As the 1960s Environmental movement has grown, sustainability and justice discourses have come to the fore of the movement. While environmental justice discourse considers the unequal effects of environmental burdens, the language that frames "sustainability" is often socially and politically neutral. This thesis critically examines sustainability initiatives and practices of an urban farming organization in Florida. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in 2017, I explore the extent to which these initiatives incorporate race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic class when working to provide sustainably grown food in diverse communities. I argue that the organization's focus on justice for the environment, rather than for communities, and education as a barrier in low-income, food desert neighborhoods neglects to integrate experiences of those living on the margins into their initiatives. This research raises awareness of the need for a critical examination of sustainability in practice and a politically aware incorporation of environmental justice themes into sustainability agendas.

As the repercussions of the nearly 50-year U.S. War on Drugs are revealing themselves to be harmful and life-threatening, especially to lower-class and minority populations, social movements aimed at drug policy reform have been on the rise. While today's generation of college students were raised on abstinence-based discourses, which constantly warned and threatened them about the dangers of drug use, these same students often change their perspective, some as early as high school, when they begin having their own experiences with drugs and engage in more drug-related conversations. As a result, many students become motivated to change drug policy and education and address the stigma associated with drug use in order to reduce drug-related harm to individuals. This thesis examines the ideas and efforts of students at a university in the southeastern United States who are actively engaged in making these changes. Based on interviews with students involved with two drug policy reform groups in 2018, this thesis highlights the role of student activism in the larger drug policy reform movement. Student activists raise awareness of the need for a critical examination of U.S. drug policy frameworks and their place in this endeavor. I argue that student activists' involvement in the drug policy reform movement is motivated by the numerous disparities they experience and observe in the dominant abstinence-based drug approach. Based on these students' perspectives, I argue for a shift towards a more holistic harm reduction education that aims to increase the quality of care and livelihood for drug users, an accomplishment they believe is inextricable from U.S. policy.

<p>In this study, I emphasize the agency of the Malian arabisant community (individuals usually trained in médersas who use Arabic as their first language of communication and who often identify first and foremost as Muslims) in creating, maintaining, and improving an education system which provides the tools needed for young Malians to be pious Muslims and productive citizens of the Republic of Mali. By creating an extensive médersa system over the years, in collaboration and confrontation with the successive governments in Mali and abroad, Malian arabisants have answered the need for a new definition of what it is to be a modern Muslim democrat in a secular democracy. I suggest that the specific formation of the educational system in Mali is related to the development of the uniquely Malian configuration of what it is to be an arabisant.</p> <p>I show how médersas have allowed and still encourage the development of a new mentality that gives Malian Muslims the tools necessary to re-define themselves in their own environment. Malian arabisants have reformulated their religious practice and sociability towards what has been called Islam mondain: a moralization of the mundane. One's energy is focused on morally purifying daily life in order to render it “islamically” sound while living in an environment that is not Islamic <em>per se</em>. It is an internalization of faith that allows the believer to enjoy the benefits of a rapidly modernizing environment by re-imagining both modernity and tradition as compatible and complementary. Islam mondain offers a model for virtuous socio-economic comfort, and an islamization of the benefits of globalization and modernization that renders them morally pure.</p> <p>This research thus contributes to the theoretical and anthropological study of Islam as a lived faith in a secular democracy; such a study is central to an understanding of the developing relationships between Islam, modernity, and secular democracy across the Muslim world. It also speaks to the very current issues faced by Muslims living in “Western” countries and vice versa. This research illustrates the agency of the Malian arabisants in defining their relationship to modernity and democracy, and thus engages with the variety of research that shows other Muslim communities in the world also engaged in such a re-definition of themselves and of their tradition.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>This study explores the current socio-political context of the Netherlands through an analysis of <em>Fitna: The Movie</em> (2008), the online video produced by right-wing politician Geert Wilders. I frame the field of analysis as an affective economy of uncertainty in the country, manifesting in the increasing visibility of, for instance, anti-Islam sentiment, declarations of national identity crisis, and public figures claiming to speak on behalf of the “real” Dutch, in the public realm.</p> <p>With photographic footage of Muslims condoning and conducting violence displayed alongside Quranic verses, and a blatant appeal to viewers to “Stop Islamization. Defend our freedom”, Fitna is both product and visualization of the country’s affective economy. To the extent that the conventions and codes of its context shape <em>Fitna</em>’s form and content, the movie provides a visualization of uncertainty in the Netherlands.</p> <p><em>Fitna </em>constitutes both the target and the lens of this analysis. I refract a close attention to the movie’s montage editing, violated/violent images, and use of photographs through the concepts of fear, offense and truth(-telling), respectively. Taking the movie as lens, my analysis elaborates: the experiential dimension of uncertainty, as the disorientation of globalizing modernity; the key figures through which uncertainty circulates, including nation, religion, Islamization and depillarization; and the affect’s primary representational mode as truth telling performance.</p> <p>Rather than explaining (away) opposition to Islam in, or the affective economy of, the Netherlands, this seeks to explore and experiment. I explore the character and mechanics of an affective economy through an experimental methodology centered on a single visual object. Given these objectives, the study closes with reflections upon the potentials and pitfalls of an analysis of <em>Fitna: The Movie</em>, with particular respect to popular narratives recounting the movie’s alleged failure.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>This thesis presents the findings of a study carried out in brothels in Khon Kaen, Thailand. The study examined efforts of the "voiceless" sex workers to organize in order to increase their control over decision-making processes. It also analyzed the difficulties, social forces, structures and ideologies which maintain an inequitable distribution of power. The broader aim was to clarify the notion of people's participation in order to make it operationally more useful with respect to AIDS prevention intervention to sex workers. A technocratic approach to issues of AIDS prevention and control among sex workers was rejected. The study embraced a number of complementary activities including: situation analysis of AIDS in the Thai context, specifically in the northeast, ethnographic study of the sex industry, and participatory action research.</p> <p>This study was initiated in late 1991 and completed in 1993. It was carried out in six brothels in downtown Khon Kaen. The study occurred in 4 phases: 1) situation assessment in which historical and documentary analysis were utilized ethnographic research on sex workers which served as a basis for constructing culturally appropriate interventions, 3) participatory action research emphasizing self determination of sex workers on AIDS prevention and control, and 4) evaluation of this "experiment." The research attempts to balance "classic ethnography" and "applied participatory research" to an AIDS prevention program for sex workers in Thailand. It was carried in collaboration with health professionals, landlords, pimps, and sex workers. Groups met and worked together in brothels to discuss the findings. Results were also presented to local health authorities.</p> <p>This study illustrates the opportunities for and the formidable difficulties of participation by sex workers in Thailand. Without strong support for non-formal AIDS education and self determination by sex workers, there is little chance that they can negotiate safe sex and make decisions concerning AIDS prevention.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The ongoing overdose problem in the United States, particularly exacerbated by the widespread use of fentanyl, and polydrug use, represents a critical public health challenge. This thesis explores how people who use drugs (PWUD) in Orlando, Florida, are responding to the overdose problem in their community. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted at a syringe services program in Summer 2023, I argue that PWUD in Orlando actively take measures to prevent overdose and overdose deaths but are faced with many obstacles that challenge their overdose prevention efforts. I examine overdose narratives of PWUD to show how factors preventing effective overdose prevention are not just systemic but also cultural. In particular, the prevailing stigma of opioid use hinders the creation of a supportive environment for preventing overdoses and perpetuates the ostracization of PWUD in Orlando. Recognizing the profound influence of stigma towards the PWUD with whom I conducted research, I make the case for reimagining overdose prevention as a comprehensive effort in Orlando to equip PWUD, their families, first responders, and the broader community with the knowledge, skills, and tools to address overdose. Such efforts also have the potential to recalibrate cultural misconceptions and biases toward PWUD. As Florida and the nation continue to experience an overdose problem, understanding local cultural and structural challenges remains pivotal. This project demonstrates that by integrating comprehensive training and combating stigmatization of PWUD, Orlando communities can prevent overdose and save lives more effectively.

This dissertation critically analyzes home and community gardens within Metro-Orlando by considering the ways that the COVID-19 pandemic impacts residents' garden participation and access to green public spaces. The study utilizes an ethnographic approach to produce informed understandings of participants' experiences within local gardens, alternative food networks, and community supported agriculture analyzed using Marxian theoretical frameworks. Findings are primarily grounded in qualitative information derived from interviews, participant observation, and photovoice. Data were collected both prior to the global COVID-19 outbreak and over subsequent months of lockdown and public health mitigation measures. Primarily focusing on local community garden organizers, community garden members, and home gardeners, this dissertation documents many of the emotional, dietary, and physiological benefits of Metro-Orlando's local gardens through analysis of food and garden access factors that serve to constrain or enhance local garden participation: (1) seasonality; (2) effective garden maintenance; (3) garden's management and social organization, and (4) transportation and resource costs. These considerations are significant as most respondents report their gardens function as supplemental food security resources, serve as a locus of self-care, and provide respite from daily stressors. Lack of convenience remains the most widely reported access challenge among my study participants while cost is the least reported challenge. Findings also demonstrate the ways local gardens foster resilience through support networks and mutual aid, promote resistance and survival through community food security, and provide escape from pandemic-related stressors.

In this thesis, I discuss how the undergraduate computer scientist is trained, and how they learn what I am calling computational intuition. Computational intuition describes the methodology in which computer scientists approach their problems and solve them through the use of computers. Computational intuition is a series of skills and a way of thinking or approaching problems that students learn throughout their education. The main way that computational intuition is taught to students is through the experience they gain as they work on homework and classwork problems. To develop computational intuition, students learn explicit knowledge and techniques as well as knowledge that is tacit and harder to teach within the lectures of a classroom environment. Computational intuition includes concepts that professors and students discuss which include “computer science intuition,” “computational thinking,” general problem solving skills or heuristics, and trained judgement. This way of learning is often social, and I draw on the pedagogy of cognitive apprenticeship to understand the interactions between the professors, tutors, and other students help learners gain an understanding of the “computer science intuition.” It is this method of thinking that computer scientists at the Claremont Colleges have stated as being one of the most essential items that should be taught and gained throughout their education and signals a wider understanding of computer science as a field.

This thesis seeks to explore the ways in which gender and identity are imagined in times of war especially in the cases of women who participate in armed struggle within the Middle East. I focus particularly on how US and UK media's framing of these women's lives and experiences distort the ways in which we understand conflict within the contemporary Middle East. Through the case studies of female militants or supports of militancy in Palestine and the Islamic State I seek to highlight women's stories and lived realities in an attempt to understand what drives them to use particular model's of agency.

“We carry our histories in our bodies, how could we not?” – Nancy Krieger In the United States and abroad, socioeconomic status (income, education, and occupation) greatly impacts health outcomes for a given population. There is a strong and consistent socioeconomic gradient within health outcomes which has been documented as far back as in Ancient Egypt and China (Krieger, Willains, & Moss, 1997; Liberatos, Link, & Kelsey, 1988) The general trend shows that individuals with higher socioeconomic status generally enjoy lower rates of morbidity (disease) and disability, which can ultimately lead to higher mortality rates (House et al. (1992) and House et al. (1994); Williams & Collins, 1995). Most of the literature focuses on the impact of race or gender on socioeconomic status and therefore health status, but rarely is the intersectionality of both race and gender—a factor in the lives of all Afro-American women—the focus of this inquiry. This research views socioeconomic factors in light of historical and sociological conditions which shape present urban environments in which Black women lives and grow. The goal of this thesis is to analyze the ways in which socioeconomic (particularly educational attainment) inequities lead to decreased health status of Afro-American women living in urban slums who fail to graduate high school. This research investigates the long-term effects of a) residential and educational segregation (b) racism and sexism within the educational system (c) racism and sexism within the healthcare system and (d) implications for morbidity and mortality rates amongst Afro-American women with respect to differences in educational attainment and high school dropout status. More research on this topic is necessary to better understand the direct correlation between educational attainment and health status among minority groups in the United States.