In the antebellum American South, slaves and free blacks from across the Atlantic World went to court to petition for their freedom from illegal enslavement. US legal officials primarily cared whether or not slaves could prove their free status in court and, to that end, petitioners made legal claims that reflected themselves and their identities as free persons. They emphasized to courts that they were born free, emancipated or manumitted, and had freedom papers. To support these claims, petitioners also created narratives that would represent their identities as free persons and common examples included telling legal officials that they previously moved freely in the Atlantic, served in the military, or worked in skilled labor positions. Another way that petitioners articulated their status and identity as free persons was by telling legal officials about their connections to Atlantic empires. To petitioners, being a member of Iberian, French, or British empires and enjoying imperial subjecthood was closely connected to their identities as free persons. This thesis examines freedom suits in the antebellum US South by slaves and free blacks from across the Atlantic World and the ways they created legal narratives connected to their identities within nineteenth-century empires. Ultimately, legal officials were most concerned with whether or not petitioners could prove their free status - not where they belonged in the Atlantic World, to what empires they pledged loyalty, or what king recognized them as subjects. Therefore, petitioners created narratives centered around proving their freedom. However, slaves and free blacks continued to incorporate notions of Atlantic empires and subjecthood in their freedom petitions to varying degrees - even if it served little legal strategical purpose to a US court. Their narratives illuminate the importance that imperial belonging and subjecthood represented to slaves and free blacks from the Atlantic World petitioning for freedom in the US South and demonstrate that they understood imperial belonging and subjecthood as a way to embody their identities and experiences as free persons.

<p> This multiple case study contributes to identifying the reasons behind the almost complete absence of high-growth ambition of early-stage entrepreneurs in Brazil by investigating why they did not develop similar cognitive frameworks as the countries high-growth entrepreneurs. The understanding of the reasons can assist in the planning of programs and policies directed toward the creation of the necessary conditions to increase the number of early-stage entrepreneurs with high-growth ambition and hence promote the country&rsquo;s economic growth and help fulfill its aspiration to transition from factor-driven to innovation-driven economic development. The reasons identified by the study were that the factors in the cognitive framework of high-growth entrepreneurs&mdash;self-efficacy as a personality trait, knowledge acquired from family and professional experience (human capital), and social capital acquired during a professional career&mdash;that explains their high-growth ambition are rare in Brazil. These factors are rare because high-growth entrepreneurs belong to the countries&rsquo; very small well-educated and empowered elite whereas most early-stage entrepreneurs in Brazil do not. Some additional findings of the study are: (1) There is no social upward mobility from self-employed to high-growth early-stage entrepreneurs in Brazil; (2) The low quality of the Brazilian education system required acquiring task-related knowledge through extensive professional experience to find high-growth entrepreneurial opportunities; (3) The task-related knowledge acquired mostly in multinationals lead to innovations to fill needs and market gaps in the Brazilian market, but not to breakthrough innovations.</p><p>

The Orthodox Church is an institution with deep roots in nationalism and collective identity. It is the patriotic faith of the majority of Eastern European nations, where many regard following the nationally dominant faith of Orthodox Christianity as an important aspect of belonging in the homeland. Despite its eastern foundation, Orthodox Christian evangelism has been on the rise in the Western Hemisphere since the 1980s, most notably in the United States and Brazil. The role that converts have played in fostering a unique American and Brazilian Orthodox society, however, has received little attention from scholars. This thesis will seek to address this gap in the literature by discussing how the publishing efforts of Orthodox Christian converts in the United States and Brazil have been instrumental in creating an Orthodox Christian society that is native to the Western Hemisphere. I argue that this literary production links the United States and Brazil in an Inter-American dialogue through their dichotomous relationship to the East and has led to the formation of a collective American Orthodox identity.

<p> The Latino paradox of crime suggests that relative to other groups with similar rates of economic disadvantage, Latinos fare a lot better in a wide array of social indices, including the propensity to violence and crime. While previous studies tend to overestimate the role of community members in creating the conditions under which violent crime occurs, very few have examined the direct role of the &lsquo;disorganizing&rsquo; or &lsquo;organizing&rsquo; factors that result from political turf wars. This study will examine the ways in which the mobilization of resources and organizational infrastructures affect the immigration-crime nexus. In an effort to better understand the Latino paradox associated with crime, this study shall critically examine how organization-based resources affect variations in violent crime rate among Latino neighborhoods in the City of Chicago.</p><p>

In 1998, a dispute between a federal government agency and the local community of Chacchoben resulted in the emergence of a community-based ecotourism (CBE) enterprise to be fully owned and operated by the community in conjunction with a complex arrangement of agreements and partnerships with external actors. CBE is usually framed as a lower-impact, often small-scale alternative to mass tourism and as a conservation and development strategy that can hypothetically protect biologically diverse landscapes while improving the lives of marginalized peasant and indigenous communities through their participation. This case study analyzes the roles of common property land tenure and social capital and how the unique dilemma of a mass community-based ecotourism theme park emerged in Chacchoben. Findings indicate that local decisions and processes of development, conservation, and land use are affected by the complex interaction between local and external institutions and fluctuating levels of social capital.

This qualitative study, based on interviews to 17 refugee families, attempts to identify the reasons behind the lack of integration of Colombian refugees in Costa Rica. The model of Immigrant Modes of Incorporation and the studies of Alejandro Portes and Julia Sensenbrenner about the sources of social capital on migrant communities provided the theoretical framework used to identify the roots of the integration challenges. The findings suggest that Costa Rican policies towards the reception and integration of Colombian refugees are exclusionary. The host labor market is marked by sentiments of xenophobia towards the sample population while reported cases of persecution in the country also inhibit this population's economic integration. The lack of social capital sources contributes to inhibit this community's development, despite their participation in informal networks. There were signs of collective action. Yet, the refugee community fails to come together, while it also seems alienated from the community of Colombian entrepreneurs in Costa Rica.

Immigrant youth are the fastest growing component of the U.S. population and Mexicans are the largest immigrant group in the U.S. The manner in which they integrate into U.S. society and the ways that they become civically engaged, will greatly determine the nature of civil society in the United States over the next few decades. Moreover, religion is increasingly recognized as an important factor in immigrant adaptation. Based upon fieldwork of participant observation and interviews in Homestead, Florida, this thesis examined the relationship among Mexican youths' identity, religion and civic engagement. I found that if these youths are active in religious practices they will be more likely to identify themselves as part of the dominant group, in this case American society. Religious groups are powerful tools that can help these youth reach the greater community.

No description available.

This thesis analyzes the profiling practices of the Spanish Inquisition and explores how comparing these to present manifestations provides us a lens for understanding the phenomenon of racial profiling today. Irene Silverblatt notes that with reference to the Spanish Inquisition in colonial Peru, certain practices of the Inquisition constituted what could be called "racial profiling" in today's terminology. This thesis revisits Silverblatt's seminal observation and extends it to current questions of racial profiling, its nature, parameters, and the most notable differences and similarities between profiling during the Inquisition and racial profiling today, even as the enforcement in question shifts from matters of religious belief to policing with ethno-cultural characteristics in view. Currently, racial profiling is a phenomenon still in search of a standard definition and comprises complex legal and emotional issues involving law enforcement impacting many ethno-racial minorities. Specifically in border control, evidence suggests that tactics of racial profiling are employed to target undocumented immigrants with a criminal background, but the wider consequences can impact a wider range of individuals, some of which may include non-criminal, non-immigrant Latinos. Understanding how racial profiling worked in the Spanish Inquisition's procedures helps us to perceive racial profiling today with keener sensitivity and awareness. Specifically, with reference to perceptions of "Mexicanness" at the U.S.-Mexico border, this enables us to see how, for both, racial profiling draws parameters for categories of suspect(s) beyond demonstrable criminality to include wider, at times inaccurate, categorical markers of appearance and behavior which may not coincide with an ethno-racial group's identity on the group's own terms.

No description available.