Review of Organizing for Social Change : Midwest Academy Manual for Activists. Kim Bobo, Jackie Kendall, and Steve Max Forum Press. 2010. 401p, 9780984275212 $29.95

People of Pacific Island descent are afflicted by obesity and diabetes more than other populations. Although interventions have succeeded in reducing these conditions among other groups, they have been unsuccessful among Tongans and other Pacific Islanders. Furthermore, little is known about the cultural perspectives of this population with a high rate of obesity and diabetes. Accordingly, this descriptive phenomenological study was conducted to investigate the lived experiences of Tongans with obesity and diabetes in a western metropolitan area of the United States to understand their predisposition toward these conditions and suggest appropriate interventions. Purposive sampling was used to recruit 11 Tongans, 18 years or older, with obesity and diabetes. Face-to-face interviews were conducted using open-ended questions. Data analysis consisted of verbatim transcription and splitter coding, which identified 5 emerging themes. The findings indicated that cultural customs have created an emotional attachment among Tongan participants to their native foods and that they feel obliged to eat abundantly at food-related social events. Moreover, they mistrust their healthcare professionals, which results in non-adherence to medical advice. The findings align with Martha Rogers' theory of the science of unitary human beings and Bandura's model of reciprocal determinism that there is a strong relationship between people and their cultural environment. This study's findings provide an understanding that may lead to positive social change in designing culturally specific preventive programs to decrease obesity and diabetes and ensure a better quality of life for Tongans.

Discrimination lawsuits can bankrupt organizations and are a continuous problem for many organizations. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore strategies restaurant managers used to deter discrimination lawsuits. The conceptual framework for this study was a theory of 4Cs, which represent critical thinking, collaboration, communication, and creativity. The targeted population consisted of 10 restaurant managers who have implemented successful strategies that reduced discrimination lawsuits, work in the Boston metropolitan area, and have 10 years of recent experience in the restaurant industry. Data were collected from face-to-face semistructured interviews, direct observation, and review of company document. Data analysis included methodological triangulation. Themes emerged from data analysis, including hiring practices, employee training, and discrimination prevention policies and procedures. Managers who practice these strategies and comply with the Equal Employment Opportunity law may reduce discrimination lawsuits, which may promote the self-worth, dignity, equality, and human rights for those who might otherwise suffer discrimination. The result of these managers' practices may contribute to social change, which may reduce bias, prejudice, and create a healthy society.

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In the northern South Island, the area northern Te Wai Pounamu (NTWP) is defined appropriate to a regional investigation of pre-European culture change. It is argued that the Maori sequence of this region is relevant to a range of interpretative problems in New Zealand�s archaeological past. Preparatory to this investigation, the international and New Zealand literature on culture change is reviewed. Two primary investigative foci of change are identified in NTWP; subsistence economy and stone tool manufacturing technology. A chronological scheme of Early, Middle and Late Periods based on firmly dated ecological events and/or independent radiocarbon ages is defined so as to order the archaeological data without recourse to unproven scenarios of cultural change and association. The Early Period subsistence economy is assessed in some detail. An Early Period settlement focus is documented along the eastern Tasman Bay coast in proximity to meta-argillite sources. Early Period midden remains suggest that several genera of seal and moa were exploited, and that people were fishing in eastern Tasman Bay during the warmer months of the year. From the Early Period fishhook assemblages of Tasman Bay, manufacturing change is inferred related to the increasing scarcity of moa bone over time. It is argued that lower Early Period settlement of the larger northern South Island was focused on the north-eastern coast to Rangitoto (D�Urville Island), while NTWP was characterized by smaller stone working communities operating in summer. In contrast, moa-free middens in Awaroa Inlet and Bark Bay of the western Tasman Bay granite coast present a physical dominance of Paphies australis, and finfish species suggesting, along with the dearth of Austrovenus stutchburyi, occupation outside of the warmer summer months. These middens also present an absence of seal and a paucity of bird bone, while sharing a robust 15th-16th centuries AD radiocarbon chronology. With the dearth of all bird species from granite coast middens in general, and evidence that the less preferred kokako (Callaeas c. cinerea) was caught during the occupation of Awaroa Inlet N26/214, it is suggested that cultural regulations beyond immediate subsistence needs were also operating at this time. From southern Tasman Bay, the archaeological investigation of the important Appleby site N27/118 suggests that the people associated with the extensive horticultural soils of Waimea West otherwise consumed finfish and estuarine shellfish in (non-summer) season, kiore (Rattus exulans), dog or kuri (Canis familiaris), and several small evidence of Maori tradition, archaeological charcoal, and the approximately 16th century radiocarbon chronology for N27/118 and the associated Appleby gravel borrow pit N27/122 places the advent of extensive Waimea horticulture within the post-moa, lower Middle Period Maori economy. The Haulashore Island archaeological assemblage of south-eastern Tasman Bay with a similar material culture to Appleby is also bereft of seal and any diagnostic moa bone. This Middle Period evidence is considered in a larger comparative perspective, where the absence of seal from 15th-16th centuries Tasman Bay middens is interpreted as a factor of human predation. A secure radiocarbon chronology suggests the convergence of this loss with the diminishment and loss of selected avifauna, and the subsequent advent of large horticultural complexes in the northern South Island compensated for the loss of faunal calories in a seasonally economy and a managed ecology. The evidence of stone tool use is also reviewed in some detail for NTWP, following the definition of an adze typology appropriate to the classification of meta-argillite tools. It is clear that meta-argillite is the dominant material of adze and (non-adze) flake tool manufacture throughout the Maori sequence of NTWP, while granite coast quartz remains generally subdominant. Beyound the apparent loss of the laterally-hafted adze, the evidence of adze change is generally subdominant. Beyond the apparent loss of the laterally-hafted adze, the evidence of adze change is generally reflected in shifting typological proportions, and in new manufacturing technologies and dressing techniques. Functional change may be inferred in the loss over time of large meta-argillite points and blade tools associated respectively with the manufacture of one-piece moa bone fishhooks and moa and seal butchery. The exclusive identification of hammer-dressed adzes with hump backs and steep bevels in Middle Period assemblages is related to the advent of horticultural intensification. More generally, adzes of the upper Early and Middle Periods are increasingly characterized by round sections, while hammer-dressing is employed more frequently and extensively reduced from riverine meta-argillite and recycled banks. Collectively, these changes reflect a developing emphasis on economy and opportunistic exploitation. From this interpretation, and evidence that meta-argillite adze length and the size of high quality Ohana source flakes diminish over time, it is suggested that accessible, high quality and appropriately shaped meta-argillite rock became increasingly scarce through intensive quarry manufacture. In conclusion, the coincidence of diminishing rock and faunal resources over time is related in a speculative anthropological model of culture change. It is proposed that the 14th-16th centuries Maori economy of NTWP, and by implication and inference, many other regions of New Zealand, was characterized by a resource crisis which either precipitated or reinforced a broader trajectory of culture change. It is suggested that influential leadears perceived a linkage in the loss of high quality rock and important subsistence fauna at this time, and that distinctive technologies, institutions and ideologies of Middle Period Maori society were influenced by, and/or developed from, this perception. Finally, it is recommended that the data of an archaeological Maori culture sequence be ordered and tested within a radiocarbon based chronological scheme, rather than the still generally used model of �Archaic� and �Classic� cultural periods. It is also suggested that New Zealand archaeologists should look beyond the functional-ecological imperative to consider more holistic anthropological explanations of change in the pre-European Maori past, with a focus on integrated regional sequences.

This study presents an evaluation of health education in schools in the Australian Capital Territory, listing as evidence the perceptions and experiences of students and teachers at three levels of schooling. There is a particular emphasis on the high school. First, a broad-based literature review was undertaken, in order to arrive at some theoretical principles for health education. For the evaluation itself a combination of methods has been used including student questionnaires, teacher interviews, group discussion, participant observation and analysis of documents. While the questionnaire was the major research tool, all sources are integrated in the final discussion in order to provide a broad picture of health education at the different school levels. Conclusions drawn from the review of literature include (i) that contemporary health education in the Western world is concerned with the quality of life and with the decisions, at both individual and community levels, which relate to lifestyle, and (ii) the inevitability of social change had led to the recognition in the United Kingdom, United States of America and Australia of the need for young people to develop strategies for coping with a changing environment. In Australian Capital Territory schools, health education has been recognised as carrying the responsibility for developing these strategies. A key theme emerging from the review and explored in the evaluation is that, if these goals are to be achieved, particular emphasis must be placed on the process of learning and on the social emotional environment as an integral part of that process. In order to explore this hypothesis information was collected on student and teacher perceptions of the above concepts of health education and how these differ in a range of schools. To this end six schools which Positively identified health education as part of their curriculum were used as case studies. As individual schools they were found to approach this in different ways and these different approaches build a broad picture of school health education in action. It was found however, that there were major difficulties in effectively incorporating contemporary health education in schools. These difficulties repeat those already identified in my review of health education in Australian schools in this century. A "reaction pattern" of "bandaid" response to social change is repeatedly incorporated into the traditional education curriculum of the time under the title of health education. In the present era, there can be identified a mismatch between the objectives of contemporary health education and the present educational paradigm. A major finding in this regard was the failure of the high school to match up either to needs of students or the ideals of health education. While the fulfilment of these ideals was shown to be possible given specific teacher qualities, it was also found to be inhibited by a range of environmental factors. Examples of these were found to be organisational barriers and staff and student pressure to conform to the established structure and to the established roles. The study highlights the frustrating position of the teacher who seeks, or is given, the task of implementing contemporary health education in presentday schools.

This thesis outlines dominant ideologies and practices that affect women's authority in the urban social milieu of north India. Theories that consider the causes of social stratification by gender as well as social movement patterns are useful for understanding the durability of gender roles. The utility of these theories for understanding the patterns of social organization in India is discussed. Additionally, I report on interviews I conducted with police, non-governmental organization founders and individuals who are involved in and affected by women's issues, in order to outline potential variations in existing practices. In urban India, traditional and contemporary social practices meld into a proscribed, often volatile cultural setting in which women's roles are stringently defined. In the city of New Delhi, reports of "bride burnings" or murders attributed to family conflicts over dowry have surfaced during the last decades of the 2O century, and resulting protest movements have sparked governmental and grass-roots level reforms. Extreme cases of violence against women are indicative of troublesome cultural ideologies, including the social and economic devaluation of women. Urbanization has intensified financial negotiations in marriage alliances, and a woman's social worth is increasingly measured according to her market value. A Women's Movement comprised of various interest groups has contributed to the dialog on the social climate of north India, and feminist advocates have sought to redefine women's roles. Within the hierarchical structure of the Hindu culture, concepts of kinship and community take precedence over personal agendas, and social action is thus driven by family values as well as movement ideologies. State policies designed to address social ills such as domestic violence are ineffectual because they do not address the extant causes of abuse or constraints against women. Independent organizations and activist groups have recognized the need to work within traditional norms in order to advance women's movement objectives, despite the restrictions inherent within patriarchy. These tactics risk accomplishing little social change, and may at times perpetuate practices that limit women's activity. / Graduation date: 2000

Thesis (B.Sc.(Hons.)) - University of Queensland, 2006. / Includes bibliography.

Thesis (MA(MW)--University of Pretoria, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 258-275).