Tourism research has tended to overlook issues relating to the variability of tourism access and participation across diverse social groups. This study selects one particular minority group, the UK Afro-Caribbean community, and examines whether this group emulates, or may wish to emulate, various tourism patterns. It is hypothesised that the community's impetus to travel and be involved in tourism is , different from established norms. This supposition is derived from a theoretical assessment of the possible factors which influence Afro-Caribbean access and participation: the economic, the social, the cultural and the product-related determinants. Accordingly, this work considers, through a "marginality perspective", structural factors which could have a significant influence upon tourism involvement, especially racism, economic disparities and urban constraints. However, through recognising an "ethnicity perspective", it is suggested that "tourism" could be culturally discordant and considered not to be a priority in people's lives. Therefore, particular forms of "travel" (eg. the visiting of friends and relatives market), reflecting cultural aspirations and preferences, are believed to be of importance to the Afro-Caribbean community. This study employs an ethnographic method, applied to various members of Manchester's (Moss Side) Afro-Caribbean community. This method, developed through a variety of strategies (informal/unstructured. interviews, "casual conversations", observation/participation, etc.), attempts to reveal people's perceptions (impressions! opinions) and experiences of traveVtourism. The approach adopted is reflexive, intracultural and based on an emic (insider) perspective .. The ethnographic presentation explores degrees of access and forms of participation through particular case studies: UK travel (with reference to countryside travel), European travel, Caribbean island travel, and transatlantic travel (with reference to America and Canada). The fmdings indicate that "travel" by the study group is atypical of mass and mainstream "tourism", distinguished by differences of kind and volume. Tourism involvement per se is limited, an outcome of both the marginality and the ethnicity determinants. The interrelationships between ethnic and racial boundaries have an effect of differential access, thereby influencing various aspects of tourism and travel: motivations, preferences, trips and destinations chosen (and not chosen), frequency of ventures, quality of experiences, host and guest relationships, etc . .. . An analysis of the social data reveals that whilst members of an Afro-Caribbean community do not aspire to a tourist identity, tourism and travel can, in various ways, reinforce an ethnic and cultural identity.

This report chronicles the development and production of the short film, Just Us Chickens, written, directed, and produced by Erin Randall. The film is based on several true stories told by a Diane Hill James, who grew up in Smithville, Texas during the 1950s. The script weaves together Ms. James’s experiences growing up near the famous Texas brothel, The Chicken Ranch, located in the neighboring town of La Grange. Diane and her friends would frequently spy on the brothel and once a stranger, new to town, mistook her family home as the brothel and her as a prostitute. The film, Just us Chickens, considers how these experiences could inform and influence the sexual identity of a young woman, and aims to clarify the contradictory expectations put upon female sexual development both then and now. / text

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Literary and Cultural Studies / Master / Master of Arts

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Comparative Literature / Master / Master of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Literary and Cultural Studies / Master / Master of Arts

This essay engages in a Lacanian reading of identity in John Banville’s Eclipse and argues that the protagonist Alex Cleave illustrates certain of Jacques Lacan’s ideas concerning subjectivity and the subject. Alex Cleave has a fragmented sense of identity and experiences alienation as well as loss and lack of authenticity. He is an actor and tries to create identity within his roles. Alex’s confusion about himself is played out in his relationships. Alex Cleave is a self-absorbed character who does not care for other people but only for himself. He uses other people, his family, ghosts and his stalking victims, as sources for an ideal ego and as a contrast to himself. The essay argues further that the novel suggests that identity is unstable and constructed within language. Alex Cleave tries to actively create identity by incorporating characteristics he has studied in his roles as well as other people, and he writes down his story, giving himself an identity in a book, Eclipse. To support its claims, the essay draws upon theories of Jacques Lacan and Jacques Derrida. Derrida’s concept of différance is used to explain the instability of identity. Lacan’s ideas about the development of identity in the course of the mirror stage and the Oedipal crisis are drawn upon. Furthermore, Lacan’s ideas about the unconscious, the Other and the imaginary and the symbolic order are employed.

This thesis is a theoretical and practical investigation of the role played by informal learning and teaching in the development of identity and applied knowledge. With the advent of mass schooling, there came to be a distinction between formal and informal education, with formal schooling representing the superiority of abstract, decontextualized, and rule-based learning over the informal, or the concrete, situated, and supposedly unstructured learning from everyday life. Research and theory in anthropology, sociocultural psychology and progressive educational philosophy have challenged this distinction, explicitly demonstrating the dialectical relationship between the formal and informal modes of all activity, regardless of setting. Inseparable from this conception of cognition is the notion that all knowledge is transmitted via culturally and sociohistorically framed and interrelated valuations of norms, beliefs, social conduct and the application of knowledge across spheres. / Progressive educational theorists argue that the creative process is the best means to tap the identity and skill-shaping potential of the informal mode. This proposition is actively and concretely investigated in this thesis through the writing, by this researcher, of a one-act play, Nineveh . As postulated by the theory, through the creative process the author's sense of identity and ability to creatively apply knowledge was affected positively. From this combined theoretical and practical examination of the informal mode of learning and teaching, a need for pluralistic educational praxis is forwarded. Engagement with the creative process is suggested as a means to help students feel more confident to learn from and enrich their lived experiences in their cultural environment, and thereby actively contribute to their interconnected sense of identity and mastery over multiple forms of applied knowledge.

No description available.

ABSTRACT The relationship between subjective age identity and ideal age, as measured by the Subjective Age Identity Scale (Hubley, 2004), and personality domains and facets, as measured by the NEO-PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992), was investigated in a sample of 210 adults ages 19 to 78. Subjective age and ideal age scores were regressed, using multiple standard regressions, on the NEO-PI-R domains and facets, respectively. Results indicated that 22% of the variance in subjective age identity scores was explained by personality domains whereas 27% was explained by personality facets. Specifically, two personality domains (Openness to Experience and Neuroticism) and one personality facet (Aesthetics) made significant unique contributions to the explained variance in subjective age scores. Very little variance in ideal age scores was explained by personality domains and facets (less than 10%). One domain (Openness to Experience) and two facets (Vulnerability to Stress and Values) made significant unique contributions to the explained variance in the ideal age scores. These findings are examined in the context of the previous research on the relationship between personality and subjective age and the importance of conducting both domain and facet level analyses when using the NEO-PI-R is discussed. Implications of the present findings for counselling and clinical work with persons facing age role transitions or other age related concerns (e.g., negative attitudes towards aging) are highlighted.

In the process of negotiating land claims, First Nations in British Columbia and Canada face the challenging task of presenting a unified identity without trampling on the inevitable diversity within their communities. This thesis explores the perceived conflict between unity and diversity amongst Native populations. It brings together fieldwork in St6:l o territory in the Fraser Valley of British Columbia, performance theory, and contemporary discourse surrounding identity production at this particular point in time. The work examines performance of identity as a form of social action and the variability of identity performances. Data was gathered from interviews with people involved with two sites where educational programmes are being developed for local students: Xa:ytem Longhouse Interpretive Centre at Hatzic Rock, near Mission, and Longhouse Extension Programme/ Shxwt'a:selhawtxw on St6:l o Nation grounds in Chilliwack. The theme explored in this thesis is that just as unity is politically expedient, diversity and its management is an important facet of the performance of identity.