Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons^™

From Planned To Lived: Street-Level Transformation And The Production Of Urban Space In New Cairo, Seba Abouyoussef

Theses and Dissertations

Egypt's new cities program has produced four generations of satellite developments, yet none have been systematically evaluated for how they perform once inhabited. Each is planned as a prototype — functionally zoned, automobile-oriented, image-driven — with little regard for the social, cultural, and behavioral dynamics that will shape it. This thesis examines the gap between the planned city and the lived city by tracing how three streets in New Cairo transformed over a fifteen-year period (2010–2025) through everyday use, stakeholder interaction, and pivotal trigger events.

The research follows a qualitative, multi-phase methodology — combining historical and physical mapping, behavioral observation, …

Topographies Of Being: World-Making And Ontological Formation In Modern Saint Catherine, South Sinai, Ahmad Mahana

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is an exploration of the ecological and sociological processes involved in the production of the socionatural space of the contemporary town and natural protectorate of Saint Catherine, South Sinai. Revered by all Abrahamic religions as the site of the Great Theophany, the town has perpetually been considered an area of immense spiritual and natural significance. In recent decades, however, the town has undergone a series of modernizing campaigns that have not only threatened the region’s natural environment and indigenous lifeways but have also jeopardized the plurality of its extant lifeworlds. By relying on a variety of ethnographic methods, …

Shadow Garments: Costume Creation For Integrating Alienated Parts Of The Self, Mega M. Galvin

Art Therapy | Master's Theses

This study explores costume creation as a narrative-based intervention for integrating "shadow" parts, or aspects of the self that are repressed or alienated due to shame, trauma, or social pressure. Grounded in Jungian analytic psychology, narrative therapy, and expressive arts theory, the research addresses the limitations of traditional talk therapy in accessing somatic memory and proposes costume making as a pathway for externalization and re-authorship. Using a qualitative, participatory study inspired by Pat B. Allen’s Open Studio Process, four adult participants engaged in a three-session workshop to design, construct, and wear costumes representing their identified shadow aspects. Data was collected …

Queer And Christian: How Lgbtq+ University Students Build Affirming Religious Spaces, Sarah L. Boyd

PANDION: The Osprey Journal of Research and Ideas

How do queer Christian students navigate religious spaces? This project examines this question by focusing on an ecumenical campus ministry’s ‘Queer Bible Study’ (QBS) meetings at a medium-sized university in Florida. The study explores how students reconcile their queer and Christian identities within a religious context. Using ethnographic observation and linguistic analysis, this research highlights how these students create inclusive and affirming spaces where both aspects of their identities can be explored and expressed. Three methods of space formation were identified: physical, cultural, and linguistic. The students used these methods to create a space where they actively renegotiated their identities, …

Contemplative Pause: Practice As Pedagogy In A Liberal Arts Classroom, Sienna R. Craig, Sid Babla, Abbey Savin

Journal of Contemplative and Holistic Education

This article discusses the integration of contemplative pedagogies – including but not limited to yoga nidra – into two case study courses at an elite private liberal arts institution. We begin by describing the structure, context, and nature of this experiment in contemplative pedagogy, considering this experiment in the context of what we call the “liberal arts promise” at a moment of heightened mental health crises across institutions of higher education and increasing public skepticism about the value(s) of higher education. The article takes as a starting point the idea that building forms of contemplative pause into the fabric of …

Kronik Perubahan Paradigma Terhadap Wacana Agronomi Di Andalusia Pada Abad Ke 11-12 M, Muhamad Naufal Sulistyo

Multikultura

This study examines the history of Islamic science through the paradigmatic shift in agronomic discourse (filāḥah) in Andalusia during the 11th to 12th centuries CE. Employing Thomas Kuhn's paradigm shift theory within his framework of Scientific Revolution, this qualitative research aims to reconstruct the intellectual transformation of the Muslim agronomist community from a magical-speculative orientation toward an empirical-technical one. The study applies a five-stage historical research method topic selection, heuristics, verification, interpretation, and historiography in conjunction with the paradigm shift concept, as applied to the major agricultural treatises of Andalusia. Data sources include both primary and secondary literature comprising books, …

Trauma-Informed Education For Teachers As A Form Of Disaster Preparedness And Mitigation Across Cultural Contexts, Emma A. Aellen

Master of Arts in Human Services

Natural disasters are ecological events that cause mass casualties and physical destruction. They are also psychological and cultural happenings which shape the lives of the affected people well beyond the immediate crisis. Emergency response systems have historically prioritized the needs for material relief, such as food, shelter, and infrastructure repair, but all while neglecting mental health support. This review draws on disaster psychology, education, and community resilience research, including cross-cultural, organizational, and institutional theory, intervention programs, and disaster mental health policy. Sources were analyzed thematically to build a multi-actor framework linking teachers, schools, and communities in post-disaster recovery. The review …

Paradoxes Of Customary Land Formalization: A Comparative Study Of Papua New Guinea And Indonesia From A Political Anthropology Perspective, Adi Prasetijo

Antropologi Indonesia

This article studies the dynamics of customary land ownership in Papua New Guinea (PNG), where approximately 97 percent of land is collectively held by clans. Drawing on insights from political anthropology—particularly normative pluralism (Griffiths, 1986; von Benda-Beckmann, 2006), Polanyi's double movement (Filer, 2014), along with cosmological perspectives on land and identity (Weiner & Glaskin, 2007; Ingold, 2021), it analyzes how government efforts to formalize customary land through the Land Act 1996 and the Incorporated Land Groups (ILG) Act 2009 generate three principal paradoxes: (1) protection versus exclusion, (2) recognition versus commodification, and (3) negotiation versus rigidity. The study blends an …

Grandma's Hands, Eric Rand

Teaching Social Studies in the Peach State

The purpose of this collaborative community based cookbook project is to archive personal memories, recipes, and experiences that contribute to the story of America. Educators are positioning students to become local historians by interacting with elders in their families or communities retrieving lost or unknown narratives regarding the different dishes. This manuscript provides educators with detailed teacher notes through 4 phases to help them and students work through the semester on the project building on additional knowledge learned through traditional course work. Students will use technology like voice recorders, and graphic design platforms to ground their finished product. Moreover educators …

Intl 30800: Research Methods For International And Global Studies, Eliza Marks

Open Educational Resources

This syllabus was developed for INTL 30800: Research Methods in International and Global Studies at City College of New York (CCNY). This project-based course introduces International and Global Studies students to research methods, with a focus on how social scientists formulate questions, design and carry out research, and interpret evidence. The course is designated Zero Textbook Cost (ZTC).

Cultural Humility In The Workplace: A Causal-Comparative Study Of Foreign And Local Hire Employees In International Education, Natalie A. Ortiz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Cultural humility is recognized as a framework for fostering respectful relationships in culturally diverse workplaces. However, limited research has examined cultural humility within international education in regard to workplace dynamics and power imbalances that may exist between foreign and local hire educators. The purpose of this quantitative causal-comparative study was to examine differences in perceived cultural humility levels between foreign and local hire employees in PreK-12^th grade private international schools in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. The study also examined whether years of international educational experience and the number of international educational assignments influenced perceived cultural humility levels. Data …

Grief As A Constitutive Shadow Of Queer Joy: Reclaiming Negativity And The Ethics Of Staying For Education Research, Akira Sawata

Journal of Queer and Trans Studies in Education

In education scholarship, authors have increasingly called to center queer joy to disrupt the conventional deficit model that normally accompanies queer communities. However, in this paper, I argue that an exclusive emphasis on joy may risk instituting and normalizing a happiness duty that marginalizes negative affects and subjects. I propose queer grief not as an opposite, but as a constitutive shadow of joy. Drawing on theories of queer, trans, and crip negativity and the studies on loss, grief, and mourning, I critique the imperative to mobilize affect solely for future utility and teleological meaning. I contend that such mobilization-driven …

Regulating Religious Coexistence : The Intricacies Of Interfaith Cooperation In Coastal Kenya, Erik Meinema

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Regulating Religious Coexistence offers a compelling ethnographic analysis of how Muslims, Christians, and practitioners of indigenous African religions negotiate coexistence in Kenya’s coastal region. The book conceptualizes religious diversity as a dynamic field shaped by multiple partly intersecting and partly conflicting models of interaction. These include the political secularism promoted by the Kenyan state and civil society organizations focused on interfaith harmony, forms of competition between religious groups, and pluralistic practices in which individuals draw on multiple traditions to meet spiritual needs.

Through a close examination of civil society initiatives funded by Western donors to foster peacebuilding and to counter …

From Source And Summit To Parish Practice: A Qualitative Analysis Of Eucharist And Social Outreach, Erik Sorensen S.J.

Journal of Global Catholicism

A small-scale qualitative study in a Catholic parish situated in Ottawa, Canada, offers insights into the complex relationship between that community's worship and its commitment to social justice. This article brings the lived theology of this community into dialogue with the academic and magisterial perspectives on the Eucharist as the source and summit of Christian life. The dialogue is framed by the Theological Action Research Network's four voices of theology: operant, espoused, formal, and normative. This framework helps to center the marginalized theology of the faithful in the pews. In this case, the parish offered a dynamic theology of welcome …

“Ite Missa Est”: How Can The Altar Alter Attitudes And Actions?, Ebenezer Akesseh

Journal of Global Catholicism

This paper brings into focus the relationship between personal agency and so-

cial structure, demonstrating that what we celebrate on the altar forms within

us the proper dispositions that can help prevent the occurrence of corruption.

The first part examines corruption from a socio-cultural perspective and ex-

plains the incidence and effects of corruption. The second part discusses the

relationship between worship and the formation of actions and attitudes. It

highlights the need to embody the social implications of our celebrations. Using

responses from interviewees, the third part illustrates that the celebration of the

Eucharist shapes the commitments and conduct …

La Santa Muerte And The Characteristic Damage Of Canonization, Ellen Webber

Journal of Global Catholicism

Devotion to La Santa Muerte, a Mexican folk saint who personifies Death, has

been condemned by the Catholic Church for its affiliation with Mexican drug

cartels. This article challenges mainstream interpretations of La Santa Muerte

devotion using the theological framework of characteristic damage, as defined

by Lauren Winner and Paul J. Griffiths. This framework understands liturgy

as celebrated by sinners in a damaged world, and therefore necessarily damaged

itself. As much as liturgy and Christian practice form us for good, they also per-

petuate damage. I argue that the sins present in La Santa Muerte veneration are

an expression of …

Negotiating Plurality: Korean Catholic Funerals As Lived Religion, Jieun Han

Journal of Global Catholicism

This article examines Korean Catholic funeral rites through the lenses of ritual

guidebooks and lived religion, arguing that Catholic funerary practice in Korea

has emerged through sustained engagement with Confucian and Buddhist tradi-

tions as well as modern nationalism. Focusing on Catholic manuals such as the

Sangjang yesik [Rites for Mourning and Funerals] and related texts, it traces how

officially sanctioned liturgical forms coexist with, accommodate, and reinterpret

indigenous ritual logics surrounding mourning, burial, ancestor veneration, and

care for the dead. Rather than viewing Korean Catholic funerals as a simple

localization of Roman rites, the article conceptualizes them as a …

Editor's Introduction, Brent H. Otto S.J.

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

The Game Within: An Anthropological Approach To Games And Play, Nehal Maged Mohamed

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is based on an eighteen-month ethnography of El Ghawasa, an Egyptian play-based organization that designs educational games, tools, and services. Claiming that El Ghawasa, with its ethos of play, seeks to create an alternative to the capitalist corporate structure. Through tracking how this organization navigates ruptures, negotiates constraints, and experiments with different practices and internal restructuring, I explore the possibilities and limitations of El Ghawasa, while attempting to resist absorption by the very system it opposes. I ask: when the rules keep changing (while the logic of the capitalist corporate structure remains the same), and the boundaries of …

Intracommunity Social Capital Systems Of Class And Caste In South Asian Intimate-Partner Violence Survivor Outcomes, Vriddhi Vinay

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study theorizes how caste and class function as transnational forms of social capital that structure intimate partner violence (IPV) outcomes among South Asian diasporic women in the New York City metropolitan area. While existing IPV scholarship foregrounds migration status, gender, and legal precarity, it often treats South Asian communities as internally homogeneous and overlooks how intracommunity hierarchies mediate access to support. Drawing on social capital theory and postcolonial feminist frameworks, this research positions caste and class stratification as underexamined axes of stratification within United States-based IPV analysis. Using survey data from 24 South Asian woman-identifying IPV survivors in New …