Rural Sociology Commons^™

Rangeland Management During Drought: Assessing Social–Ecological And Cognitive Indicators Of Ranchers’ Adaptive Capacity, Tonya Haigh

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Rangeland managers face challenges to adapt to climate extremes, and research is needed on how to support their adaptive capacity for managing climate risk. This study evaluates adaptive capacity using an integrated vulnerability and resilience conceptual model and three cognitive behavioral models. Overarching research questions focus on the relationship between protective action and impacts and the best predictors of taking action in response to drought. Three studies address these questions, using quantitative data collected from two post-drought surveys of rangeland-based livestock managers in the Northern Great Plains of the U.S. The studies find evidence of the roles of social-ecological sources …

Nebraska Annual Social Indicators Survey (Nasis) 2019 Methodology Report, Bureau Of Sociological Research

Nebraska Annual Social Indicators Survey (NASIS)

Introduction 3

Mode Selection 3

Design and Item Selection 3

Sampling Design 4

Experimental Design Treatment 4

Data Collection Process 5

Response Rate 5

Data-Entry Training, Supervision, and Quality Control 5

Processing of Completed Surveys 6

Data Cleaning 6

NASIS Sample Weights 6

Design Effects 7

Questions 7

Estimate of Sampling Error 10

Appendices 11

Appendix A: Cover Letters and NASIS 2019 FAQ 11

First Mailing – Version 1 (UNL Logo) 11

FAQ – Version 1 (UNL Logo) 13

FAQ – Version 2 (New UN Logo) 14

Second Mailing – Version 1 (UNL Logo) 15

Second Mailing – Version 2 …

A Virginia Mountain City Responds To The Challenge Of Improving Health Outcomes, Robert S. Cowell Jr.

Journal of Appalachian Health

In 2012, Roanoke Virginia was becoming a city of haves and have-nots, a place where many were benefitting from revitalization underway but too many were seeing their situation grow worse and becoming even more entrenched. Poverty with levels as high as 50% in some neighborhoods; life expectancy sometimes 14 years shorter than those living just one or two neighborhoods over; and lack of access to fresh food, medical care, and economic opportunities—all within view of the largest hospital in the region was unacceptable.

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Adult Food Security And The Relationship With Adverse Childhood Experiences Among Residents Of Appalachian North Carolina, Manan Roy, Erin Bouldin, Maggie Bennett, Adam Hege

Journal of Appalachian Health

Introduction: The Appalachian region has worse health outcomes than the remainder of the United States. These disparities are often linked to the underlying social and environmental determinants of health. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are associated with poor health outcomes across the lifespan and have a significant impact on future social determinants as an adult, including food security status.

Purpose: To explore the relationships between ACEs and food security among adults in the Appalachian counties of North Carolina and make comparisons with the rest of the state.

Methods: Researchers used North Carolina’s 2012 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System data; namely, …

Roanoke's Collective Public Health Activities, Michael Lytton

Journal of Appalachian Health

Roanoke is addressing problems that confront many small and medium sized cities in the U.S., especially disparities in health and life expectancy between neighborhoods. These disparities are often legacies of decades of racial and economic segregation, resulting in low-income or disinvested communities. Typically, such neighborhoods have fewer parks, higher vacancy rates and less stable affordable housing stock, inadequate public transit systems, too few clinics, too many fast food restaurants and insufficient access to high quality schools. In Roanoke these are the northwest and southeast quadrants, both federally designated Medically Underserved Areas, and characterized by a large proportion of the city’s …

The Promises And Perils Of Radio As A Medium Of Faith In A Q’Eqchi’-Maya Catholic Community, Eric Hoenes Del Pinal

Journal of Global Catholicism

Because their parish is large, dispersed, and overwhelmingly rural, FM radio is one of the few reliable means through which the Q’eqchi’-Maya Catholics of San Felipe in Alta Verapaz, Guatemala, can communicate with each other en masse. Yet, because it is a one-way medium, it is also impossible to gauge how its intended audience is responding, or if is even there to receive broadcasted messages. Drawing on ethnographic material collected in 2005 (on the use of radio broadcasting to call together ritual participants) and 2016 (on an ultimately failed attempt to launch a radio station to serve rural parishioners), …

Introduction: Mediating Catholicisms: Studies In Aesthetics, Authority, And Identity, Eric Hoenes Del Pinal, Marc Roscoe Loustau, Kristin Norget

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

Overview & Acknowledgements, Mathew Schmalz

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

当代中国农村生态丶生计的文化批判 : 以山西"蒲韩社区" 为例, Xiaohui Yan

Lingnan Theses (MPhil & PhD)

在发展主义语境下，农村常常被视为衰败和落后的地区，农村发展也多被看成由贫变富的经济化过程，尤其依赖对各种“生态资源”的开发。在这一过程中，人被塑造成将“资源”变成“资本”的主体，同时人自身也被当成某种资源，乡村社会似乎被裹挟。而当代乡村建设运动，即使提出各种创新或可持续发展策略，亦未能轻易摆脱上述发展逻辑，常常使运动自身陷入困境。

本研究以山西“蒲韩社区”为主要案例，借助Felix Guattari关于三生态（the three ecologies）的视野，尝试指出，思考当下中国乡村的发展问题，须跳出一般的环境保护和经济发展论述，以及以人为中心、理性主义的主体形而上学，引入生态哲学（ecosophy）思想，在更宏观的人类生存视野下开展主体性（subjectivity）生产领域的研究，尤其要重视无意识（unconscious）的层面，重新把握构成主体性的各种力量，在乡村社区的自我组织和生产中寻求不一样的应对危机的出路。

本文探索了“蒲韩社区”如何致力于生产去辖域化（deterritorialization）的主体性，脱离同质化的辖域和个人主义的束缚，让农民可以在日常生活的各个领域重新构建集体实践活动，通过再独特化（resingularization）应对生态和生计危机。在当前的生态问题以及经济发展主导的危机面前，农民群体既不完全是被压抑和被动，也不具有充分的自主创新空间；农村社区/集体作为一个组合体（assemblage），是在各种构件（components）关系变化中持续生成的，大气候有各种限制和辖域，自我组织的集体具有潜存（virtual）的抗衡空间，在压抑和抗衡的相互斗争中持续生产出不同的主体性。

本文认为，当代的乡村建设运动，应该以主体性的生产作为突破点，克服宏大论述，在农民具体生活的领域重新把握各种潜存关系和力量，让农民可以在重新构建集体实践活动中走向再独特化的生存之路。

Notes From The Editorial Office (Volume 34, Issue 1), John J. Green

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

No abstract provided.

Simple Life In Rural America: An Investigation Of International Faculty Members Classroom Interaction And Migration Motives At A Teaching-Focused University, Chenyu Liu

Theses and Dissertations from 2019

By interviewing 15 international faculty members who are currently employed at a teaching-focused university in the rural South of the U.S., this study investigated: 1) what brought them to the university in rural America; 2) whether students’ complaints about their English proficiency affected the levels of their classroom interaction with students; and 3) whether the levels of their job satisfaction affected their migration motives. The present study found job opportunity is the only reason that drew the 15 participants to rural America. The findings indicated that domestic student complaints about their English proficiency and the levels of their job satisfaction …

Benefits To Qualitative Data Quality With Multiple Coders: Two Case Studies In Multi-Coder Data Analysis, Sarah P. Church, Michael Dunn, Linda S. Prokopy

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

Qualitative research methods contend with debates surrounding subjectivity and bias. Researchers use a variety of techniques to help ensure data trustworthiness. One such technique is to involve multiple coders in data analysis. The deliberative nature of codebook development among multiple coders produces rich data analysis that may not otherwise be achieved with a single (or even two) researcher(s). In this manuscript, we make a plea for researchers and journals to include data analysis procedures and descriptions in published literature. In addition, we illustrate minimal reporting of qualitative data analysis processes through a synthesis of 21 years of agricultural best management …

Robert Wuthnow, The Left Behind: Decline And Rage In Rural America (Book Review), Peter A. Kindle

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

No abstract provided.

The Nonmetro Vote And The Election Of Donald Trump, Don E. Albrecht

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

Securing an overwhelming majority of the rural vote was vital to Donald Trump’s surprise win in the 2016 presidential election. This article provides an analysis of the relationship between rural/urban residence and 2016 voting patterns. The Trump campaign’s unique emphasis on economic and racial issues attracted large numbers of voters from groups threatened by rapid cultural, economic, and demographic change occurring in the US. Prominent among threatened groups is the rural, white working class. The analysis reveals that rural counties where a large percentage of the residents were white, with low levels of education and working in the goods-producing industries, …

Nebraska Residents’ Perceptions Of Drought Risk And Adaptive Capacity To Drought, Michelle L. Edwards

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

Climate change is expected to increase the frequency and intensity of drought in certain regions, including Nebraska. While differences in ecological and social vulnerability impact drought response, scholars argue that perceptions of risk and adaptive capacity also play a role in predicting adaptation responses. Drawing on Grothmann and Patt’s model of private proactive adaptation to climate change, based on protection motivation theory, I examine Nebraska residents’ perceptions of drought risk and adaptive capacity to drought at two spatial levels, the community and the region, as well as the predictors of these perceptions. Multivariate analyses demonstrate that rural residence positively predicts …

Marshallese Migrants And Poultry Processing, Jin Young Choi, Douglas H. Constance

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

This descriptive study investigates the work and health conditions of Marshallese poultry-plant workers in Northwest Arkansas, a global center of the poultry industry. Poultry processing is very dangerous work including numerous human rights and ethical concerns. Processing work has historically been carried out by marginalized workers, such as women, minorities, and immigrants. The Marshallese, one of the Pacific Islander groups, are the latest wave of migrants sourced as processing workers. A survey was conducted with a site-based, convenience sample of current and former Marshallese poultry-plant workers. The final analysis was based on a total of 198 questionnaires. The study showed …

“I Have A Job... But You Can’T Make A Living”: How County Economic Context Shapes Residents’ Livelihood Strategies, Marybeth J. Mattingly, Jessica A. Carson

Journal of Rural Social Sciences

This study explores how rural residents’ livelihood strategies are shaped by community economic and population characteristics. We use qualitative data from interviews and focus groups with low-income residents and social service providers (N=85 participants) in two rural New England counties to understand livelihood strategies within rural places. We then employ quantitative data to understand how these strategies are shaped by local historical labor markets and demographic characteristics. Although one county attracts wealthy retirees, with corresponding work opportunities in the service sector, and the other is remote and losing population, low-income workers in both places are struggling to make ends meet. …

Communication Infrastructure Theory: A Rural Application, Callie S. Embry

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The health of a community’s communication infrastructure influences their efficacy and efficiency in dealing with societal problems. The majority of previous communication infrastructure research has focused on multicultural urban centers. This study looks at the communication infrastructure of one rural Arkansas town, specifically looking for the places residents report as communication assets and the subjects discussed within the storytelling network. I used a combination of communication asset mapping and semi-structured interviews to identify the physical locations within the community where residents regularly converse with one another. The interviews along with observations also provided insight into the subject matter that residents …

Incarcerated Workers And Inmate All-Hazard Firefighters In Emergency Response And Disasters: A Captive Labor Force, Jordan Carlee Smith

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

As disasters continue to increase both in frequency and in capacity for damage, the impacts of such events on incarcerated populations in the U.S. is becoming more apparent. The dependence of various states on the labor of prisoners to respond to major disasters such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, oil spills, and wildfires has become a focal point of discussions centering on mass incarceration, the rights of prisoners, and the future of criminal justice reform. The institutions and structures which make incarcerated workers vulnerable to disasters within the prison setting, also make them vulnerable as workers. They face life altering repercussions …

The Oppressive Pressures Of Globalization And Neoliberalism On Mexican Maquiladora Garment Workers, Jenna Demeter

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

The international economic trends of globalization and neoliberalism have exposed and enabled the exploitation of Mexican workers, especially women in the maquiladora garment industry. During the 1950s, globalization gave rise to the new international division of labor and transnational corporations (TNCs) that have offshored labor-intensive phases of production to developing countries, many of which have pursued export-led industrialization. Export processing in Mexico was encouraged in the 1960s by Item 807 of the U.S. Tariff Code and Mexico’s Border Industrialization Program. Especially following the Latin American debt crisis of the 1980s, advanced capitalist countries and International Financial Institutions foisted neoliberal structural …