subject: Sociology
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Jim Crow's teachers: Race, remembering, and the geopolitics of teaching in the North Carolina coastal plains
description- – There is conflict in memory over the quality and character of legally segregated schools for blacks. On one hand, there is a profoundly negative national memory of these schools as 'inherently inferior' compared to their white counterparts. On the other hand, there are overwhelmingly positive counter-memories of these schools as 'good' among many former students, teachers, and community members. This dissertation explores one aspect of this conflict in memory by examining the collective remembering and perspectives of former teachers. The research is driven by two enduring questions: (1) How can we explain the existence of a national memory of legally segregated schools for blacks as 'inferior' and the collective remembering among former teachers of these same schools as 'good?' (2) Given the well-documented inequalities linked to the geopolitics of race and racism in the Jim Crow South, from the perspective of former teachers, what was the quality and character of teaching in the all-black school before federally-mandated desegregation in the South? The data consists of 44 oral history interviews with former teachers in three counties in the North Carolina coastal plains, local and state archival materials, and secondary historical sources. The dissertation is divided into three parts. In the first part, I advance a theory of collective remembering based upon hidden transcripts. I found that participants in my study remember from hidden transcripts-latent reports of the social world created and lived in all-black schools and communities. In the second part, I show how the voices of collective remembering among participants reveal hidden social relations and practices that were constructed away from the guise of white educational authorities. I found that participants fashioned situated pedagogies for the acquisition of educational capital that black youth could exchange for jobs, civil rights, and social power. In the third part, I conclude that the national memory of 'inherently inferior' all-black public schools does not tell the whole story about legally segregated education. Ultimately, I found that the oral narratives of Jim Crow's teachers reveal a critique of power and a fight for respectability that shaped teachers' work in the Age of Jim Crow.
- – SOCIOLOGY, ETHNIC AND RACIAL STUDIES (0631)
- – 2007-01-01
Negotiating Discourses on Homoeroticism: The Coming Out and Other Tales by Colombian Immigrant Men in New York City
description- – This work analyzes the ways in which transnational migration transforms and is transformed by the sexual dimensions of identity. It presents the experience of Colombian homosexual men who have migrated to New York City in the last twenty-five years as a case that illuminates identity transformations in the process of transnational migration. Throughout ethnographic research, this work finds that immigration greatly impacts family arrangements and patterns of inclusion and exclusion in the immigrant's original and recipient society.
- – 2007-01-01
- – application/pdf
Stealing Time and Being There: Fathers, Class and Time
description- – Although the conflicting demands between work and family have been documented for mothers, much less is known about fathers. Specifically, must less is known about how family and work influence the work hours and schedules of fathers and how these influences might vary by class. In this paper, I use multi-methods to compare a relatively affluent group of professionals (physicians) to a group of working class fathers (emergency medical technicians) in how work and family influence their hours and schedules. I find that, on the one hand, the working-class fathers, while saying that their children are not a great influence on the schedules, are more likely to manipulate their schedules in order to participate in the daily care of their children in response to spouses' employment, or perform "private fathering." Physicians, on the other hand, are more likely claim the importance of their children on their schedules, but prioritize work demands and participate with their children through their children's special events, or practice "public fathering." These differences are class-related, based on the work and family structures in place for each group of fathers.
- – 2007-01-01
- – application/pdf
The economic experience of grandparent households
description- – In 1998, 5.6 percent of all U.S. children under age 18 (3.9 million) lived in the homes of their grandparents. Many of these households experience serious financial strains. This study uses quantitative and qualitative methods to develop a more thorough understanding of the economic experience of grandparent households. Using the 1996 Current Population Survey (U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1996) a demographic and economic profile of grandparent households is provided along with a detailed description of the private and public sources of income and benefits upon which those families rely. Focus groups of grandparent caregivers described their families' economic circumstances, the sources of private and public support upon which they relied, and made re commendations for policy makers. The demographic and economic profile documented the significant incidence and the vulnerable economic circumstances of grandparent households. Pure grandparent households (neither of the grandchildren's parents live in the home) were found to be more economically at risk than either co-residing households (neither parent lives in the home), or households in which parents were raising their own children. An analysis of the different private sources of income and benefits indicated that while grandparent households tend to rely on the same types of private sources as other families, the median values from in those sources were generally lower for pure grandparent households. Grandparent households benefited from a wide range of public programs, including a number of important?safety net?programs that proved to be essential in providing support especially to the neediest of these families. Focus group participants provided a wealth of information and a variety of important insights that shed light on their families' economic experiences, expanded the picture of where and how they receive support, identified important barriers to access help and gaps in services, and provided important direction for policy makers. A range of recommendations for policy, social work practice, and research were offered. One primary recommendation focused on the development of more systematic and coordinated approaches to addressing the economic needs of these intergenerational families.
- – SOCIOLOGY, INDIVIDUAL AND FAMILY STUDIES (0628)
- – 2000-01-01
Striving and surviving: A daily life analysis of Honduran transnational families
description- – Sociologists and anthropologists have focused considerable attention on contemporary transnational flows of capital, labor and culture, as well as on the ways in which communities create and maintain transnational ties. However very few have studied the specific role of the family in transnational processes and fewer still have looked at how families actually function in a transnational space. In this dissertation I address this gap in the literature by investigating how transnationalism impacts and structures daily family life and how transnationalism works as a survival strategy in which families use the difference in living costs between Honduras and the United States to support household consumption. Drawing on data I gathered in Honduras and the United States from one-week time diaries, in-depth interviews, participant observation and interpretive focus groups, I look specifically at the experience and prospects of transmigrant labor in the United States; the aspirations and consumption practices of transnational family members in the United States and Honduras, especially as they relate to the American Dream; and I explore the ways in which families negotiate caretaking responsibilities, both financial and emotional, while striving and surviving in a transnational space. This is the first daily life study of undocumented immigrants and the first transnational analysis of Honduran families.
- – SOCIOLOGY, ETHNIC AND RACIAL STUDIES (0631)
- – 2004-01-01
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