Rural Sociology Commons^™

Perceptions Of Trail Safety In Humboldt County, California: An Analysis Of Safety Concerns, Factors That Impact Trail Use, And The Value People Place On Trails, Natalie C. Arroyo

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Trails in Humboldt County, California that are used for both transportation and recreation have myriad community benefits. However, people’s concerns about feeling safe can affect trail use, design, and development, as well as how trails are valued and perceived by residents. There has been a lack of information in Humboldt County about trail safety perceptions despite it being a factor that repeatedly arises in infrastructure planning and funding conversations. My research was focused on answering the following questions: (1) How do Humboldt County trail users perceive their safety on and near trails? (2) What factors affect these perceptions about safety, …

"Think Of The Children!": Understanding Parental And Community Opposition To Critical Race Theory, Daniela S. Tierra

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Critical Race Theory (CRT) in schools has become a controversial topic nationwide, leading to widespread and alarming bans on the teaching of CRT. CRT has been accused of shaming white children, creating racial division, and creating a “victim mentality” amongst people of color. The CRT utilized in critical legal studies, ethnic studies, and sociology looks drastically different from what opponents claimed. So, what exactly is CRT - more importantly, what do opponents of CRT believe it to be, and why are they opposed to it? This thesis builds on the sociological field of critical whiteness to examine the academic origin …

Organizing For Power: Understanding Changing Conceptions Of Power In Rural Community Organizing, Evan R. Morden

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Community organizing is a practice of building and utilizing collective power, often initiated by groups who have little or no preexisting social or economic power. By acting together in a disciplined, organized, and targeted fashion, organizing is used to exert influence in the public square to achieve policy outcomes, provide mutual aid, and reweave the fabric of social relations in communities, frequently in direct opposition to existing power structures. Thus, creating a shared understanding of power that is fundamentally liberative is key to the success of organizing efforts and moreover, to creating lasting community cohesion that can continue to mount …

Alone On The Range? Rangeland Stakeholder Perceptions Of Public Lands, Community Change And Maintaining Rural Livelihoods, Hailee Rose Nolte

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Ranchers are a part of a rapidly changing rural western American landscape, and they play a special role in protecting and stewarding working landscapes. Rural communities in Eastern Oregon and Northeastern California have deeply rooted identities and economies connected to ranching and a high percentage of federal lands. The aim of this research is to: 1) document how ties to ranching are changing in communities undergoing social and economic change; 2) analyze the relationships and interactions between ranchers and federal management agency representatives; and 3) to identify how ranchers are maintaining their lifestyle under these circumstances. I interviewed representatives of …

Ishi And The California Indian Genocide As Developmental Mass Violence, Robert K. Hitchcock, Charles A. Flowerday

Humboldt Journal of Social Relations

Ishi represents a form of sentimental folk reductionism. But he can be a teaching tool for the California Indian Genocide, John Sutter also. His mill was where gold was discovered – setting off a frenzied settlement in which Indians were legally enslaved and slaughtered, finally ending a decade after the Emancipation Proclamation. They had already experienced wholesale devastation under Spanish and Mexican colonization. The mission system itself was inhumane and genocidal. It codified enslavement and trafficking of Indians as economically useful and morally purposeful. Mexican administration paid lip service to Indian emancipation but exploited them ruthlessly as peons. The California …

Community Development Financial Institutions (Cdfis): An Analysis Within The Political And Economic Context Of Neoliberalism, Tracie Victoria Wynand

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

This thesis explores Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs) business models by examining the organizational structures, procedural operations, services, and geography. It aims to understand its overall behavior as a financial institution providing low-income communities financial services and ultimately the role it plays within the neoliberal context. The research identifies that CDFIs ultimately hold a mission that promotes economic prosperity from within the neoliberal project by expanding free-market capitalist beliefs and practices when servicing low-income communities. Additionally, the findings suggest that CDFIs take on the role of the neoliberal state by operating in tandem with the Nonprofit Industrial Complex (NPIC), which …

"This Is Home:" Pictures, Place Meaning, And Community In The Natural-Amenity-Rich Del Norte County, California, Erik Arndt

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

This study contributes to the existing, yet small, cadre of research using photo elicitation to investigate the place meanings of people living in a natural-amenity-rich area. Ten current and former residents of Del Norte County, California took pictures of and discussed in an interview the people, places, and attributes they found valuable or meaningful about that place. The primary focus of the photos and interviews was how these natural amenities, in particular Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park, impacted or influenced residents’ place meanings. Three major themes of place meaning were identified from the interviews: Environment-Landscape, Human-Social, and Recreation-Exploration. Each contained …

"We're All Aging": A Discourse Analysis Of Older Adults Aging Experiences In Humboldt County, Kaitlyn Dawn Boyes

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Age is a ubiquitous concept. One minute we are counting down the days until our birthday and the next minute we are ignoring the fact our birthdays exist. Society’s aging population is rapidly growing and is expected to double nearly double by 2050, this increase in population has led to a shift in treatment and attitudes towards both those who are aging and aging itself. There is currently a gap in the literature on aging experiences coming from those experiencing it; rather those in medical professions often dictate these experiences. To help fill those gaps this thesis explores how older …

The Role Of The Local Community On Federal Lands: The Weaverville Community Forest, Erin C. Kelly

Humboldt Journal of Social Relations

In the wake of the timber wars, communities across the American West have struggled to redefine their relationships to nearby federal forests. The timber-dependent model of the pre-Timber War era, with clear timber targets and economic outputs, has been replaced by more nuanced and less clearly-defined model: ecosystem management. This case study research uses interviews with participants in the Weaverville Community Forest (WCF) to explore the role of a community in managing its nearby federal lands. Momentum for the WCF flowed from a small group of citizens who were invested in the forest despite their cultural and ideological differences regarding …

Social-Ecological Change, Resilience, And Adaptive Capacity In The Mckenzie River Valley, Oregon, Timothy B. Inman, Hannah Gosnell, Denise H. Lach, Kailey Kornhauser

Humboldt Journal of Social Relations

This study explores perceptions of long-term residents regarding links between governance, landscape, and community change in the McKenzie River Valley (MRV) in western Oregon and provides a general assessment of factors affecting resilience and adaptive capacity. Residents interviewed indicated that dramatic changes driven by market competition, timber industry changes, increased regulation, and rural restructuring have occurred in both the landscape and community. The changes that have transpired have redefined the relationship between the community and the landscape, moving away from local dependence on timber harvests to an economy focused on tourism and other ecosystem services. In doing so the community …

Public Perceptions Of Homelessness In Humboldt County, John Thomas Krapf

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Homelessness is a social and political issue of great importance in the United States. For every 10,000 people in the U.S. 17 are experiencing homelessness (Bishop et al. 2017). Despite being a consequence of structural factors in the economy such as a lack of affordable housing and livable wages, the news media often frames the issue as an outcome of individualistic factors such as deviant characteristics, criminality, and personal flaws like drug addiction and mental illness. This study examines public perceptions of homelessness in Humboldt County. To explore this question, I conducted a content analysis of 94 articles on homelessness …

What's So Great About The Alternative? Understanding Motivations For Participating In Humboldt County Alternative Food Networks, Jessica Smith

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Participation in alternative food networks such as farmer’s markets, community supported agriculture (CSA), and community gardens has become an increasingly popular way to express opposition to the current industrial food system. Food justice scholars often criticize alternative food networks for operating within a neoliberal economic framework and suggest that structural inequalities within the food system are not able to be addressed by alternative food networks in the same way they are through food justice or food sovereignty. The goal of this research is to discover individual motivation behind participation in local alternative food networks in Humboldt County. I am curious …

The Role Of Social Capital In Fishing Community Sustainability: Case Of Shelter Cove, Ca, Laura R. Casali

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Community development scholars have consistently highlighted the importance of social capital – the glue that keeps a community together – for the development and long-term sustainability of rural communities. There has been less discussion about the role of social capital in fishing communities. This thesis explores the historical trajectory of social capital in Shelter Cove, CA, a small, remote fishing community with an attempt to understand how the type and level of social capital have and may continue to affect the progress and sustainability of the community.

Data for this thesis were collected as part of a strategic planning effort …

A "Dying Breed"? Exploring Logger Identity After The Decline In The Timber Industry In Hayfork, Ca, Sheri L. Harrison

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

The rapid decline of timber operations in the late twentieth century had an immense impact on rural communities whose economy was dependent on logging and lumber mills. The voices and concerns of timber-dependent communities and timber workers have been marginalized by broader forces that focused on political, economic, and environmental issues throughout the Pacific Northwest timber conflict and the subsequent deindustrialization of the timber industry. This study examines the social impacts on loggers, their families, and the broader community in Hayfork, California, through the framework of identity theory. The formation of logger identity and the broader processes that have impacted …

Positionality And Feminisms Of Women Within Sufi Brotherhoods Of Senegal, Georgia Collins

IdeaFest: Interdisciplinary Journal of Creative Works and Research from Cal Poly Humboldt

No abstract provided.