Chineseness at the crossroads examines how Chineseness is negotiated by diasporic Chinese women in Australia. I question the essentialist notions of Chineseness by deploying Homi Bhabha's theory of liminality. This concept of being neither here nor there helped me examine the women's ambiguous experiences of acceptance and rejection, within and across marginal and dominant Australian circles. My position disrupts the binaric frames that divide the old from the new, and the eastern from the western practices for cultural appropriation. It recognises instead the past and the present in the creation of new but familiar versions of Chineseness. I argue that essentialist norms are commuilicated through cultural semantics to inform how Chineseness is rehearsed. I assert that liminality exposes the power structures that inform these cultural semantics by disrupting the naturalised norms. I posit that the diasporic women's awareness of these interdependent processes enables them to question their practices and ideologies. I used an autoethnographic technique to collapse the divide between the researcher and the researched. It created a liminal space between the researcher and the researched. This subverted norms of the researcher as the archaeologist of knowledge by enabling the other women's narratives to tell their stories alongside mine. This methodological frame also serves as a prism to examine the intersections of gender, sexuality, family, relationships, language, education, class, age, and religion with Chineseness in the lives of the 39 Malaysian and Singaporean women interviewed. My results indicate that Chineseness is precarious and indeterminate, and specific to the particular moments of articulation at the crossroads of geopolitical and socioeconomic factors. The versions of Chineseness rehearsed are complexly influenced by the various cultural semantics that impact on the women's negotiations of who they are as diasporic Chinese women in Australia. I conclude with a discussion of how these results challenge current curriculum and pedagogical practices in English classrooms. I argue that a re-examination of these practices will contribute to a more inclusive Australia.

Thesis (M.A.)--Texas State University-San Marcos, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 109-112). Also available on microfilm.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Theatre, 2003. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 45-47).

Since the late 1990s, governments across the post-Soviet space have redefined freedom of conscience as freedom from "non-traditional" religious groups — part of a broader effort to recast pluralism as a threat to national sovereignty. This dissertation focuses on the Central Asian states of Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, which have restricted such groups as the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Ahmadi Muslim community, and the Chinese spiritual movement Falun Gong. It analyzes why illiberal regimes restrict marginal and apolitical religious groups, which are often more docile than the population at large. Furthermore, it addresses why policies that infringe on civil liberties nevertheless enjoy popular support. These questions take on greater significance in the midst of the current global retreat from democratic values. Yet they cannot be answered by the prevailing instrumentalist perspective in political theory, which assumes that rational citizens should seek to maximize individual liberties. Popular support for authoritarian figures has prompted scholars to propose non-instrumental motivations, such as national and religious identity. Rather than treat “identity“ as non-instrumental, I propose a relational model of identity politics, wherein pluralism and essentialism represent opposing strategies in a competitive political field. Drawing from Bourdieu's work on public politics, I argue that essentialist claims to authority (e.g. ethnic nationalism, religious populism) appeal to strata with relatively low capacity for autonomous political mobilization. Illiberal regimes propagate essentialist claims on behalf of such strata, and repress even benign forms of pluralism as part of this essentialist social contract. I investigate these hypotheses by examining recent discourses on religious tradition in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. I employ a dataset of 5,000 public documents (legislation, court rulings, etc.), which I analyze using qualitative coding. In addition, I draw on interviews with government officials and religious leaders collected during fieldwork between 2012 and 2014, and on data from the World Values Survey. I find that the political and religious establishments of both states are erecting new orthodoxies that consecrate the will of their political bases as essential to national self-determination. Thus, illiberal democracies maintain popular support by redistributing authority (symbolic capital, per Bourdieu) to core constituencies at the expense of peripheral constituencies.

La thèse porte sur les transformations des politiques électorales dans l’état de l’Uttar Pradesh, Inde, dans la période suivant une phase de cristallisation et de politisation des identités de castes et religieuses. La thèse considère l’évolution d’un certain nombre d’indicateurs de la vie politique de cet état pour faire état de changements profonds des ressorts de la mobilisation politique. Au cours de la période considérée, il est observé que les formes mobilisation horizontale de la caste se sont estompées au profit de transactions locales entre groupes et individus inscrits dans des contextes socio-économiques différenciés. Cette localisation des politiques de caste a conduit la caste à s’encastrer davantage dans le champ politique mais de manière moins transversale qu’auparavant. En d’autres termes, les partis politiques ne parviennent ni ne souhaitent plus mobiliser leurs électeurs en usant registre de la caste horizontalement, par-delà le niveau local, mais font de la caste un élément central de le stratégies au niveau des circonscriptions. L’argument principal de la thèse consiste à dire que l’encastrement local de la caste s’effectue en lien étroit avec le contexte socioéconomique d’inscription. Une prosopographie des candidats et élus aux élections régionales de 2007 et 2012 révèle que les candidats sélectionnés par les principaux partis politiques tendent non seulement a l’être fonction de leur appartenance de caste ou de communauté religieuse mais également en fonction de leur ancrage dans les tissus économiques locaux. Une ethnographie politique confirme l’existence d’un processus d’intégration des élites politiques, sociales et économiques au travers des processus démocratiques. En d’autres termes, le profil des candidats et des élus tend à être socialement hétérogène mais économiquement homogène, ce qui contredit trahit en partie le caractère émancipatoire des mouvements politiques dits de basses castes. / This dissertation focuses on the transformations of electoral politics in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, afte period of crystallization and politicization of caste and religious-based identities. The dissertation studies evolution of a number of political indicators to reveal profound changes in the ways parties and candidates mobi voters. It is observed notably that the horizontal forms of caste-based mobilization that characterized much of politics of the state have receded in favour of local arrangements between parties, candidates and local social grou This leads the caste variable to become more deeply embedded into the political sphere, but locally.The main argument of this dissertation is the local embeddedness of caste took place in deep connection with th local economical context. The prosopography of candidates and elected representatives of the state assembly in 2 and 2012 reveals that parties tend to not only choose their candidates according to their ascriptive identity, but a following their inscription in local dominating economic networks. A political ethnography conducted across state confirms the existence of a process of integration or congruence of political, social and economic elites. Th the social composition of the state assembly tends to be both heterogeneous in terms of caste and homogeneou terms of economic background. This questions the emancipatory character or potential of caste-based mobilizat and representation.

This study, entitled African modernism and identity politics: curatorial practice in the Global South with particular reference to South Africa, postulates that perceptions of African identity in curatorial exhibitions are changing, moving towards the intercultural views generated by Africans themselves. African identity politics is investigated in relation to critical ideas on African modernism and post-Africanism, in conjunction with similarities with Nicholas Bourriaud’s concept of altermodernism. The research focus falls within the Global South as a geo-political location, with particular reference to South African artworks and their curation. In this qualitative study, an investigation is launched of curated exhibitions dealing with identitarian issues. A critique is set up on curatorial approaches on African identity as presented at seminal exhibitions, from the 1985 exhibition, Tributaries: a view of contemporary South African art (curated by Ricky Burnett), through the 1990s Johannesburg Biennials, to more recent exhibitions such as Documenta XI (2002, curated by Okwui Enwezor) and Africa remix: contemporary art of a continent (2004-2007, curated by Simon Njami), as well as the Tate Liverpool exhibition Afro modern: journeys through the black Atlantic (2010, curated by Tanya Barson and Peter Gorschlüter). Along with a critique of curatorial intentions, these exhibitions are reviewed in order to explore the representation of African modern identity. This study considers how, after postcolonialism and postmodernism, binary differences such as Western/African and black/white have become less pronounced, due to globalising processes, resulting in interculturalism and transnationalism. This study captures the shift away from the centrality thinking of postmodernism and postcolonialism, not in terms of white superiority, but in terms of a reconstruction of the modern, in order to situate Africa as a product of globalisation. The study hypothesises that transmutation has occurred, rendering society as culturally intermixed, and thus dismantling essential racial stereotypes. The study rather investigates identity exchange in terms of translation, where the understanding of difference is considered in terms of changing understandings of difference itself through globalisation. In order to surpass stereo-racial boundaries, this study postulates that identitarian understanding is now transconscious, pluralised to the point of being racially exchanged. The exhibition Trans-Africa: Africa curating Africa challenges and transmutes stereotypes of backwardness, exoticism and dislocation in perceptions of Africa within the curatorial realm, and aims to elicit new frameworks to interpret African art. The curatorial objective is to posit a contemporary understanding of African identity within the public domain: in a space where terms like race, culture, tradition or self/other need not form the basis of identitarian understanding in Africa. The outcome of such an understanding is explained through the concept of the transmutation of culture, that problematises differences in cultural translation and trans-consciousness. This results in a transnational and global understanding, no longer limited to the understanding of African identity with regard to diasporic or nomadic conditions. As such, cultural intermixing and trans-consciousness conveys that within changing curatorial perceptions, the issue of who has the right to comment on whom is fading. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2014 / Visual Arts / unrestricted

The full abstract for this thesis is available in the body of the thesis, and will be available when the embargo expires. / Education, Faculty of / Educational Studies (EDST), Department of / Graduate

This treatise explores the Matatiele boundary demarcation dispute and, in particular, the role that unmet basic human needs play in this dispute. The subject of identity is also explored. In 2006, the government of South Africa decided that Matatiele should no longer be part of the province of Kwa-Zulu Natal (KZN) and instead should be incorporated into the province of the Eastern Cape. This decision divided the community of Matatiele into two groups; one was pro-KZN and the other, pro-Eastern Cape. In 2008, violence broke out between these two groups. The government’s decision and the resulting violence have created a situation of protracted conflict in the community of Matatiele with rivalries and antagonism being part of the fabric of the society. This treatise attempts to analyse this conflict and link it to the theory of basic human needs as advocated by conflict theorists such as John Burton and Johan Gultang. Human needs theorists hold the view that unmet psychological and physical needs are sources of social conflict and can lead to protracted conflict. This treatise also explores the efficacy of problem-solving workshops and referendums as conflict-resolution techniques for boundary demarcation disputes. The data were collected from unstructured, in-depth interviews with a sample of eleven respondents. The data indicate that there is a nexus between this conflict and the theory of basic human needs and that community-identity concerns are central to this dispute. The findings of this study suggest that the conflict is multi-faceted and that the underlying causes can be attributed to unmet human needs. The data was analysed using the grounded theory approach. This allowed the key causes of the conflict to be identified and subsequently informed the recommendations presented in the conclusion of this treatise.

An analysis of the preoccupation writers of South African fiction display after the process started by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is vital in post-apartheid South African writing. It becomes clear that a fascination with the past is not bound to any one specific racial or gender group within post-apartheid South Africa. Authors can therefore be said to continue the excavation work that the TRC started many years ago. The severe impact that the rigid classification of human beings into different groups based on race had, and continues to have, becomes evident in contemporary South African writing. The fact that white privilege always comes at a cost for those wanting to attain or maintain it cannot be overlooked and whiteness as a construct is examined.

The New Evangelization (NE) is a recent development in the Catholic Church. It seeks to preserve, restore, and re-invigorate Catholic religious identity in the face of what it perceives to be a dominance of secular values. This proselytization program instigates personal religiosity among adherents in the hopes of forming an evangelical Catholic identity. However, little is known of the processes and discourses of Catholic evangelization, especially among young people in Canada. This thesis responds to the main question: How are young people engaging and interpreting evangelical modes of religious and socio-political identity, and integrating or negotiating this worldview within a pluralist Canadian society? This research, therefore, focuses on an annual summer Catholic youth conference called Journey to the Father as a case study that sheds light on the dissemination of Catholic perspectives, the development of a personal and charismatic religious experience, and the instigation of an evangelical impetus in young Catholic participants. Using participant observation and semi-structured interviews with both the adult organizers (ages 18 and older) and young participants (ages 13–18) in Journey to the Father, this research examines the processes of identity formation through affective and experiential religiosity, and the formulation of a minority identity politics among young Catholics within a diverse Canada. It also takes into account the correlation between an evangelical Catholic worldview and young people, spelling out different reflections on religion and society, experience and agency. This research emphasizes how young people negotiate (i.e. appropriate or negate) evangelical Catholic values and charismatic religious experience when forming their social, political, and religious identities, in order to gain an understanding of their socio-political position within a diverse Canadian society.