Education has proven to be a powerful tool. Higher education in particular has been and continues to be utilized in various ways around the world and has been instrumental in the rise of societies including Americo-Liberian society in Liberia, West Africa. This study investigates how education has been instrumental in the formation of identity for Americo-Liberians (descendants of historically oppressed groups), demonstrates the relationship that existed between education attainment and social stratification within their system, and uncovers the socialization process that existed within the Americo-Liberian system of education. A critical analysis of social structure and history was undertaken to demonstrate how a mythical norm and cultural capital were key in both the identity formation and destruction of the Americo-Liberian population in Liberia, West Africa. Other theoretical frameworks, in particular "othering" were utilized throughout this dissertation to further demonstrate the rise of Americo-Liberians through their employment of a mythical norm and cultural capital, which ultimately led to their demise. A historical case study method was utilized to uncover the cultural capital of the preferred upper class and political elite, known as Americo-Liberians, which was deeply embedded within their system of education. In all, the system that was set up to ensure their privilege led to their demise and the complete destruction of the country as a whole.

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The topic of this thesis is the identity formation of descendants of Eritrean immigrants in Sweden. The aim of this research was to understand how descendants of Eritrean immigrants have adapted to the Swedish society and how this has contributed to who they are and what this means for their future based on the process of social identity theory. The research sought to answer the following questions (1) How descendants of Eritrean immigrants identify themselves, and (2) How they negotiate their Swedish and Eritrean identity by interviewing six interviewees. A qualitative approach was used in this study, and data were analyzed using social identity theory. The result of the study was that descendant immigrant identified with Swedish and Eritrean cultures. They also categorized themselves based on culture, language, and religion. Therefore, language, ethnicity, culture, and religion constitute identity formation of the descendants of Eritrean immigrants in Sweden.

The following study traces the transformation of an American identity from the sectional conflict through the end of the nineteenth century in an effort to understand how that identity eventually changed into something regarded and defined as distinctly southern. Mississippi offers fertile ground for such a study since the state so closely mirrored the American experience prior to the Civil War with episodes such as Indian removal, frontier living, the incorporation of racial slavery, and the creation of a social order based on independent landownership. Mississippi also aptly represented the traditional southern experience beginning with the Civil War due to the state’s participation in the formation of the Confederacy, staunch opposition to Reconstruction, the overthrow of Republican rule within the state in 1875, the codification of segregation and a white-supremacist social order, and the social, political, and economic oppression of the state’s African American population. Understanding the nuances of social identity formation requires a ground-level analysis to uncover how individuals created and reshaped their social identity in the wake of significant challenges to the established social structure. Diaries, personal correspondences, newspaper editorials, and reminiscences provide a wealth of information in revealing how Mississippians thought of themselves and others, how various groups (Unionists, Confederates, conservatives, and African Americans) fashioned competing social identities, and how those groups vied for legitimacy and control of the state through their interaction with one another. The transformation of a group or collective identity during a series of crises from the sectional conflict through the end of the nineteenth century not only reveals how Mississippians made sense of their surroundings and place within it but informed the parameters and outcomes by which the contest for social control of the state would be fought and won. The struggle for social control culminated in the establishment of a strict, whitesupremacist social order which lauded the exploits of the white inhabitants, vilified the actions of blacks, and ultimately defined the basic tenets of a southern identity for the next one hundred years.

Professional identity is defined as the internalized values of a profession as a representation of the self, and is formed through a process of socialization, or how a student learns to become a member of their profession. As medical students transition to residency, new social environments, clinical experiences, and curricular emphases can impact how they identify as professionals. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how professional identity formation (PIF) occurs in surgical residents over their first year of postgraduate training. Twenty-four surgical residents were interviewed at the start of their postgraduate training. Questions explored participants’ understanding of what it means to be a medical professional. Six months later, residents completed a follow-up interview to investigate how their experiences in their training programs have influenced their professional identity. Thematic analysis was utilized to identify themes in responses. Central to participants’ understanding of their professional identity was their relationships with patients and the public, other healthcare professionals, their training program, and their own expectations for themselves. After six months, less emphasis was placed on the influence of the public and one’s own personal expectations. Factors such as patient encounters, a team-based work environment, time constraints and high volumes of work, and being prepared for all situations were all identified as crucial to professional development. It is important for medical education programs to consider their impact on the development of students, especially regarding the transition to competency-based medical education (CBME) that is currently occurring in medical education. This change could impact the social environment and formal curricula of these programs. The explicit study of PIF is important not only for students as they develop into independent health professionals, but also to ensure the proper care of the patients these surgeons will be working with. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

This research looks at the dynamics of identity formation in a higher education organisation during a strategic branding project, the arrival of a newcomer and my role as the dean of a school of art and design. Most branding literature focuses on the key stages of how a brand proposition is formed and assumes the straightforward roll out of the identity for the organisation. In this research I focus on what goes on around me as ideas are formed and presented back to the organisation, rather than on the idealised process of what should go on. The method takes a “withness” approach to the narrative rather than a synoptic case study approach, focusing on my experience and practice. This highlights the social context of organisational life – the context of human power relationships in which people enable and constrain each other on the basis of human attributes such as identities, anxieties, values, emotions, fear, expectations, motives and interests. The research shows that intention is only a part of the narratives about strategy and identity in organisations. I argue that notions of certainty that are inherent in intentional brand strategies are often based on arbitrary inferences and that by nature brand propositions are abstractions and therefore only representative of a partial reality. To present them in a rigid sense and develop vigilant strategies for identity preservation seems artificially limiting and devoid of context. Branding has played an important role in the world of objects and transactions. It has indicated a sense of ownership, a promise of quality and performance, and more recently an indication of self-image and identity. Yet when branding is applied to organisations it is problematic. Taking principles from a context of objects and applying them to social life has led to branding often being about the preservation of a specific concept of identity and not about the ongoing dynamic process of identity formation in organisations. It is frequently seen as manipulative and controlling, yet is also seen as an important indicator of personality, differentiation, togetherness and is linked to notions of loyalty and trust. Paralleling Mead’s notion of the “I-me” dialectic, an organization can also be seen to be emerging in the context in terms of its presentation in everyday life. The notion of certainty in this sense of organizational identity denies the dynamics of the situation and one could argue that vagueness is present in all aspects of social life and essential for creative action as it allows space for newness. Any articulation of identity is a simplification of an identity that is constantly evolving. But at what level are these simplifications and abstractions useful and not debilitating? This is not to argue that intention and strategy are not essential parts of joint action. The process of negotiating is an essential part of working together towards joint action. It is a process in which we reveal our intent and discover important aspects about each other and ourselves as we emerge in the social; it is about intention and attention. However we cannot really know how people will respond to our gestures and actions, and it is in the actions that we reveal the sincerity of our intent. Managers and strategies do not solely determine organisational identity, and neither are employees free to choose their identities, attitudes, expectations and actions. We are both enabled and constrained by our own pasts and social relationships. We inform the organisational identity as well as being informed by it in an on going process of relating. This way of thinking has implications for the way that we think about brand strategy in organisations – it is not a deterministic process of control, and neither is it a process of anarchic behavior, of open resistance to management intention. Branding is a social act and is performed by human agents who are inherently complex, individual and collective at the same time. The role of the practitioner is to make sense of what is going on between us and pay attention to what emerges – after all, it is not what a brand is but what a brand does.

My report will use the 2009 Guadeloupean strikes as an ethnographic moment that reveals the complex intersection of race, culture, and nationality in the construction of Guadeloupean identity. The strikes created an environment that made even more visible the strategic negotiations of identity that are important to understanding postcolonial relationships between intimately tied nations such as Guadeloupe, Haiti, and France. I argue that Antillean identity is constructed along a racial continuum as represented by the racio-cultural extremes of Haiti and metropolitan France. Depending on the agenda—whether socio-cultural, economic, political, or any combination of the three—in politicized situations, Antilleans will highlight categories that allow for them to maximize their various, fluid positions as non-sovereign Caribbeans, as second-class French citizens, and as members of the Black diaspora with racial politics that have a complicated relationship to Blackness. By looking at how certain categories are manipulated, we can also develop a better understanding of—and even strategies for—relieving the tensions that, I believe, undermine racial and cultural cooperation for these under-researched communities in France and its territories. / text

Abstract The purpose of this study is to provide a descriptive account of the experiences of two teachers with disabilities in order to report how disability influences them both personally and professionally. My research questions were as follows. Firstly, how do participants understand themselves as adults, adults with disabilities, and as adults with disabilities who are teachers? Secondly, how does disability contribute to their pedagogy and how do their experiences as educators contribute to their understanding of disability? Thirdly, for these teachers with disabilities, what is the nature of their relationships in both educational and workplace contexts? Fourthly, what is their perspective on accommodations? Finally, what is their advice to aspiring teachers who have disabilities, including myself? I conducted interviews that addressed these research concerns with two participants, both experienced teachers with self-identified disabilities. For data analysis, I used the method of constant comparison to create codes and find themes within the data collected from the interview, based on disability identity and self-advocacy theories. It is discussed that individuals with disabilities face unique identity-related challenges aside from the physical and mental aspects of having a disability. A key finding is that participants were shaped by prior experiences in childhood and in the education system that were related to their disability which now influence their teaching. Other findings include: their independence, resilience and ability to strategize led to their creation of their own accommodations: they found an environment that honoured their own strengths. Both teachers found that disclosing their own disability helped their students to better relate to them. However, at the same time, they were not as aware of accommodations for themselves as they were for their students. Teachers with disabilities serve an important role in schools as they are not only representatives of what inclusive societies can achieve: they also have unique experiences and skills that are an asset to their students. Recommendations to expand upon Gill’s (1997) disability integration model as well as to create more inclusive environments for teachers with disabilities are also discussed. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2013-08-28 00:52:34.69

This study examined the roles of emotion regulation, negative emotional reactivity, callous-unemotional traits, and socioemotional competence (i.e., identity, self-esteem, communication skills, work orientation, empathy) in overt aggression in a sample of detained juvenile offenders. Clusters were formed based on type and level of overt aggression exhibited: reactive, proactive/reactive, and low aggression. The proactive/reactive distinction failed to provide differential relationships with dependent variables when compared to an overall level of overt aggression. Results indicate that adolescents high in overall overt aggression exhibit higher levels of callousunemotional traits and negative reactivity, as well as lower levels of selfconcept and self-esteem when compared to those low in overt aggression. Additionally, youth with high levels of both overt aggression and callous-unemotional traits displayed significantly lower levels of empathy. No significant findings for overt aggression and emotion regulation emerged. Implications for interventions with adolescent offenders as well as future research directions are discussed.

A dissertation presented to the graduate school of the University of Florida in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 2009 / Submitted by Leonardo Martinez-Acchini (leonardo.acchini@unila.edu.br) on 2017-11-01T01:49:38Z No. of bitstreams: 1 martineza_l.pdf: 1737664 bytes, checksum: a522807aa2f99a94e70dedfdaee49734 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-11-01T01:49:38Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 martineza_l.pdf: 1737664 bytes, checksum: a522807aa2f99a94e70dedfdaee49734 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009 / This research is about cultural and linguistic change among western Bolivian highland and valley peasants who have been migrating to the country’s eastern lowlands in the recent years, a very widespread phenomenon in developing economies of the Andean neo-tropics today. In particular, I want to know how Quechua-speaking people from the highlands and valleys adapt to lowland culture; which ethnic traits and linguistic resources they keep, and which ones they abandon; and which strategies they utilize to ease the process of adaptation. The results indicate that highland migrants who settled in the lowland community of Cuatro Cañadas (department of Santa Cruz) speak less Quechua among themselves, and especially with their children, although they assign great importance to the maintenance of this language. Four specific cultural practices that were selected as indicators of Quechua mode of life were measured and analyzed. The results indicate that there is a substantial reduction of these practices in the lowlands. Also, inter-ethnic marriage (highlanders seeking lowlanders), thought to be an important strategy of adaptation, was found to be a preference for a reduced proportion of both the single migrant population and the married population. Therefore, migrants in Cuatro Cañadas are reducing their traditional linguistic behavior and the practice of specific cultural traditions, but their alliance patterns are still somewhat conservative. In spite of this process of acculturation, the theoretical framework used in this research argues that highland migrants do not fully own Cuatro Cañadas: they are trapped between traditional, modern and globalizing codes, and just embrace the hybrid nature of their identities, which makes them speak and behave in certain ways depending on which ethnic identity they want to activate.