Studies Review

The inauguration of the United States first Black President has prompted mass discussions of race relations in America. It is often articulated that America is now in a post-racial society. However, the question still remains: does the election of a Black president demonstrate that America is now a "color-blind" society? To answer this question, we rely on data collected by PEW (2007). Our results suggest that white and African Americans differ significantly in the extent to which they express post-racial attitudes. Specifically, we find that whites more commonly express post-racial attitudes, claiming that racism and discrimination are rare, in opposition …

Scarlet-Letter Politics: The Rhetoric Of Shame In The Campaign To Unseat President Barack Hussein Obama, Myra Mendible

Ethnic Studies Review

This essay considers the politics of racial shaming as deployed against Barack Obama, arguing that it targeted "black" and "foreign" bodies as threats to the "American" body politic.

This Paper Is Only Skin Deep: The Socio-Cultural And Biological Reality Of Human Variation, Paige Jamieson

A with Honors Projects

This project is an anthropological study of human variation and "race".

[Review Of] H. Samy Alim And Geneva Smitherman. Articulate While Black: Barack Obama, Language, And Race In The U.S., Lisa Doris Alexander

Ethnic Studies Review

In his introduction to Articulate While Black Michael Eric Dyson frames Barack Obama as the Orator-in-Chief and the authors would certainly agree with that assessment. Alim and Smitherman argue that in order to have an open and honest discussion about race in the United States, we must look at its linguistic dimensions; we need to language race, to view the racial politics of the United States through the lens of language (xviii). This book seeks to untangle how we talk about race and what assumptions are being made based on a speaker's use of language.

Ida B. Wells And The Forces Of Democratization, Jane Duran

Ethnic Studies Review

The work of Ida B. Wells is examined not only from the standpoint of her anti-lynching writings, but from a perusal of her diaries and her efforts as a young woman. It is concluded that she exemplifies the best of the notion of a genuine democratic political force.

How Porous Are The Walls That Separate Us?: Transformative Service-Learning, Women’S Incarceration, And The Unsettled Self, Coralynn V. Davis, Carol Wayne White

Faculty Journal Articles

In this article, we refine a politics of thinking from the margins by exploring a pedagogical model that advances transformative notions of service learning as social justice teaching. Drawing on a recent course we taught involving both incarcerated women and traditional college students, we contend that when communication among differentiated and stratified parties occurs, one possible result is not just a view of the other but also a transformation of the self and other. More specifically, we suggest that an engaged feminist praxis of teaching incarcerated women together with college students helps illuminate the porous nature of fixed markers that …

Association Between Hospitals Caring For A Disproportionately High Percentage Of Minority Trauma Patients And Increased Mortality: A Nationwide Analysis Of 434 Hospitals., Adil H. Haider, Sharon Ong'uti, David T. Efron, Tolulope A. Oyetunji, Marie L. Crandall, Valerie K. Scott, Elliott R. Haut, Eric B. Schneider, Neil R. Powe, Lisa A. Cooper, Edward E. Cornwell

Manuscripts, Articles, Book Chapters and Other Papers

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether there is an increased odds of mortality among trauma patients treated at hospitals with higher proportions of minority patients (ie, black and Hispanic patients combined).

DESIGN: Hospitals were categorized on the basis of the percentage of minority patients admitted with trauma. The adjusted odds of in-hospital mortality were compared between hospitals with less than 25% of patients who were minorities (the reference group) and hospitals with 25% to 50% of patients who were minorities and hospitals with more than 50% of patients who were minorities. Multivariate logistic regression (with generalized linear modeling and a cluster-correlated robust …

Normalization And The Welfare State, Ladelle Mcwhorter

Philosophy Faculty Publications

In Racism and Sexual Oppression in Anglo-America, I argued that as race was absorbed into biology in the nineteenth century, it was recast from a morphological typology to a function of physiological and evolutionary development. Racial difference became a sign of developmental difference. Racial groups represented stages of human evolution, and raced individuals were to be disciplined and managed in accordance with developmental norms.

Development And Hope: Comments On Thomas Mccarthy's Race, Empire, And The Idea Of Human Development, Ladelle Mcwhorter

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Thomas McCarthy’s Race, Empire, and the Idea of Human Development is an intriguing and important book; moreover, despite its heavy themes and its fine scholarship, it is extremely readable. And it is very timely. The questions it takes up are some of the most pressing of our age: globalization, international distributive justice, and sustainable economic development in particular. Its central problematic concerns the detrimental effects of developmental thinking as a core feature of modernity. The book seeks, says McCarthy, to make “a contribution to the critical history of the present” (2), but it does not stop with critical analysis; McCarthy …

Institutional Factors Contributing To The Under-Representation Of African American Women In Higher Education: Perceptions Of Women In Leadership Positions, Kimberly Ann Robinson

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

he purpose of this basic qualitative study was to examine the lived experiences of African American women who have obtained senior leadership positions in Predominantly White Higher Education Institutions. Data were collected through open-ended, phenomenological-oriented interviews with 12 African American women holding senior level positions in both academic and student affairs in the north and southeast parts of the United States. This study focused on the perceived institutional barriers that have contributed to the under-representation of African American women in higher education senior administration and strategies that were used to overcome perceived barriers. Critical Race Theory was used as a …

A Household-Level Decomposition Of The White-Black Homeownership Gap, Eric Fesselmeyer, Kien T. Le, Kiat Ying Seah

Research Collection College of Integrative Studies

This paper uses a semiparametric homeownership model to estimate and to decompose the household-level white-black homeownership gap into an endowment component and a residual component across the distribution of homeownership rates. We find that the racial gap differs across homeownership rates and that studies that examine the gap only at the mean may be misleading. We also find that although household characteristics explain the homeownership gap for most households, there is a substantial portion of the gap that remains unexplained for households with a very low propensity to own homes. A comparison of the estimates from the semiparametric model and …

The R-Word: A Tribute To Derrick Bell, Kenneth B. Nunn

UF Law Faculty Publications

Racism has become the “R-word,” an allegation that is so outrageous that it cannot even be spoken in public, let alone seriously addressed. In this brief exploration, I propose that it is exactly because racism continues to loom large in American society that talking about it has become taboo. In other words, banning the “R-word” serves a political function. It masks the failure of American society to confront the existence of racism and do something about its effects. Derrick Bell's path breaking work can be used to show why the focus of race discourse has moved from debating over what …

Stereotype Threat In Criminal Interrogations: Why Innocent Black Suspects Are At Risk For Confessing Falsely, Cynthia J. Najdowski

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Little theoretical attention has been paid to evidence that Blacks are overrepresented in samples of false confessors compared to Whites. One possible explanation is that innocent Black suspects experience stereotype threat in interrogations and that this threat causes Black suspects to experience more arousal, self-regulatory efforts, and cognitive load compared to White suspects. These psychological mechanisms could lead innocent Black suspects to display more nonverbal behaviors associated with deception and, ironically, increase the likelihood that police investigators perceive them as guilty. In response, investigators might engage in more coercive tactics and exert more pressure to confess on Black suspects than …