The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between Hispanics and their levels of acculturation. This study's intent was to incorporate variables in order to identify generation and language as defining factors for acculturation. A Likert-type Bidemensional Acculturation Scale for Hispanics (BAS) was used to test six hypotheses.

Since the 1951 United Nations Convention, nations have dealt with refugee issues in various ways. In the United States, since the Vietnam War, there has been great debate and a significant amount of research on issues of refugee resettlement, with these discourses inherently involving issues of power and ideology. English language training and the promotion of economic self-sufficiency have been interventions used to integrate and assimilate refugees into American culture and society. These two interventions were the subject of the current investigation. The purpose of this study was to look into the way federal refugee resettlement policy mandated by the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) construes the notion of self-sufficiency in policy documents; and whether or not that constructed version of self-sufficiency is reflected or reinforced in the local attendant English language training, provided by the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization's (IRCO) Pre-Employment Training's English language training courses. Through a combination of Critical Discourse Analysis and analytic techniques influenced by Corpus Linguistics, this study was able to investigate the construal of self-sufficiency in ORR refugee resettlement policy and its reflection in IRCO PET ELT. The ORR policy Title 45: Public Welfare, Part 400: Refugee Settlement Program and the lesson plans and materials of IRCO's PET's SPL levels 2 and 3 were analyzed with a textual analysis, process analysis, and social analysis. The ORR policy also underwent a collocation comparison analysis that employed the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA). The results of this qualitative study indicate that the federal resettlement policy exploits a common connotation of self-sufficiency to mask its underlying subjugating policies that position resettled refugees into early employment positions with little opportunities for higher education or occupational advancement. The ELT provided by IRCO's PET program reflects and reinforces the ORR's construed notion of self-sufficiency as well as its underlying hegemonic agenda. These findings this relate to broader discourses of immigration, neoliberalism, and education in the United States. Conclusions drawn from this investigation have pedagogical implications and applications that are discussed.

This study examined psychological, social, and cultural factors that can affect suicide risk among Mong/Hmong youth between the ages of 18 and 25. Emerging evidence suggests that Mong/Hmong youth are at an increased risk for suicide (Huang, Lee, & Arganza, 2004; Jesilow & Xiong, 2007). Additionally, initial findings and theories have suggested potential associations between Mong/Hmong youth suicide risk and intergenerational family conflict, ethnic identity, acculturation, depression, and spirituality. The seriousness of suicide risk among Mong/Hmong youth in this country has been overlooked for decades; therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine these associations with the hope that the findings would be beneficial in future efforts to reduce suicide risk among Mong/Hmong youth. This research was a cross-sectional exploratory study that used a purposive sampling method in addition to snowball sampling. The sample consisted of 165 Mong/Hmong youth between the ages of 18 and 25 from three California academic institutions. Results indicated that of 165 respondents, 59% (n=98) have had passing thoughts of suicide. There was a correlation between ethnic identity, intergenerational family conflict, depression, and spiritual beliefs. Furthermore, ethnic identity and intergenerational family conflict were significant predictors of depression. Lastly, depression and having a belief in Mong/Hmong traditional spiritual and healing practices were predictors of suicide risk among the sampled population. Two open-ended protective factor questions were explored to encourage participants to reflect on their resilience to suicide by sharing how they responded to thoughts of ending their life and what helped them to overcome those thoughts. Five themes were identified as protective factors: (1) having the cognitive ability to understand how death affects loved ones; (2) optimism and having a positive orientation toward the future; (3) connectedness with family, friends, and community; (4) having a sense of self-worth; and (5) a social life. Implications for social work practice and policy include the development, expansion and delivery of culturally appropriate mental health treatment services for young adults. This entails the incorporation of traditional Mong/Hmong mental health healing practices into western mental health treatment, ongoing clinical research to better understand the mental health needs of the Mong/Hmong young adult population, and educating and empowering the Mong/Hmong community to access the mental health system, thereby reducing the stigma associated with mental health and increasing access to treatment.

International workers are a vulnerable population within the hospitality industry. Their challenges, and needs have an impact on productivity, loyalty and satisfaction of international workers towards the organizations that employ them. The social and cultural impacts of labor migration are felt in their new environment by both domestic and immigrant populations. It is important to understand international workers’ acculturation process in order to provide them with tools necessary to succeed; it is also important to create responsible practices that translate into positive migration outcomes for both domestic and foreign populations. This study collected data on the motivations, processes, challenges, and alternatives experienced by international workers when relocating to the United States. It documents the cultural adaptation process followed by international workers laboring in the hospitality industry, and based on the data collected from interviewers’ responses, it creates new constructs intended to assist hospitality organizations in their operations. By providing tools to support international workers in the acculturation process, and by providing new understandings of the cultural adaptation process undertaken by international workers when relocating, it is plausible to convert a challenge and limitation into an opportunity for hospitality organizations to create value out of their international human capital.

There is an extensive amount of research on academic success and career development, but most of the literature has focused on the process of White participants. While some of the studies have examined samples from ethnic minority populations, the majority of studies use these populations as comparison groups, studying between-group differences as opposed to within-group differences. The literature is especially lacking in the area Latino academic success and career development. The current study examined how family and culture, specifically socioeconomic status, acculturation, and the quality of the parent-emerging adult relationship, influence the academic success and career development of Latino emerging adults. Eighty-three Latino undergraduate students ages 18 – 24 were recruited for participation in this study. Results indicated that valuing the role of work (career salience) significantly predicted the maturity and positivity of attitudes toward work (career maturity) in Latino emerging adults. Additionally, while family demographic and cultural variables did not seem to have a significant impact on academic success and career development, first-generation college student status, career salience, and conflict in the parent-emerging adult relationship lent some insight into the variation of levels of career maturity in a Latino sample. Furthermore, first-generation student status also impacted the relationship between career maturity and GPA.

Since the 1950s modernization theory predicted within the Third World a trajectory for social evolution and development mirroring perceived social and developmental evolution in Western societies since the 17th Century. Despite this theory being much discredited in both Western societies and the developing world; this theory still forms the basis for much analysis and policy formulation within post-1990 South Africa. This thesis looks at various aspects of urban black South Africans' existence and concludes that African tradition has found a place within an urban existence due to it's flexibility in dealing with peoples' daily challenges. An urban existence can thus no-longer be thought of as supplanting tradition in favour of western influences, but rather as bringing about a mixture of western and traditional influences - with positive and negative theoretical and practical developmental consequences / Development Studies / M.A.

Text in Afrikaans / Die verhandeling behels 'n holistiese benadering tot die geskiedenis van die Israelitiese stamme/clans gedurende die 'tyd van die Rigters' (soos in die Ou Testament gereflekteer). Na my mening het 'n holistiese benadering die potensiaal om 'n meer komprehensiewe beeld van die 'Rigtertyd' te verkry. 'n Vierledige ondersoek na die situasie van die Israelitiese stamme/clans word daarom aan die hand van die politieke konteks, die sosio-kulturele en ekonomiese situasie, die godsdienstig-ideologiese aspek en die literere dimensie gedoen. In die laaste hoofstuk is daar gepoog om die verskillende dimensies op mekaar te betrek. Opsommend kan gese word dat byna alle aktiwiteite gedurende hierdie periode ongestruktureerd en sonder orde was, dit wil se daar was anargie in die Beloofde Land. · Elkeen het gedoen wat reg was in sy eie oe' (Rgt 21 :25). / This dissertation deals with a holistic approach towards the history of the Israelite tribes/clans throughout the 'period of the Judges' (as referred to in the Old Testament). In my opinion, a holistic approach has the potential to offer a more comprehensive analysis of the 'period of the Judges'. A fourfold investigation into the situation of the Israelite tribes/clans is carried out involving the political context, the socio-cultural and economic situation, the religious-ideological aspect and the literary dimension. In the last chapter an attempt is made to integrate the different dimensions. To conclude, it can be said that nearly all phenomena in the tribal period was characterized by a lack of structure or order, in other words, there was anarchy in the Promised Land. 'Everyone did what was right in his own eyes' (Jdg 21 :25). / Biblical and Ancient Studies / M.A. (Bybelkunde)

Text in English / Most Xhosa people experience the condition of feeling dislocated and confused when choosing a spiritual belief between Christianity and Xhosa ancestral traditions. This study uses the concept of diaspora to describe the mental dislocation that people whose culture has changed experience. This study is based on the phenomenon of diaspora as a state of identity in the contemporary cultural identity of amaXhosa, the people of the Eastern Cape Province, by exploring the interrelationship between the key concepts, namely, identity, culture, land, and home as they relate to ancestral worship and Christian practice. Two installation artworks by Bill Viola and Nicholas Hlobo were selected for a comparative analysis under the spectacle of Xhosa ancestral tradition. In this study, I seek to understand how identity is constructed within a particular geographical and ideological culture and how self-identity can be constituted through the construction, deconstruction, and reconstruction of cultural histories. Touching on notions of mediation, altar, and dislocation, this study uses Martin Buber’s concept of I AND THOU to weave the key concepts together. / Art History, Visual Arts & Musicology / M.A. (Visual Arts)

In May 1984, the Nahua, a Panoan speaking indigenous people living in a remote corner of the Peruvian Amazon, experienced their ‘first contact’ with Peruvian national society. 25 years later they appear to many observers to have ‘thrown away their culture’ under pressure from the outside world. This thesis argues instead that these changes were adopted by the Nahua for their own very good reasons and that these transformations reflect greater continuity with the past than first appears. The apparent lack of nostalgia that the Nahua have for the past instead reflects an inherent capacity for flexibility. This flexibility is manifested at a collective level in the frequent fissions of local groups and at an individual level in their susceptibility to losing their sense of self. The thesis focuses on two key aspects of this flexibility. The first is that the Nahua understand the site of their personal transformations to be the body which they describe as ‘soft’. This ‘softness’ refers to its ability to incorporate other worldly powers and become like the animals they eat or the people with whom they co-reside. Nevertheless, this capacity also means they can become ‘other’ when they live apart from their kin. This elasticity of selfhood is typical of many indigenous Amazonian peoples but the Nahua sit at the more flexible end of this spectrum. This is because they cultivate an attitude of radical hunger towards the outside world and place relatively less importance on techniques of restraint and control. The second aspect is the astonishing flexibility of Nahua worldviews. This is because their cosmologies are less a fixed set of facts and more a shamanic technique of knowing the unknown. These techniques help the Nahua understand the mysteries of the spirit world, their dreams and the world of Peruvians. In conclusion, it is the ‘softness’ of their bodies, the elasticity of their selves and the flexibility of their cosmologies that explain the extraordinary resilience of the Nahua in the face of dramatic transformations in the surrounding world.

Objectives: This study documented events contributing to historical trauma among American Indian mission boarding school survivors, described residual effects of that trauma, and verified the Dream Catcher-Medicine Wheel model as a culturally appropriate tool that enhanced storytelling. Research Design and Methods: Nine women from two Upper Plains tribes were located through snowball sampling and participant referrals. A descriptive exploratory qualitative approach facilitated them in relating their survival stories. Seven were tape-recorded and two were hand-written on the Dream Catcher-Medicine Wheel, a model specifically designed for this study; this, combined with traditional spiritual grounding ceremonies, enhanced perspective for researcher and participants alike. Data Analysis: Liehr and Smith's (2008) Story Theory guided the methodology in the data gathering and analysis process using the Dream Catcher-Medicine Wheel combined with taped and written storytelling sessions. Major themes were categorized and supported with interview quotes through inductive analysis of the two research questions: What were the health challenges faced by survivors of American Indian mission boarding schools over time?, and, How have American Indian mission boarding school survivors resolved the health challenges they have faced over time? The first theme, subdivided into Breaking and Silencing of Spirit, examined physical, mental, and sexual abuse. The second theme, Survival of Spirit, examined relationships/parenting, coping/substance abuse, and spirituality. Findings: The seven dimensions described in Lowe and Struthers' (2001) Nursing in Native American Culture Conceptual Framework provided the value structure used for interpretation of findings. Implications for practice and research were related to the seven dimensions as culturally appropriate parameters for nursing. / Data analysis identified disturbing themes; unanticipated candor emerged, possibly owing to the fact that the researcher is a historical trauma survivor. Despite having survived historical trauma through the survival of the spirit, each participant struggles to resolve health challenges to this day. Unable to voice mission boarding school experiences for most of their adult lives, each affirmed the rediscovery of Native spirituality empowering; all expressed appreciation for traditional methods woven into storytelling sessions, particularly the Dream Catcher-Medicine Wheel, and all indicated they experienced release and healing through telling their stories. Key words: American Indian; historical trauma; nursing; boarding school; Dream Catcher-Medicine Wheel. / by Barbara K. Charbonneau-Dahlen. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2010. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2010. Mode of access: World Wide Web.