Browsing by Author "BonillaSilva, Eduardo"
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Item Open Access Betting on Black and White: Race and the Making of Problem Gambling(2015) Buckelew, RoseProblem gambling, a fairly recent addition to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, is estimated to affect between two and five percent of the US adult population (Volberg 2001). While present in all racial groups, this disorder is not evenly distributed, as Blacks are more likely than any other group to become problem gamblers (Welte et al. 2006). And while this pattern is consistent with those found with other disorders (Black 1984; Ford and Widiger 1989; Strakowski et al. 1993), it is important to note that thirty years ago, when the first study of problem gambling prevalence was conducted and the disease had only recently been institutionalized, there was no difference in rate of illness by race (Kallick et al. 1979). This dissertation aims to explore this phenomenon: the role of race in the making of problem of gambling.
Through a multi-site and multi-method approach, this study examines the assumed race neutrality of gambling addiction. By tracing the history of gambling policy and North Carolina's adoption of a lottery program, this study explores how the state further defined problem gambling as a mental illness. Following this, participant observation of state-sponsored problem gambling counselor training workshops provides insight into the ways racialized understandings of behavior are constructed and maintained through counselor education. To gain a sense of how gambling is lived, this study involves participant observation of lottery gambling in convenience stores to interrogate racialized conceptions of behavior and reveal how financial gain motivates gambling across groups.
Item Open Access Home is Where the Hurt Is: Racial Socialization, Stigma, and Well-Being in Afro-Brazilian Families(2012) Freeman, Elizabeth HordgeThis dissertation examines racial socialization in Afro-Brazilian families in order to understand how phenotypically diverse families negotiate racial hierarchies and ideologies of white supremacy. As an inductive, qualitative project, this research is based on over fourteen months of ethnographic fieldwork in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil in fifteen poor and working-class Bahian families and 116 semi-structured interviews with family members and informants. Findings suggest that one of the most prominent features of racial socialization is the pervasive devaluation of black/African influences, which is conveyed through implicit and explicit messages as well as concrete practices (including rituals) that promote the stigmatization of negatively valued racialized physical features. The study reveals a pattern of unequal distribution of affection based on racial appearance (phenotype), which is evident in parent-child, sibling, extended family, and romantic relationships. Findings suggest that negative appraisals of racial phenotype may significantly compromise affective bonds in families and have social psychological consequences impacting self-esteem and sense of belonging, while also eliciting suicidal ideations and anxieties. These outcomes are most pronounced for Afro-Brazilian females. Racial socialization also conveys the "strategically ambiguous" logic of color and racial classification, uncritically exposes family members to racist messages, jokes, and stereotypical images of Afro-Brazilians, and encourages cultural participation that superficially valorizes Afro-Brazilian culture and fosters nationalism, rather than racial identity. In contrast to traditional findings of racial socialization in the U.S., messages valorizing racial heritage are rare and efforts to prepare family members for bias rely on universal terms. Families do employ counter-discourses and creative strategies of resistance; and so, racial socialization is characterized by practices that reflect both resistance and accommodation to racial hierarchies. I conclude that racial socialization in families is influenced by and sustains racialization processes that maintain the broader system of white supremacy. Contrary to how racial socialization has been framed as having a purely protective role in families, this study illustrates how it may disadvantage blacks vis-à-vis whites and uniquely stigmatizes the most "black-looking" family members vis-à-vis those who more closely approximate an idealized (whiter) somatic norm. Future studies should triangulate data on racial socialization from other regions of the Americas.
Item Open Access "It's so Pura Vida": The Tourism Global Value Chain and Ethnoracial Stratification in Costa Rica(2011) Christian, Michelle MarieOver the last thirty years successful national economic development is considered participation in global industries, particularly in global value chains. Frequently, however, inclusion in these chains brings forth varied socioeconomic benefits for chain actors, acutely different ethnic and racial groups. Costa Rican participation in the tourism global value chain while heralded as a success story shows varied impacts for ethnoracial groups who are incorporated, excluded, and stratified in various forms. By comparing two communities in Costa Rica, Tamarindo and Cahuita, three main practices are apparent in determining the position of foreigners from the global North, Costa Ricans from the Central Valley, Afro-Costa Ricans, and Guanacastecans in the industry as workers or entrepreneur suppliers: (1) the role of governance structures, i.e., power dynamics between firms along the value chain and the importance of standards, formal and subjective; (2) institutions, including global private travel fairs, national tourism boards, and specific development policies; and (3) the dominance of environmental imagery and rural democracy narratives to market Costa Rica. Concretely, the development of global tourism in Costa Rica and its impact upon different groups is nuanced and it is a testament to both opportunities for local economic and social empowerment and stratification and marginalization.
Item Open Access Legacies of Slavery: An Analysis of the Dimensions of Slavery’s Post-Emancipation Effects(2017) Reece, RobertOver the last few years, so-called “legacy of slavery” research has made great strides in helping us to understand how the Trans-Atlantic slave trade continues to affect contemporary life. New and improved data sources have allowed this work to become increasingly complex, with a combination of sub-national, cross-national, and individual level analyses. This research focuses on the former, where a number of questions remain, namely: do the long term effects of slavery remain robust to other historical factors; does slavery exacerbate color stratification among black Americans; and does slavery have a net-positive influence on the contemporary social outcomes of white Americans? A use regression analysis and Census data to answer this questions. Ultimately, I find that the answer to questions are “yes” to varying degrees. The effect of slavery remains robust to historical covariates, though the relationship is complex. Slavery seems to exacerbate color stratification among black Americans through its disproportionately negative effect on darker skinned black people. And on four of six contemporary measures, slavery improves the life outcomes of white Americans. I discuss the implications of these findings for the future of sociological research and the discussion of reparations for black Americans.
Item Open Access Preserving the White Picket Fence: Interracial Conduct in an Integrated Neighborhood(2012) Mayorga, Sarah AnnMy dissertation identifies and deconstructs the interracial codes of conduct produced and enacted by three distinct racial-ethnic communities in an integrated neighborhood. My analysis of Creekridge Park is based on data collected via in-depth interviews, a neighborhood survey, and participant observation. By addressing the particularities of an integrated neighborhood, this project augments traditional index-based studies of segregation research and examines how the concept of social distance can explain the quantity and quality of encounters between Black, White, and Latino/a residents. I also evaluate the social environment of an integrated neighborhood by documenting and questioning the attitudes, behaviors, and relationships of neighborhood residents. Finally, I analyze the data using modified grounded theory, an iterative process that uses data and existing theory to develop conceptual models. Overall, this project emphasizes the importance of race as a social marker of status, privilege, and marginalization; the limits of diversity as an emancipating ideology; and the importance of power as a conceptual tool in analyses of White and nonwhite experiences in integrated settings.
Item Open Access Race, Power and Economic Extraction in Benton Harbor, MI(2016) Seamster, Louise SeamsterMy dissertation investigates twin financial interventions—urban development and emergency management—in a single small town. Once a thriving city drawing blacks as blue-collar workers during the Great Migration, Benton Harbor, Michigan has suffered from waves of out-migration, debt, and alleged poor management. Benton Harbor’s emphasis on high-end economic development to attract white-collar workers and tourism, amidst the poverty, unemployment, and disenfranchisement of black residents, highlights an extreme case of American urban inequality. At the same time, many bystanders and representative observers argue that this urban redevelopment scheme and the city’s takeover by the state represent Benton Harbor residents’ only hope for a better life. I interviewed 44 key players and observers in local politics and development, attended 20 public meetings, conducted three months of observations, and collected extensive archival data. Examining Benton Harbor’s time under emergency management and its luxury golf course development as two exemplars of a larger relationship, I find that the top-down processes allegedly intended to alleviate Benton Harbor’s inequality actually reproduce and deepen the city’s problems. I propose that the beneficiaries of both plans constitute a white urban regime active in Benton Harbor. I show how the white urban regime serves its interests by operating an extraction machine in the city, which serves to reproduce local poverty and wealth by directing resources toward the white urban regime and away from the city.
Item Open Access Rebellious Conservatives: Social Movements in Defense of Privilege(2011) Dietrich, David RaymondThe first decade of the 21st century in the United States has seen the emergence of a number of protest movements based upon politically conservative ideas, including opposition to affirmative action, undocumented migration, and national health care, among others. Conservative social movement organizations like the Minutemen and the Tea Party have had enormous influence over American politics and society. Conservative movements such as these present challenges to existing ways of thinking about social movements. Most social movement research has centered on so-called progressive movements, like the Civil Rights Movement, which are assumed to be organized by an oppressed population fighting for rights they have been denied historically. However, conservative movements do not appear to involve an oppressed population fighting for rights denied to them. It seems that actually the reverse may be true: conservative protesters tend to be members of privileged populations in contrast to oppressed. But if conservative protesters tend to be privileged instead of oppressed, why then are they protesting? What are their goals?
To fully answer these questions, we must look beyond existing social movement theory. The purpose of my research is to extend social movement theory, particularly Rory McVeigh's theory of power devaluation by using Blumer's theory of racial group position and Bourdieu's conceptualization of capital to explore the motivations of conservative movements and how they construct movement ideologies. This research explores the goals and ideology of two conservative movements, the anti-illegal immigration movement and the anti-abortion/pro-life movement. To examine these movements, I first performed an ethnographic content analysis of over 1000 articles and posts from movement organization web pages. Second, I conducted nearly fifty semi-structured interviews with movement leaders and participants. Finally, I examined over twenty hours of speeches given at rallies and protest events.
Consistent with McVeigh's power devaluation theory and Blumer's theory of group position, I found that these conservative activists are motivated by perceived threats to privileges claimed as proprietary rights by their movement groups. Anti-illegal immigration groups perceive threats to existing privileges associated with employment, social services, citizenship, and cultural issues such as language, while anti-abortion groups cite threats to American morality. Furthermore, these groups make proprietary claims to these privileges based upon restrictive identity formations. While anti-illegal immigration activists identify as "American," they constrain who qualifies as an American based upon factors such as language spoken, cultural behaviors, and citizenship of parents. Similarly, anti-abortion/pro-life activists identify as "Christian," but exclude many who would be identified as Christian in the broader population based upon criteria including opposition to abortion and sexual preference. They also claim American is a Christian nation. Following Blumer's group position theory, I also analyzed those individuals from which these groups feel threatened: migrants crossing the border without documentation and women who get abortions. I found that conservative activists portrayed these individuals in terms of perpetrators and victims, providing only mixed support for group position. Finally, I examined the goals of anti-illegal immigration and anti-abortion/pro-life organizations specifically looking at non-policy-oriented goals. Anti-abortion/pro-life organizations emphasize changing American culture as much or, in many cases, more than changing laws. While most anti-illegal immigration organizations stress education as a goal, whether this is for the purposes of policy change or cultural change is unclear.
Item Open Access Reproductive Citizenship: Women of Color and Coercive Sterilization in North Carolina 1950-1980(2012) Sebring, SerenaThis dissertation develops an original theoretical framework of reproductive citizenship using an historical case study which explores the history of coercive sterilization of women of color in North Carolina between 1950-1980. It traces the ideological, political, economic, and social factors which led to a neo-eugenic sterilization campaign impacting over 3,000 women of color who were sterilized under state order. Data was drawn from historical sources including: the records of the North Carolina Eugenics Board, policy documents and statutes, trial records, articles in contemporary periodicals, manuscript records of social service providers and activist groups, and recorded statements of coercive sterilization survivors. The study employs two comparative historical methodological strategies: first, a time-period comparison contrasting the periods 1950-1964 and 1965-1980; and second, a group comparison highlighting the similarities and differences between Black and Native American women along three theoretically-significant dimensions. Group comparisons revealed important distinctions in: 1) how each group was framed within contemporary popular discourse regarding race, reproduction, and welfare provision; 2) the relationship of each group to the state welfare system in each of the aforementioned time periods; and 3) how each group was affected by the neo-eugenic sterilization campaign led by the North Carolina Eugenics Board. Over the course of the thirty-year time period examined, improvements in the quality and character of reproductive citizenship for women of color in North Carolina were indicated by: shifts in public and professional discourses concerning family planning and welfare provision; the implementation of policies and legislation protecting reproductive autonomy; and the dismantling of North Carolina's Eugenics Board, which had increasingly targeted poor, black women over time. Four key mechanisms supported these expansions of reproductive citizenship: 1) public outcry and judicial consideration of reproductive rights generated by a series of high-profile legal cases involving women of color seeking legal redress after experiencing coercive sterilization; 2) shifts in popular understanding and discursive frameworks led by emergent national coalitions of feminists and women of color advocating for reproductive and welfare rights; 3) increased political representation as more minorities, and women of color in particular, attained elected office as a result of the Voting Rights Act; and, 4) the implementation of state and federal policies protecting reproductive autonomy.
Item Open Access Yellow in White Suits: Race, Mobility, and Identity among Grown Children of Korean Immigrants(2014) Son, InseoChildren of post-1965 Asian immigrants experience a different mode of social incorporation than other people of color. They achieve marked socioeconomic advancement but racism and discrimination continue to haunt them. Sociologists suggest that the group falls between whites and African Americans in the American racial stratification system. However, scholars know little about how this intermediate position shapes the group's modes of social incorporation and identities. I seek to answer this question by examining the lived experiences of grown children of Korean immigrants. For this research, I draw upon 69 in-depth interviews with upwardly mobile, 1.5- and 2nd-generation Korean Americans. I focus my analysis on four distinctive but related aspects of their lives: parental socialization, neighborhood contexts, occupational standing, and racial identity. Utilizing the grounded theory and the critical discourse analyses, I found that the group experiences neither full inclusion into nor exclusion from the white mainstream, but undergoes divergent adaptational experiences due to multiple factors. First, in their upbringing, Asian ethnic advantages and racial marginality did not shape parental expectations for children's success in a uniform way; their influences differ by the parents' class backgrounds. Second, the community contexts where my informants grew up diversify their perception of race relations, leading them to have divergent ideas of social incorporation. The ethnic communities function to refract the influence of the larger society's racial categorization on the informants, rather than insulating them. Third, the Korean informants' upward mobility in the mainstream labor market does not guarantee full assimilation; their occupations partially determine the extent of incorporation. Korean informants in Asian-clustered occupations are more likely than those in Asian-underrepresented occupations to experience social inclusion while accepting the racialized image of Asians. Finally, my Korean informants do not have homogeneous racial identities; they are diversified by gender and occupational standings. Male respondents and those in Asian-clustered occupations tend to have white-like identities. Also, the majority of my informants have an ambivalent racial identity that denies that they are an "oppressed" minority while endorsing the idea that they are non-white, which reflects their intermediate racial position. By identifying multiple factors in the construction of Asian Americans as racialized subjects, the findings illustrate the distinctive racialization pattern of Asian Americans, a pattern that is qualitatively different from other racial and ethnic groups. Additionally the research confirms the ongoing significance of race in the life chances of Korean Americans.