This dissertation tested a methodological explanation for a double paradox in psychiatric epidemiology: a lower prevalence of major depression in Blacks than Whites in the US, coupled with equal and higher levels of psychological distress in Blacks. The first paradox is a lower prevalence of major depression in Blacks than Whites. The second paradox is the discordant results from comparing Blacks and Whites on depression and distress. These are paradoxes from the vantage points of, respectively, dominant theory and conceptual and empirical understandings of the relationship between disorder and distress. The idea that Blacks in the US express depression and distress more somatically than Whites has been in the literature for decades. If true, it could explain the double paradox. A formal diagnosis of major depression requires endorsing a screening symptom, either sad mood or anhedonia, which are both psychological rather than somatic symptoms. To the extent Blacks express depression more somatically than Whites, depression could be disproportionately undercounted in Blacks due to a lower likelihood of Blacks endorsing a screening symptom, adjusting for underlying levels of depression. Measures of distress share symptom content with the diagnostic criteria for depression but typically do not require endorsing screening symptoms. Thus, if Blacks do somatize depression and distress more somatically than Whites, the depression algorithm may produce a greater undercount of depression in Blacks than Whites, whereas a similar undercount would not occur with distress measures. Accordingly, both paradoxes could be explained. This dissertation has three main parts. In part one, the double paradox is documented in a systematic literature review. Using data from two nationally representative household samples, parts two and three test whether Blacks express depression and distress, respectively, more somatically than Whites, whether this accounts for a lower likelihood of Blacks endorsing a screening symptom, and if (part two only) this explains the Black White depression paradox. The systematic review provides robust evidence of the double paradox. Parts two and three reveal slightly higher levels, respectively, of depression and distress somatization in Blacks than Whites. However, the underlying structure of these small differences provides no evidence of a broad somatization hypothesis in Blacks. Moreover, no evidence is found that the somatization difference inhibits Blacks' endorsement of screening symptoms. One unexpected finding points to subsequent steps to take towards resolving the double paradox.

This dissertation highlights the interconnected relationship of community, family, and school by tracing the lived experiences of African American students and parents to capture how they come to terms with where they are situated in racially diverse settings. The research also shows the intergenerational impact of tracking on African American families who attended the same racially diverse school and lived in a segregated African American neighborhood. Racialized tracking and the segregated African American community have contributed to separate and unequal outcomes, treatment, and performances that demonstrate a racialized duplicity in the United States. Utilizing and building on the theorizing of Pierre Bourdieu's (1977a, 1977b) theorizing about habitus, this study reveals how race, place, and class impact the perceptions of African American students and their parents by mapping out their routes, which include their everyday journey from their homes, school, and community. In addition, Michele Foucault's concept of subjugated knowledge captures how tracking and unequal educational experiences are deeply rooted within a larger struggle for equality for African Americans, which results in an uneven distribution of power/knowledge in the United States. The duplicity that African Americans have to confront in schools and communities is what I refer to as Plessy's tracks. This dissertation thus examines and connects the routes, roots, and academic tracks of African American students and their parents to bring an understanding of how they perceived academic placement and their social positions in a segregated community and a racially diverse school.

“This Day, We Use Our Energy for Revolution” is a collaborative ethnography of activist endurance, which I have researched and written alongside the leaders of Women With A Vision (WWAV) in New Orleans, a black feminist health collective founded in 1989. Grounded in three years of fieldwork and a decade of engaged partnership, this dissertation centers the often-hidden histories, practices, and geographies of struggle in America’s zones of abandonment and asks how visions for living otherwise become actionable. Two events frame its inquiry: On March 29, 2012, WWAV overturned a law criminalizing sex work as a “crime against nature,” thereby securing the removal of more than 800 people from the Louisiana sex offender registry list; two months later, on May 24, still unknown arsonists firebombed and destroyed the organization’s headquarters. Using a multidisciplinary approach, this dissertation excavates the histories of violence and struggle that surround these events in order to render visible a complex geographic story of religion, conquest, and refusal. Post-Katrina New Orleans has been imagined as a “resilient” city fulfilling secular visions for progress and development. I argue, by contrast, that this spatial project of renovation rests on centuries-old colonialist logics, wherein blackness figures as the foil upon which “resilience” establishes its own significance. As such, I read the attacks on WWAV not as exceptional, but rather as clues into the enduring spatial threat that black women’s material, spiritual, and intellectual labors pose. For generations, southern black women have been doing history outside of established historiography. Their archives take many forms: texts written, bodies resurrected, communities made whole. So do their narratives. The deft two-step of southern black women’s history-making both refuses and reframes the dominant discourses into which they enter, as well as the places they have been assigned by white supremacy, gender injustice, and state power. I argue that this generations-honed black feminist praxis opens new directions for understanding the work of crafting social life and political vision since emancipation. Complementing historical studies on how black women fashioned authority within mainline and charismatic Christian institutions, this dissertation looks beyond the pews to the blues, to front porches and to Afro-Caribbean traditions––to locate and theorize black women’s ethics, aesthetics, and epistemologies for crafting more livable human geographies.

Haiti’s public image has long vacillated between extremes: from democratic beacon to shadow of insurrection; from space of racial uplift to pit of economic exploitation; from bearer of Enlightenment ideals to dark land of “voodoo.” Indeed the two taglines most commonly associated with Haiti are: “first black republic” and “poorest country in the Western hemisphere.” These opposing taglines fit within a critical paradigm that has long viewed Haiti in terms of example (as a site of universal emancipation and racial equality) and exception (or, in Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s memorable words, the notion that Haiti is “unnatural, erratic, and therefore unexplainable.”) This dissertation engages these two competing figures of Haitian exemplarity and Haitian exceptionalism in early 19th-century literatures of the black Americas. In doing so, I examine Haiti both as an imagined space and as a site of literary production whose products circulated in various and sometimes misleading translations. This network of what I call “translations of Haiti’ re-navigate, and mark with difference, traditional narratives of race and nation. My project reveals how the idea of Haiti flickered through many complex forms in the early 19th-century. Some of these forms fall into the rubric of exception/example but others do not: from sister in democracy, to vanguard of black internationalism, to potential site of exploitation, to occasion for domestic reflection. By nuancing the binary between example and exception, I question critical accounts that depict early representations of the first black republic as either symptomatic of white anxieties or an ideal site for the realization of black nationalist projects. These accounts, I argue, often overlook how national and racial categories failed to overlap; they occlude Haitian (and especially Kreyòl) literary production; and, most importantly, they ignore the complex transnational movements occasioned by this production. I argue that when we consider translation as a metaphor (for example, the notion of translation as an analogical model or heuristic) we must also consider translation as a practice with material consequences. I negotiate between Haiti’s powerful abstraction(s) and a material network of constantly circulating, translated and re-translated texts. These texts, I argue, provoked fears and anxieties, but also speculations, hopes, and visions amongst constantly changing constituents of groups that may or may not be usefully labeled (for example, free U.S. blacks; mulâtres; noirs; U.S. northerners; etc.) Using this shifting international stage as a point of departure, “Translated Subjects” takes Haitian cultural production seriously – that is to say, as more than a convenient metaphor – to reveal new channels of literary exchange.

This dissertation project examines the Ghanaian state's role in developing a heritage tourism industry that actively manipulates commemorative practices surrounding the legacy of the slave trade to redefine and institutionalize the ambiguous relationship Ghana holds with communities of African descent abroad. Developed in response to the renewed interest in African ancestry following the 1976 release of Alex Haley's novel Roots and its popular television adaptation, Ghana and other states in the region have since sought to incorporate African-Americans into their economic planning by providing them with opportunities to recover their lost heritage through tourism experiences. Not limited to the creation of heritage sites, monuments and museums dedicated to the legacy of slavery and dispersal from Africa, these states have also tailored investment opportunities to reflect a renewed spirit of Pan-Africanism and validate African-Americans' membership within a re-envisioned diasporic African community.

In a country where inventors and innovators are noted as being at liberty to enter and contribute to the free market space, conversely studies have found that Black tech entrepreneurs face greater difficulty launching and growing their businesses. A review of the literature suggests that many of these difficulties stem from the lingering effects of historical inequalities. These inequalities have existed for decades due to laws and regulations that once limited home ownership, income earning, credit access, inheritances, and educational opportunities. Additionally, literature in the tech arena has demonstrated a lack of diversity in the field. Pattern matching or preconceived standards have also been said to impact Black tech entrepreneurs’ opportunities to receive investments to launch and grow their businesses. While great dialogue has taken place in the tech arena around these disparities, little is known in academic literature about how Black tech entrepreneurs engage in the process of creating innovative brands and marketing their companies. In light of this, the researcher conducted a qualitative case study designed to explore black tech entrepreneurs’ perceptions of how they learn to launch and grow their businesses. This study engaged participants who self-identified as tech entrepreneurs of Black or African descent who have launched apps, websites, or hybrid companies in the United States. Among the key findings that emerged from the study were: An overwhelming majority of participants described that seeking the counsel of “expert” others was a key action in securing funding to grow their companies. Further, a strong majority of participants indicated that having a positive self-concept was a key facilitator in growing their businesses; while, an equal number indicated that a misalignment between the investor and entrepreneur inhibited their ability to grow. The tech entrepreneurial field can evolve through the increased trying on of differing perspectives by both investors and entrepreneurs; the continued development of diversity tech ecosystems and support networks; and, sustained progress in increasing the investment opportunities for Black tech entrepreneurs.

Thesis (M.C.P.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning, 1981. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ROTCH. / Includes bibliographical references. / by Benjamin Franklyn Blakney. / M.C.P.

Thesis. 1978. M.Arch--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Architecture. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND ROTCH. / Bibliography: p. 129-132. / M.Arch

Backgroud: Drinking to a level that causes harm to oneself or others is characterized by several terms in the alcohol literature. These include: alcohol abuse, alcoholism, excessive drinking, heavy drinking, and problem drinking. The latter is the term used throughout the dissertation. Findings across various alcohol measures and across time show that Blacks have lower prevalence rates of problem drinking than Whites. These results appear paradoxical. First Blacks have poorer health status than Whites for many health outcomes such as diabetes, hypertension, and cirrhosis of the liver--a chronic condition attributed to heavy alcohol use. Blacks lower problem drinking than Whites seem contrary to the way social determinants and tension-reduction theories are thought to influence health. According those theories and frameworks, exposure to poor economic and social circumstances are considered socioeconomic status-related stressors, which are risk factors for problem drinking. Blacks therefore would be expected to have higher prevalence rates of problem drinking because they are exposed to a greater number and frequency of poor socioeconomic status conditions, and greater frequency of stressors relative to Whites. Quite often, the typical investigation of Black-White differences in health aims to understand why Blacks have poorer health than Whites. I investigated problem drinking for my dissertation because I thought it was equally important to understand health and behavioral outcomes for which Blacks do better than Whites and to learn about what contributes to that better health. Levels of religious involvement, the salience of religion among groups, and the potential strength of religion to regulate the lives of individuals differ across social statuses such as race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status. That rationale is discussed through historical evolution of religion among Blacks, beginning slavery, through theories attributed to Max Weber and Karl Marx, and through analysis of a passage within the Holy Bible. Given that measures of religion differ across social status, it is plausible then that religion's protective effect on health too is expected to be different across social statuses. My second hypothesis is that the protective benefits of religion on problem drinking will be stronger among Blacks than Whites. My third hypothesis is that lower socioeconomic status is associated with higher levels of religious involvement. My fourth hypothesis is that the protective benefits of religion on problem drinking are stronger among persons with low compared to high socioeconomic status. Finally, I argue that the dual social location of low socioeconomic status and Black race creates an opportunity where the protective effects of religious involvement on problem drinking become compounded. My fifth hypothesis is that the protective effects of religious involvement on problem drinking among Black low socioeconomic status would explain their lower prevalence rates of drinking compared to Whites. Methods: A secondary data analysis was conducted using Wave 2 of the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC) among a sample of Non-Hispanic Blacks (n=6, 587) and Non-Hispanic Whites (n=20,161). The main dependent variable was DSM-IV alcohol abuse. A second variable, heavy drinking, which was used for sensitivity analyses, was derived from two variables (1) frequency of consuming 5+ drinks in a single day and (2) largest number of drinks in a single day. The exposure variables were four measures of religious involvement: (1) currently attending religious services, (2) frequency of religious service attendance, (3) count of the number of religious members one interacted with on a social basis, and (4) importance of spirituality in one's daily life. Education and income were the socioeconomic status (SES) variables. Race/ethnicity was a binary variable indicating Non-Hispanic Blacks versus Non-Hispanic Whites. Results: Detailed results of this analysis are presented in this dissertation. Conclusions: Overall, religion measures had a protective effect on problem drinking, but service attendance had the most robust association. It appears that religion and socioeconomic status are not competing factors that potentially explain race-differences, in fact, they work together. There appears to be some support for the perspective that Black-White differences are explained, or at least better understood, when socioeconomic status and religion operate in an interaction model framework. The lack of finding of Black-White differences across all combinations of religion and socioeconomic status, and those differences being dependent on the type of problem drinking measure used limits the ability to generalize to an overall hypothesis. There are some noteworthy contributions this dissertation that advances the state of knowledge on this topic. It appears that the effect of religion on DSM-IV alcohol abuse for Blacks operates under different model assumptions than for Whites. Therefore, statistical comparisons may not tell the full story of Black-White differences and I recommend a renewed focus on race-specific analyses. Two main theoretical contributions emerge from this study. First, these findings suggest that individual religiosity plays an important protective role on problem drinking for equally for Blacks and Whites. The study adds more evidence as to which dimensions of religiosity most salient for protecting against problem are drinking, which is lacking in the research literature. Second, sensitivity analyses showed that the type of alcohol measure one uses to characterize problem drinking has potential implications racial disparities in alcohol research.

Recent research has shown that distinct event-related potential (ERP) signatures are associated with switching between languages compared to switching between dialects or registers (e.g., Khamis-Dakwar & Froud, 2007; Moreno, Federmeier & Kutas, 2002). The current investigation builds on these findings to examine whether contrastive and non-contrastive morphosyntactic features in English elicit differing neural responses in bidialectal speakers of African American English (AAE) and Mainstream American English (MAE), compared to monodialectal speakers of MAE. Event-related potentials (ERPs) and behavioral responses (response types and reaction time) to grammaticality judgments targeting a contrasting morphosyntactic feature between MAE and AAE are presented as evidence of dual-language representation in bidialectal speakers. Results from 30 participants (15 monodialectal; 15 bidialectal) support the notion that bidialectal populations demonstrate distinct neurophysiological profiles from monolingual groups as indicated by a significantly greater P600 amplitude from 500ms – 800ms time window in the monodialectal group, when listening to sentences containing contrasting features. Such evidence can support the development of linguistically informed educational curriculums and clinical approaches from speech-language pathologists, by elucidating the differing underlying processes of language between monodialectal and bidialectal speakers of American English.