Roughly 1 million Blacks fled from the South to cities in the North, and with this shift New York City saw a 66% increase in its Black population between 1910 and 1920. By the end of the 1920s Harlem had become home to approximately 200,000 Black residents. But during the period 2000 to 2016 three of the nation's top ten gentrifying zip codes could be found in Harlem, and Harlem's Black population decreased by 23,166 residents, while Harlem's white population increased by 33,442 during this era. Similar to Harlem having played a pivotal role in Black culture throughout the United States, the Black church has been a pillar and resource in the Black community. In sustaining its congregants, the Black church has played a critical role in Black liberation. But despite the potential that Black churches may hold, many are experiencing declining attendance and presence. This study aims to examine the racially nuanced dynamics of Harlem's spaces confronting gentrification by looking at the interrelated dynamics of gentrification and the Black church. Data was collected via participant observation and semi-structured interviews in Harlem. The research elucidates findings regarding Harlem's gentrification, the Black church in Harlem, tactics for survival of the Black church amid gentrification, and how the Black church may play a role in combating the state-sanctioned violence of gentrification.

The purpose of this dissertation was three-fold. The first intent was to investigate the historical role of English and American Sign Language (ASL) in the communication, education and culture of deaf/Deaf people in America. The second purpose was to investigate sociolinguistical and physiological properties of American Sign Language in light of language learning among the deaf. And the third objective was to research bilingual education methodologies in order to interface knowledge and practices from bilingual education, communication and ASL research to the field of post-secondary education of the deaf within the framework of bilingual education. Evidence demonstrates that the history of language policies and educational practices for the deaf are strongly influenced by the majority language of English. A primary goal of education of the deaf has been the assimilation of deaf people into the hearing society. An avenue for this integration has traditionally involved the exclusion of ASL from the classroom and the mandate of Signed English systems and/or aural/oral communication. The incorporation of a cross-disciplinary blend of communication, bilingual education and ASL sociolinguistic aspects form the foundation for further investigation. This dissertation should serve as an impetus and reference point for others wishing to advance the education of the deaf, utilizing a bilingual approach.

This study is based on participant observation and ethnographic fieldwork in Tlaxcala, Mexico and looks at language use and linguistic ideology in several Mexicano speaking communities undergoing language shift in the Malintsi (Malinche) region of Central Mexico. Many Tlaxcalans expressed conflicting feelings about teaching Mexicano to their children, while some actively avoid transmitting the indigenous language. I suggest that there is ideological multiplicity that surfaces in discourses of language, identity and progress. This multiplicity is organized through three discourses that have local, regional, and national expressions, these are: the pro-development meta-discourse of salir adelante, or forging ahead, and improving one's socioeconomic position; menosprecio , the denigration of indigenous identity; and third, the pro-indigena or pro-indigenous discourse that promotes a positive attitude towards indigenous-ness. The analysis of discourse offers a productive means for understanding the semiotic resources speakers employ as they orient towards and against particular identities through discourses they create and tap into. Using recorded data collected during field research, I analyze "naturally occurring" and elicited speech, and interviews conducted with local people on language use, ideology, shift, and bilingual schooling. The study of bilingual schooling offers an important site for the study of ideological multiplicity. Bilingual-indigenous schools in Tlaxcala as both community and nation-state institutions are a nexus for the discursive emergence and local reformulation of ideologies of language, identity, modernity, and the nation. I consider the politics and possibilities of language revitalization through the school system, focusing on the dialectics between agency and structure, as local communities and teachers interact with the national system. Despite the tremendous structural and ideological constraints on bilingual teachers, several are dedicated "language promoters." In this dissertation I suggest that focusing on ideological multiplicity, surfacing in and through discourse, can begin to address the question of how and why speakers shift their ideologies and their languages.

This thesis focuses on multiple identity constructions and symbolic uses of language among Mexican-Americans in Arizona. The concept of a homogeneous "Mexican-American community" is shown to be a construct--an imagined community. Building on anthropological conceptualizations of identity, and studies in language and identity, a framework of the simultaneity of experience focuses the analysis in terms of ethnicity, class, and gender, framing a discussion of the emotional dimension of minority status and the symbolic function of language in identity. Rather than offer a comprehensive analysis of a bounded Mexican-American identity, this paper offers insight into the construction of multiple identities, through the analysis of discourse from a small group of people; individual voices are highlighted through the use of case studies. Conceptualizations of identity construction are problematized, including the common expectation of heterogeneity in ethnic groups such as those of Mexican heritage.

This study examined the feelings and perceptions of Southern Ute students about their tribal heritage. These students attend a high school located on the Southern Ute reservation in Southwestern Colorado. The sample of Indian students was limited to senior high (grades 10 through 12). Total Southern Ute enrollment in the school was 31.6 percent of the overall enrollment. The students involved in this study represented 23.5 percent of the total Southern Ute enrollment in grades 9 through 12. These Indian students experienced acculturation processes in differing ways. Some see themselves as no different from their non-Indian peers, while others see themselves distinctly and uniquely as Ute Indians.

This paper shows how the battered women's shelter where I work has become, like many other battered women's shelters in the US, enmeshed in a bureaucratic web of procedures and requirements. The shelter uses a therapeutic, self-help model in its approach to counseling residents, partly as a result of its bureaucratization. This paper provides a forum to discuss the advantages and disadvantages to the shelter's use of the self-help model, and proposes the adoption of a different counseling model by the shelter, that of resistance. Data from interviews conducted individually with thirteen shelter residents over a period of six months buttress the recommendation.

This work investigates the ideological content of Brazilian comics created under the military dictatorship of 1964-1985. The comics promote a vision of national history and identity that corresponds to the military's focus on industrialization. Brazilian history is portrayed as a peaceful transition to a modern, urban nation of white, middle class, rigidly gendered nuclear families. Despite explicit messages of equality, social groups are implicitly subordinated in a hierarchy of social place according to region, race, ethnicity, class, and gender. Recognizing the processes through which the subordination of social groups is legitimated and protest suppressed is essential to combating inequality in contemporary Brazil.

This thesis is a description and analysis of various types of hegemonic changes that have occurred and are occurring in Otavalo, Ecuador. These changes are part of a process of change that extends back in time to 1483 and probably much earlier. Woven into the tapestry of this work is the history of the Inca and Spanish conquests in the area of Otavalo/Imbabura. I exemplify that cultural and ideological changes due to earlier conquests were brought about primarily through the use of extreme force. There was great resistance to Inca and Spanish hegemony. The glaring difference in the present day western hegemonic conquest is that there is little resistance to this form of hegemony. The forces of western hegemony are permeating Otavaleno culture not through armed force but through technology and western ideology.

For my Master of Arts in American Indian Studies at the University of Arizona I have done a comparative analysis of the Docent program's at the Arizona State Museum and the National Museum of the American Indian. A docent program or guided tour program, is part of educational programing at each museum. In order to fully understand and appreciate objects in a museum, especially those in exhibits dealing with Native Americans, requires interpretation. The guided tour is one of the most popular interpretive techniques. In this particular study, I focus on the use of storytelling as an interpretive technique. This study was done in an educational setting through informal observation of the docents, personal interviews and discussion with the docents and Educational Coordinators at each museum, examination of educational training, examination of Native American education techniques, and investigation of storytelling and its relationship to museums and Native peoples.

This thesis is an attempt to understand the purposes of modern Chinese park design. The goal of this work was to identify the social, economic, and political factors influencing contemporary park design. The primary approach was analysis of case studies. By analyzing characteristics of parks constructed at different stages in urban park history and in the cultural history of China, the results provide strong support for important political, economic, and social influences on park design.