Rap music has been a major force in American culture since the 1970s. It can be political, uplifting, and celebratory. It can also be misogynistic and degrading to women, the focus of the current research. This paper begins with a brief history of the importance of music in the African American community. It then provides a history of rap music and major influences on its development through the decades. A systematic comparison of Billboard’s top 5 rap videos for 2004 and 2014 follows. This section, the core analysis, compares the lyrical and visual content in terms of the representation of African American women. Findings reveal three stereotypes—Jezebel, Sapphire, and Mammy/“Baby Mama”—dominate the presentation of African American women in the videos. Based on these three stereotypes, the videos present African American women as greedy, dishonest, sex objects, with no respect for themselves or others, including the children under their care. The women in the videos are scorned by men and exist to bring pleasure to them. Differences between 2004 and 2014 with respect to misogyny and degradation of a group that has historically suffered from dual disadvantage—because of both race and gender—are minimal. This research is a call to action to pay close attention to rap songs and rap music videos and to demand change both from rap artists and the companies that back them.

China has been home to some of the most prominent hackers and hacker groups of the global community throughout the last decade. In the last ten years, countless attacks globally have been linked to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) or those operating within the PRC. This exploration attempts to investigate the story, ideology, institutions, actions, and motivations of the Chinese hackers collectively, as sub-groups, and as individuals. I will do this using sources ranging from basic news coverage, interviews with experts and industry veterans, secondary reportage, leaked documents from government and private sources, government white papers, legal codes, blogs and microblogs, a wide array of materials from the darker corners of the online world, and many other materials. The work will begin to sketch for the reader some of the general and specific aspects of the shadowy world of cybercrime and hacker culture in China in recent years. One of the most prevalent beliefs is that the Chinese government is in fact the one responsible, whether directly or by sponsor, for cyber-attacks on foreign systems. My careful analysis has revealed is not always the case, or at least more complex than simply labeling the group as a state actor. At the root of these attacks is a social movement of "hacktivists," a patriotic sub-culture of Chinese hackers. It is incorrect to allege that all attacks are performed by state-sponsored individuals or groups, because there are many individuals and groups that are motivated by other factors.

After the rebellion over the killing of Michael Brown, the US Justice Department reported that over-policing for the sake of monetary extraction was taking place in Ferguson, MO, with non-White and people in poverty being disproportionately targeted at the hands of the police. And while it has been shown to be present within the Ferguson community, this extraction and targeting by police is not a geographically isolated occurrence. Based on previous research, a racialized, economic-based system of oppression goes hand-in-hand with policing. But how do the qualities of these geographies affect the prominence and location of police violence on a systemic level? Through a process of identity creation and reification informed through the interaction of racial capitalism and the state, specific geographies are identified with different groups within society as a function of housing segregation. These areas are then targeted by police based on their identity and the existing social hierarchy. By using data from Fatal Encounters, an independent organization which catalogs who has been killed by police, coupled with demographic descriptors of place, I show that zip codes with higher levels of Black and Hispanic populations as well as worse-off economic measures were positively associated with an increased odds of more people being killed by police. By shedding light on the drivers of this cycle of violence, I hope to contribute to the establishment of a more just society by redefining who shall be protected from what and whose interests shall be served.

The academic discipline of Sociology has rarely broached the subject of war and its recursive relationship with society. This paper addresses three major approaches in several disciplines that can be deemed ‘economically deterministic’: Marxist, Liberal, and Realist. These approaches can be useful for certain questions, but also leave out, or cloud other non-economic variables in understanding war – notably culture and military variables themselves. By using Karl Polanyi’s thesis regarding the “Myth of the Hundred Years’ Peace” (1815-1914) as a foil, the historical case of war in the nineteenth century is used to highlight the nature of war in European modernity and capitalism.

Social scientists agree that public confidence in social institutions is a crucial element in building democratic society. This is especially true for transitional societies including post-communist countries, because the lack of public confidence in newly emerged democratic institutions can interfere with democratic development. Although different theories explaining public confidence in social institutions were developed, these theories ignored the role that mass media play in building public confidence. The goal of this study is to examine the connection between mass media coverage of social institutions and public confidence in these institutions by conducting content analysis of Belarusian newspapers, reviewing the results of the public opinion polls from Belarus, and exploring the links between coverage of social institutions and trust in them. Four institutions were chosen for this examination: two institutions with high level of confidence representing the state (the President, the military) and two institutions with low level of confidence representing civil society (independent labor unions, opposition political parties). Results showed that there is a noticeable connection between media coverage and public confidence in social institutions. Content analysis demonstrated that the state-run newspapers publish a great number of articles about Belarus President Lukashenko, covering him within the scope of explicitly positive themes. As results of public opinion polls demonstrate, the President enjoys an high level of confidence amongst people who trust state-run Media. On the other hand, independent newspapers present President Lukashenko in a negative different light: he is being depicted as a dictator and an ineffective leader. According to public opinion polls, people who trust the independent media are less confident in the President: more than 42% do have confidence in him. Given that state-run newspapers present the President almost exclusively within positive themes and independent newspapers seldom speak of the President’s achievements, concentrating mostly on his failures and shortcomings, we can see a strong connection between media coverage of the President and levels of public confidence in him. Examining media coverage and public opinion about other social institutions provided similar results, confirming the connection between media coverage and public confidence in this study.

When Democrats and Republicans crafted the 2002 No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the bipartisan reauthorization of the 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), they did so with the best of intentions: Close our nation’s staggering achievement gap with federal leadership, accountability, flexibility, and choice. But a over a decade later, many argue the law’s flaws have outweighed its successes to detriment of our public education system, schools, teachers, and most importantly, our students. In accordance with ESEA’s traditional reauthorization cycle, NCLB was signed into law in 2002 and expired in 2007. It is now 2013, and our nation’s education policy still has yet to be reauthorized. In examining how this can be accomplished, this paper first demonstrates how our tradition of local school control developed into one of dual jurisdiction. It then examines the executive and legislative battle that produced NCLB in the 107th Congress. Next, this paper analyzes the intended and unintended consequences of NCLB, which include conflicting conservative and liberal mechanisms, perverse incentives, narrowing and homogenizing education, inadequate resources, ignoring community issues, and seeking annual educational profit over qualitative learning. The paper concludes with an outlook on reauthorization–how NCLB should be substantively improved, as well as, the political context in which this reauthorization will occur.

There has been much literature about the economic effects of terrorism in democratic countries, but this literature often considers democracy to be a binary variable. This paper sought to explore how the effects might differ depending on the strength of a democracy. In the end, I found that the numbers of attacks and the effects of those attacks do not follow a linear path. The results for autocracies and anocracies require further analysis, but democracies have revealed interesting results. It seems that democracies as a whole have more terrorist attacks, but, within this group, the more democratic a country is the fewer attacks are carried out.

This analysis seeks to understand the power of social media to create sustainable social movements. The 1999 World Trade Organization protests in Seattle were one of the first internet-supported acts of protest and illustrate the power of the Internet and social media to bring together diverse coalitions of actors and maintain decentralized power structures. Next, the analysis studies the non-profit advocacy organization Invisible Children and the recent media explosion of their Kony 2012 campaign to make sense of how uses of the Internet have expanded since 1999. The Kony 2012 case illustrates the power of committed networks in disseminating information but also alludes to some of the new challenges social media presents. Ultimately, this analysis concludes that social media has simultaneously empowered and crippled social media, calling for an intentioned use of the Internet applications, strong leadership, and cultural framing to sustain mobilization.

To understand the reasons for the increase in recent years of the Bosnian population in Bowling Green, Kentucky and their adaptation problems as refugees in their host country, this study focused upon the Bosnian community in Bowling Green and addressed what the role of their challenges is in the shaping of refugees’ new life in their host country. Extensive literature review helped to emerge that for an understanding of the situation of the refugees, their interaction in the host country is more meaningful topic for research. This study employed qualitative research methods, drawing from existing empirical studies addressing resettlement in the context of the informants’ wartime experiences. Initially, the researcher approached patrons at Bosnian restaurants and worshipers at local mosques to find Bosnian people. Snowball sampling used to identify Bosnian refugees living in the Bowling Green community. Twenty-five in-depth interviews were conducted for needs assessment and issue identification. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed in an attempt to understand the difficulties of adaptation among Bosnian refugees living in Bowling Green. A qualitative case study approach was chosen because it was the most effective way to gain knowledge of refugees’ experiences and perceptions in the context of the societies in which they resettled. Findings revealed that interviewed group struggled with mostly language and employment challenges to integration. Social support was provided through organizations that included Americans aided integration and the families resettled before as they provided significant support is directing resettlement. Banki’s (2004) and Jacobsen’s (2001) indicators of refugee integration were used to in order to determine to the extent to which this sample of Bosnian refugees are integrated into their host county.

The academic discipline of Sociology has rarely broached the subject of war and its recursive relationship with society. This paper addresses three major approaches in several disciplines that can be deemed ‘economically deterministic’: Marxist, Liberal, and Realist. These approaches can be useful for certain questions, but also leave out, or cloud other non-economic variables in understanding war – notably culture and military variables themselves. By using Karl Polanyi’s thesis regarding the “Myth of the Hundred Years’ Peace” (1815-1914) as a foil, the historical case of war in the nineteenth century is used to highlight the nature of war in European modernity and capitalism.