"This thesis analyzes the impact of the Mexican-American voters in south Texas on the 1960 presidential election. During that election year, this ethnic minority was strong enough to merit direct appeals from the Democratic presidential candidate, and subsequently, allowed to conduct a unique campaign divorced from the direct control of the conservative state Democratic machinery...The study of the Mexican-American political behavior in 1960 proceeds in three stages. The first chapter examines the political factionalism within the state Democratic Party suggest the conservative solution to the problem of liberal splinter groups, and evaluates Lyndon Johnson's contribution to the Democratic ticket in south Texas. Chapter II probes into the importance of imagery and indentity in politics, challenges the possibility of a religiously-based bloc vote in south Texas, but postulates the probability of a sub-conscious religious identification with the Democratic candidate. The last chapter describes the Valley 'Viva Kennedy' clubs, their origin, organization, activities, and contributions. To substantiate the author's hypothesis, oral interviews, club reports, personal files, letters, and contemporary newspapers were extensively used."-- leaf 1.

The visualization of recent episodes regarding apparently unjustifiable deaths of minorities, caused by police and federal law enforcement agencies, has been amplified through today's social media and television networks. Such events may seem to imply that issues concerning racial inequalities in America are getting worse. However, we do not know whether such indications are factual; whether this is a recent phenomenon, whether racial inequality is escalating relative to earlier decades, or whether it is better in certain regions of the nation compared to others. We have built a semantic engine for the purpose of querying statistics on various metropolitan areas, based on a database of individual deaths. Separately, we have built a database of demographic data on poverty, income, education attainment, and crime statistics for the top 25 most populous metropolitan areas. These data will ultimately be combined with government data to evaluate this hyp othesis, and provide a tool for predictive analytics. In this thesis, we will provide preliminary results in that direction. The methodology in our research consisted of multiple steps. We initially described our requirements and drew data from numerous datasets, which contained information on the 23 highest populated Metropolitan Statistical Areas in the United States. After all of the required data was obtained we decomposed the Metropolitan Statistical Area records into domain components and created an Ontology/Taxonomy via Protege to determine an hierarchy level of nouns towards identifying significant keywords throughout the datasets to use as search queries. Next, we used a Semantic Web implementation accompanied with Python programming language, and FuXi to build and instantiate a vocabulary. The Ontology was then parsed for the entered search query and returned corresponding results providing a semantically organized a nd relevant output in RDF/XML format. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.S.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2015. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

Based on fourteen-months of multi-sited, ethnographic fieldwork that compares two Hmong communities in Vang Vieng, Laos, and Sacramento, California in the United States, my doctoral thesis examines how the Hmong diaspora is constituted in the absence of a territorial ethnic homeland. Although scholars claim that the Hmong originated in the southwestern part of China, many Hmong are uncertain about their origins and have lost their connections to the ancestral homeland. This thesis suggests we examine diasporas as a dialectical process involving both transnational continuity and national differentiation. Despite their further migratory dispersal after the Vietnam War, Hmong in Laos and the United States have actively created a transnational diasporic community by maintaining their cultural practices across national borders, particularly in the domains of kinship practices and spiritual rituals. At the same time, diasporic Hmong have also created partial 'homes' in the nation-states where they reside. Therefore, their ethnic traditions and perceptions are transformed according to different national contexts, such as local socioeconomic conditions, state policies, and access to economic capital. This results in cultural differences within the diaspora. In addition, Hmong in different countries disagree about their relative position in the diaspora in relation to each other, leading to discursive fragmentation. As a result, diasporas are refracted through different national affiliations. Nonetheless, the sense of national belonging among diasporic Hmong remains partial because they continue to experience social, economic, and ethnic marginalization as an ethnic minority group in both Laos and the United States, which causes them to maintain a diasporic affiliation to Hmong scattered in other countries as an alternative source of ethnic belonging. In this sense, the Hmong are constantly positioned 'in-between' the diaspora and the nation-state.

Interest in a multiracial society has increased in recent years and including on racism and prejudice and in the propensity to stereotype out-groups. Theories on racism help explain the dominant group's prejudice toward subordinate groups. Yet they only explain why dominant group members stereotype subordinates or if the dominant group's propensity to stereotype is different from that of subordinate groups. Recent assimilation theories suggest that some minorities are assimilating with Whites but Blacks are not undergoing assimilation. Classic assimilation theory suggests that when a subordinate group assimilates with the dominant group then they will also take on the dominant group's values and beliefs, including their prejudices and propensities to stereotype. The use of racial stereotypes in support of the assimilation of a minority group has not been tested. Results from the LSAF national survey provide support for Asians to be assimilating with Whites. However, Hispanics do not appear to be taking on Whites' propensity to stereotype, contradicting the prediction that Hispanics are assimilating with Whites.