This thesis investigates the roles, themes, techniques and contexts of composition in hip-hop. It seeks to explain how hip-hop artists view and define their work, while also taking into consideration the viewpoints of other participants in the marketing pool of hip-hop production and consumption. The conceptual plan on which the study is based is Afrocentric; coupled with Ethnographic method of data processing and interpretation. This method is comprised of personal interviews, participant observation, sonic analysis and the use of bibliographic entries and notes that allows for sense and meaning in text. Also used are documented data, which contain descriptions of hip-hop lyrics, interviews, opinions, journalistic notes, and scholarly reports as a means of evolving a cohesive sense of the message's intent, opinion, knowledge of its roles, themes, techniques, images, and contexts The study found that the issues and themes that dominate hip-hop include bondage impairment, concern over currently warped social values and trends, and challenges over oppressive cultural values and social institutions. The artists whose compositions and renderings were used for the purpose of this study not only demonstrated an ability to isolate and construct themes about issues, but were also familiar with the issues that reveal them as agents for the liberation of the minds of their Diaspora Africa peoples and communities. Their music and grassroots commentaries were found to be appropriately designed to persuade their targeted audience to greater awareness. They conveyed messages that encouraged positive attitude and behavioral change in respect to addressed themes that were, in the main, issues of disenfranchisement. They addressed negative, disapproving behaviors which the atmosphere of disenfranchisement has spurned, and were being expressed through the media of the hip-hop rap musicals. The study also highlights the connection between classical African musical expressions and postmodern Diaspora African musical innovations. / African American Studies

This study examines the effect of student peer interactions on students' educational outcomes. It presents African-heritage students' perceptions of their interactions at a predominantly White institution of higher education (PWI) and how these interactions affect their academic persistence. The study focuses on intraethnic and interethnic student-peer interactions in the university environment. Concern about attrition rates and retention of students of African descent requires that educators and administrators take actions to facilitate the development and academic success of these students. Traditional student development models, often based on a Eurocentric world view, have often failed to adequately address the needs of this student population. Social functioning and social adjustment are critical to African-heritage students' development. Sociocultural involvement is an inherent aspect of African-heritage characteristics, which include music and dance and collective cooperation. In this study, these relevant sociocultural issues, including a common experience of oppression, are examined as they relate to African-heritage students' interpersonal interactions, social adjustment, academic persistence and development. The social functioning of African-heritage students is identified and represented in five proposed modes of social adjustment, (1) alienation/isolation, (2) assimilation/acculturation, (3) biculturality, (4) Africentricity and (5) cultural relativism/pluralism, These modes of adjustment may also be considered ways in which Black students cope with and respond to various situations while interacting in the PWI environment. This study utilizes a triangulation research design that includes qualitative and quantitative data collection methods. Focus group interviews are the primary data collection method. The focus group interview process included spoken dialogue and written responses to focused questions and is complemented with additional individual written responses. This process is triangulated with quantitative methods of demographic survey and a Likert scale questionnaire. Participants are students of African descent at a four-year public university in New England. These Black students relate important behavioral strategies used to interact in, adjust to and persist at the PWI.

No description available.

<p>This quantitative research study examined the relationship between degree attainment of 99 African American males from dual-parent and single parent families. This empirical investigational study examined the relationship between type of family support from dual and single parent families on African American males&rsquo; academic success. The variables tested were dissimilarities, the amount, and the differentiation in degree attainment. Participants completed an online survey that included an informed consent form, demographic questions as well as survey questions regarding their relationship with and support from their families. The survey also required the participant to answer questions that provided information about family activities, structure and relationships, organization, activities, emotional support, and methods of communication. Moos and Moos&rsquo; (2002) Family Environment Scale (FES) Real Form (Form R) was used to measure people&rsquo;s perception and attitude of their actual family environments. The relationship subscale was used to ascertain measurements of cohesion, expressiveness, and conflict. This study addressed three research hypotheses pertaining to the type of family situation (dual versus single-parent homes). None was statistically significant, thereby providing support to retain all three null hypotheses. Study results indicated the success of African American males and their degree attainment is due in part to the familial support and encouragement. The outcomes yielded from the study suggest that regardless of the type of family structure whether dual or single parent, there are common variables within both family systems that aid the individuals in persisting in their efforts to obtain their undergraduate degree. </p>

<p>“War Worlds” reads twentieth-century British and Anglophone literature to examine the social practices of marginal groups (pacifists, strangers, traitors, anticolonial rebels, queer soldiers) during the world wars. This dissertation shows that these diverse “enemies within” England and its colonies—those often deemed expendable for, but nonetheless threatening to, British state and imperial projects—provided writers with alternative visions of collective life in periods of escalated violence and social control. By focusing on the social and political activities of those who were not loyal citizens or productive laborers within the British Empire, “War Worlds” foregrounds the small group, a form of collectivity frequently portrayed in the literature of the war years but typically overlooked in literary critical studies. I argue that this shift of focus from grand politics to small groups not only illuminates surprising social fissures within England and its colonies but provides a new vantage from which to view twentieth-century experiments in literary form.</p> / Dissertation

In 1968, Dr. Margaret Walker Alexander, professor of English at Jackson State College, founded a Black Studies Institute in Jackson, Mississippi. This study is an intellectual, institutional and social movement history that utilizes archival research and textual analysis of Alexander’s writings, poetry, and work as teacher and director of the Institute in the context of the Black Campus Movement (BCM) and Black Freedom Struggle. It pushes the boundaries of historiographical scholarship on BCM that overshadows the epistemological and aesthetic politics of women faculty-activists who ushered forth racialized and gendered analysis as well as developed the foundations of Black Studies.

<p> My dissertation contends that diaspora, perhaps the most visible spatial paradigm for theorizing black constructions of identity and self, is inherently limited by the historical conditions of its rise as well as the preoccupations with which it has been most closely associated. I propose that we expand our theoretico-spatio terms for constructions of blackness to include the space of the home, the space of the plantation and the space of the prison (what I call the space of justice). These three spaces point to literary themes, characters, and beliefs that the space of diaspora alone does not explain. Each chapter analyzes the work of three or four writers from the United States, Brazil and Mozambique. These writers include: Paulina Chiziane, Concei&ccedil;&atilde;o Evaristo, Octavia E. Butler, Toni Morrison, Zora Neale Hurston, Carolina Maria de Jesus, Bernice McFadden, Wanda Coleman, Ifa Bayeza and Asha Bandele. </p>

<p>Prior to the Civil Rights Movement, fewer than 50 Black judges had been elected or appointed to the judiciary. As of August 2015, there are over 1,000 Black state and federal judges. As the number of black judges has increased, one question arises: have American courts been altered purely by this substantial increase? One expectation—and, at times, a prediction—behind the increased descriptive representation of Black judges is that their mere presence would alter the judiciary. It was supposed that these judges would substantively represent Black interests in the decisions they made. In other words, it was suspected, and predicted, that Blacks in the judiciary would enhance equality and justice by being aware of, responsive to, and advocating for African Americans. This theory about the likely role of Black judges derives from theoretical work on political representation and racial group consciousness, and empirical studies of Black elite behavior in other political institutions.</p><p>Despite such predictions, there is no corresponding scholarly consensus regarding whether Black judges possess a racial group consciousness and have racially distinctive judicial behavior. Therefore, the theory undergirding the demand for increased diversification, as a means to transform the judiciary, remains unsubstantiated. This is precisely where this project, “They’re There, Now What?: The Identities, Behavior, and Perceptions of Black Judges,” seeks to intervene in and explore, if not settle, the matter of whether black judges possess a racial group consciousness and exhibit racially-distinctive judicial behavior. It addresses a set of interrelated questions relevant to understanding whether we can view Black judges as representatives in ways that are similar to how we view other Black political officials. I examine these questions using a multi-method approach. For my analyses, I draw on diverse materials: the published biographies of every Black judge appointed to the federal bench, a survey experiment with a nationally-representative adult sample, and semi-structured interviews with 30 Black judges.</p><p>This research, which engages with scholarship on representation, group consciousness, judicial behavior, and candidate perceptions, offers new insights into the lives, perceptions, and behavior of Black judges, as well as the manifestations of Black substantive representation in the judiciary. My dissertation argues that, despite the general reluctance to use the term “representation” when referring to judges, we can consider Black judges as representatives. Black judges behave as substantive representatives by (1) sharing and understanding the experience, history, and perspectives of Black Americans, (2) challenging language, persons, policies, and laws they feel negatively affect, or violate the rights and liberties of, African Americans, (3) respecting African American litigants, and (4) ensuring the rights of African Americans are protected and the needs of black Americans are being met. </p><p>Only through research that considers the perspectives, identities, perceptions, and behavior of Black judges will we arrive at a more comprehensive understanding of the importance of racial diversity in the courts. As this project finds, a link between descriptive representation and substantive representation can, and frequently does exist within the judicial context. Such a link is significant given that Blacks’ liberty and justice through the American legal system continues to be subject to those who exercise judicial power. This dissertation has implications for the discourse surrounding the need for increased descriptive and substantive representation of Blacks in the judiciary, and the factors that affect representation in the justice system.</p> / Dissertation

This study examines the lives of Black "professional" adult educators (both have PhD.s) as they reflect on their respective 20 years of work experience. The primary question to be answered is: How have these women shaped their own professional identity in adult education and to what extent has that process been affected by race and/or gender? A subsidiary and closely linked question is: What lessons are learned by shifting the methodological lens to contemplate the lives of two nondominant people in adult education? Four theoretical constructs bear directly on how the research problem was framed and how the "data" were perceived. Those constructs were: the concept of hegemony, the perspective of African American feminist theory, the perspective of a theory of women's history, and theories of professionalization. / A life history methodology, with a feminist influence, was used in this qualitative study; the data were analyzed using a grounded theory analysis. Two African American adult educators collaboratively engaged with the researcher in open-ended interviews and analysis of emerging concepts during 1992-93. Analysis revealed strategies used by the "co-historians" to overcome gender and racial barriers within their institutions and in the larger society. Findings indicate professional identity for these adult educators was not one of "conversion" to an externally defined symbolic model of an adult educator (no such model exists), rather it was an identity "melded" with personal beliefs and values colored by racial and gendered experiences. Another significant finding is the extent to which the lack of definition and professionalization of the field of adult education seems to affect the necessity for its members to create not only a professional identity but also the necessity to design opportunities for the application of their skills--this is referred to as "intrapreneuring." Life history, in this study, appears to be an important addition to adult education historiography because it accentuates the relationship of the degree of professionalization of the field to the individual practitioner's identity formation. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 55-08, Section: A, page: 2247. / Major Professor: Peter A. Easton. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1994.

<p> This qualitative study is about the experiences and challenges Black girls have while attending predominantly White high schools and what they are doing to navigate that particular space. The purpose of this study was to explore and understand more about how Black girls navigate White space as minority members of a system that was not originally intended for them. Through semi-structured interviews, Black girls were asked directly to share their lived experiences. This study hopes to illuminate and amplify the voices of Black girls and help others see them by giving them a platform to discuss and tell their stories. It also aims to create agency in Black girls by asking them to examine the challenges they face while attending predominantly White high schools and how they navigate that particular setting and make it work for them. </p><p>