Using feminist poststructuralist and postcolonial lenses, I explore how young Lebanese-Canadian women construct health, obesity, and the body within the context of the dominant obesity discourse, which over-emphasizes supposed links between inactivity, nutrition, obesity, and health. Participant-centered conversations were held with 20 young Lebanese-Canadian women between the ages of 18 and 25. The conversational texts were analyzed according to two consecutive methods: a thematic analysis which allowed us to focus on what the participants had to say about health, obesity, and the body followed by a poststructuralist discourse analysis which helped us to decipher how the participants spoke about these topics. The findings of this study attest that the young women construct health, obesity, and the body as matters of individual responsibility. They speak about achieving health and avoiding overweight/obesity through disciplinary practices such as rigorous physical activity and proper dietary restrictions. The participants also construct health in close linkage with the physical appearance of the body; moreover, they conflate the “healthy” and “ideal” female body, which they represent as thin. As such, the young women reject “fat” and portray obesity as a disease, a matter of lack of will, and an “abnormal” physical appearance. Finally, the young Lebanese-Canadian women report their involvement in various practices such as restriction of the quality and quantity of their nutritional intake, rare and non-organized forms of physical activity, and problematic practices such as the use of detoxes, dieting pills, and compulsive exercise, all in the name of health. Throughout this study, I highlight the participants’ multiple and shifting subjectivities: While the young Lebanese-Canadian women most often construct themselves as free neoliberal subjects re-citing elements of dominant neoliberal discourses (of self-authorship, self-responsibility for health, traditional femininity, and obesity), they at times construct themselves as “poststructuralist” subjects showing awareness of, and “micro-resistance” to such discourses. The impacts of the Lebanese and Lebanese-Canadian cultures on the participants’ constructions of health, obesity, and the body comprise an important part of this thesis. The participants accentuate the major importance of beauty and physical appearance—particularly not being fat—in the Lebanese and Lebanese-Canadian cultures. However, they also attempt to distance themselves from “Lebanese” ways of thinking about health, obesity, and the body, and in doing so they replicate homogeneous representations of Lebanese, Lebanese-Canadian, and Canadian women. I offer practical suggestions to inform health and obesity interventions that target Lebanese-Canadian women and women from ethnic minorities and I discuss future research possibilities that may stem from the present thesis.

”A new Estonian-Swedish identity” ­– An ethnological study of the magazine Kustbon as an arena for mediation and negotiation of Estonian-Swedish identity: The purpose of this master’s thesis is to investigate how the magazine Kustbon constitutes an arena for the mediation and negotiation of Estonian-Swedish identity. Kustbon (Coastal inhabitant) is a magazine published by the Estonian-Swedish cultural association Svenska Odlingens Vänner (Friends of Swedish Cultivation). The magazine has since its beginning functioned as a link for the Estonian-Swedes as a group. It has survived for over 100 years despite various setbacks and different regimes that prevented the publication of the magazine. The material for this thesis consists of the magazine's issues between the years 2001 and 2017. I analyzed them using theoretical concepts such as: identity, ethnicity, diaspora, cultural heritage and imagined communities. As methods of analysis, I have used cultural analysis and discourse analysis. Through them I have been able to show how the texts in Kustbon have reproduced various notions of Estonian-Swedes in relation to Swedes in Sweden (or “rikssvenskar”) and thus communicated a community inwards and distancing outward. I have used theoretical concepts such as identity and ethnicity to analyze the foundations on which the imagined community is created. In the analysis I show the importance and role of Estonia in the magazine's various texts, and how the country can function in different identity forming processes. I have used the theoretical concept of diaspora to discuss the group’s relationship to both Estonia and Sweden. Finally, I have analyzed how recurring historical themes and stories are written in Kustbon, and how these stories work to legitimize the Estonian-Swedes' position and group identity. I also discuss identity creation through modern technology and how genealogy and DNA tests are recurring themes in Kustbon. Furthermore, I discuss how Kustbon writes about their and Svenska Odlingens Vänners problems with recruiting new members and the underlying factors that could lie behind these problems.

El presente trabajo de investigación tiene como objetivo principal presentar una colección de alta costura, el cual aborda el tema de estudio La danza de tijeras: ritual andino. La investigación ha desarrollado varios aspectos relacionados a la danza de tijeras, tales como el origen y sus características. Asimismo, se han descrito las características del mundo andino y su vinculación con los rituales de la danza de tijeras. Luego, se realizó la justificación, el desarrollo de los objetivos y el estado del arte. En este último, se ha entrevistado a investigadores y artistas para consolidar la información obtenida que a su vez han contribuido al desarrollo del trabajo en las definiciones y datos. Además, en base a la teorización del tema se ha diseñado un proceso visual con moodboards, el desarrollo de prototipos de estructuras y de antecedentes de diseño. Finalmente, inspirado en los moodboards se realizó un collage y los bocetos de la colección en la indumentaria con la descripción del usuario propuesto. Los resultados evidencian una relación entre los elementos que componen al danzante en el proceso creativo y la elaboración en cada indumento propuesto. / The main objective of this research work is to present a collection of haute couture, which it addresses the subject of study The dance of scissors: andean ritual. In the first place, the research has developed several aspects related to the scissors dance, such as the origin and its characteristics. Likewise, the characteristics of the Andean world and its link with the rituals of the scissor dance have been described. Then, the justification, the development of the objectives and the state of the art were carried out. In the latter, researchers and artists have been interviewed to consolidate the information obtained, which in turn have contributed to the development of the work on definitions and data. Moreover, based on the theorization of the subject, a visual process has been designed with moodboards, the development of prototypes of structures and of design backgrounds. Finally, inspired by the moodboards, a collage and sketches of the collection were made on the clothing with the description of the proposed user. The results show a relationship between the elements that make up the dancer in the creative process and the elaboration in each proposed outfit. / Trabajo de investigación

The subject of this dissertation is a theoretical and empirical analysis of the transformations of cultural identity in the context of intercultural communication. In the course of processing the chosen topic the author used the theoretical knowledge acquired by studying professional books and other relevant sources as well as the empirical data which were gathered by the author during her anthropological field research over her two-year stay in Berlin. The main objective of the dissertation was to describe, analyse and interpret the phenomenon of cultural identity in the context of migration processes, globalization and the European refugee crisis. Special attention was, therefore, paid to the situation of foreigners who find themselves in a new different culture and are going through a difficult process of adaptation to a new environment. Transformations of the foreigners identity and their relationship to the majority culture are also being studied in terms of different types of immigration policies in host countries. In the focus of the research interest were the questions of the efficiency of assimilation, integration and multicultural policy. Among the sub-objectives of the work are included the description and analysis of the processes of formation, reproduction and transformation of...

The aim of this study is to examine how British culture and British cultural identity is discursively constructed and represented in two texts, including images accompanying the texts, found in two textbooks used in the foundation course for English as a second language in the Swedish upper-secondary school, the textbooks published in the 1970s and the 1980s respectively. The aim also includes to see if British cultural identity is represented in a stereotypical manner and to see which views on culture are present in the texts. The methods used in the study are discourse analysis based on Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory, and Hall’s visual analysis. Two theories are applied to the material, these are Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory and Hall’s theory of stereotyping. The result of the present study shows that there are several representations of British cultural identity in the 1970s text and that all are stereotypical. In one of the representations, British cultural identity is understood as someone who is an Englishman which entails amongst other things being brought up in England as a real Englishman. The other representations of British cultural identity included the identities English people, Englishmen and cockneys. The identity English people includes both of the identities Englishmen and cockneys. The representation of English people is that background, class and the way you speak are important and that English people check each other’s background and class by listening to one another’s speech. The representation of Englishmen includes that they are upper-class proper Englishmen who speak the Queens English whereas cockneys are represented as lower-class people who speak a vulgar sort of English. In the 1980s text there are two representations of British cultural identity. The first one of these, which was found to be represented in a stereotypical manner, is constituted by the group identity pupils with British cultural background within a culturally and nationally diverse class in Britain. This representation is culturally exclusive since only pupils with British cultural background are included in this representation. The second representations of British cultural identity found in the 1980s text is a British class made up by a group of pupils with culturally and nationally diverse backgrounds. This representation was deemed to be non-stereotypical and culturally inclusive since this representation of British cultural identity is culturally diverse.

This study explores the role of design as a force that may stabilise cultural identity in a cultural climate of globalisation through the use of visual rhetoric and narrative. It focuses specifically on the heritage and face of a German culture in South Africa. Objects that are found amongst the South African German community are analysed in an attempt to uncover the rhetoric and narrative of the culture’s heritage in a country far removed from their Heimat. The study deals with terms such as Sehnsucht and belonging, of maintaining a sense of cultural difference while being integrated and socially accepted. It uses visual rhetoric as a means to discover elements that may be used by design in order to adequately represent the Germanness of the South African German community in a way that it can be maintained in today’s way of life. / Dissertation (MA)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Visual Arts / unrestricted

<p>Purpose of visit is one of the main determinants of destination choice. Assessing the fulfillment of travelers’ desires could thus gauge the tourism potential of a country from the perspective of travelers. The main reasons for traveling are relaxation, pleasure and entertainment, social interaction, opportunity to meet a romantic or sexual partner, educational opportunity, self-fulfillment, wish fulfillment, shopping, business, holiday, health, and transit. Meanwhile, academic research on satisfying the curiosity about a destination remains underdeveloped. The concept of curiosity is central to motivation and curiosity as a personality trait plays a significant role in the behavior of a traveler.</p> <p><br></p> <p>The goal of this dissertation was to examine the tourism potential of a destination from the point of view of travelers interested in exploring new horizons and perspectives to better fulfill their expectations and increase customer satisfaction. The purpose of this study is three-fold: (1) conceptualize destination curiosity; (2) develop a scale for destination curiosity; (3) examine the impact of destination curiosity as a major driver of international travel. For the latter, a set of integral relationships across different measurement items associated with destination curiosity and the cultural identity dimension of place identity is instituted in an SEM model in which the dependent variable is international visit intention. </p> <p>For this purpose, this study coined the term destination curiosity (hereafter, DC), which was defined as the travel enthusiasm that is reflective of a curious behavior to explore and seek fulfillment in acquiring knowledge through the actual travel experience at the destination. Aligned with Berlyne’s definition of curiosity and exploratory behavior, who is the most influential contributor to the concept of exploratory behavior, the two main dimensions of curiosity continue to be perceptual curiosity, which is more emotionally driven, and epistemic curiosity, which is information seeking behavior and cognitively driven.</p> <p><br></p> <p>Having addressed both the affective and cognitive drivers of curiosity to conceptualize DC, sensation seeking, novelty experience, need for cognition, and perceptual curiosity were incorporated into the approach. DC was conceptualized according to Fine's clockspeed model (1998). Fine’s model is related to the rate of change and includes two dimensions: process control (integrality-modularity) and decision control (slow-fast clockspeed). By incorporating this model, both the complexity and diversity dimensions of DC were considered. Therefore, DC was conceptualized in a way that illustrates how the existing or potential competitive advantages of destinations can influence the destination choices of travelers when they travel to explore new horizons and perspectives. In this study Fine’s clockspeed model—as a supply chain model defined to be used by suppliers/organizations—is incorporated in conceptualizing destination curiosity, as personality trait of a traveler, with the lens of demand expectation. </p> <p><br></p> <p>As for developing a scale through a rigorous approach via higher-order factor modeling, a scale was developed to measure DC. Delphi method was used to purify the initial measurement items that were adopted from the perceptual curiosity scale (Collins, Litman, & Spielberger, 2004), the need for cognition scale (Cacioppo & Petty, 1982), the desire for novelty scale (Pearson, 1970), and the sensation seeking scale (Zuckerman, Kolin, Price, & Zoob, 1964) in the travel context. In addition, EFA and higher-order factor modeling were incorporated to develop a scale. </p> <p><br></p> <p>Finally, to ensure the predictive validity of the developed scale, another study was designed to examine the mediating effect of DC on the impact of the cultural identity (dimension of brand identity) of a country on international visit intention. Motion pictures, mega-events, or gastronomy arguably act as instigators; while established brand persistence, geopolitics, or the existence of stereotypes about a destination act as inhibitors when it comes to one’s willingness to travel to another country. Therefore, Turkey was chosen for the context and a scenario was defined that addressed all the mentioned elements. The cultural identity of a destination was considered a proper antecedent for examining the mediating effect of DC on international visit, as the desire to enjoy unique pleasant experiences is likely to be universal. Meanwhile, culture is undoubtedly a unique attribute of any destination, whether a destination affiliated with thousands of years of fame or a non-major tourist destination which has sustained its culture. The significant mediating effect of DC in that study shows its importance in destination marketing.</p> <p><br></p> <p>The DC is arguably critical for the improvement of relations between nations. The more people travel to explore new horizons and perspectives, the more they will understand each other. In the same vein, for travelers with a high level of DC, traveling is a means of nourishing their soul that can eventually improve the well-being of the global society.</p>

Välbefinnande är en upplevelse som många människor försöker att uppnå. När man inte uppnår välbefinnande kan frustration i stället upplevas i högre grad. Dessa två upplevelser kan skilja sig åt i olika kulturella kontexter samt hur olika kulturer internaliseras. Vilket betyder hur man anpassar och upplever sin kulturella identitet. Denna studie är en psykologisk tvärkulturell enkätstudie, som genomförts på studenter vid svenska universitet och sydafrikanskt universitet. Studien syfte var att se om det fanns en signifikant skillnad mellan de två grupperna. De 59 svarsenkäterna sammanställdes och analyserades i SPSS. Resultatet visar på en signifikant skillnad på upplevelsen av välbefinnande och frustration. På den kulturella sidan var skillnaden inte signifikant. / Well-being is an experience that many people try to achieve. When people aren't so frustrated, I can be more involved. These two experiences may differ in different cultural contexts and how different cultures internal. It is a man who is one of those who is sinful. This study is a psychological cross-cultural survey, conducted on students at The Swedish University and the University of South Africa. The purpose of the study was to see if there was a significant difference between the two groups. The 59 response questionnaires were compiled and lasted in the SPSS. The results show a significant difference between the experience of well-being and frustration. On the cultural side, the difference was not significant.

Indigenous* college students in both Canada and the United States have the lowest rates of obtaining postsecondary degrees, and their postsecondary dropout rates are higher than for any other minority (Freeman & Fox, 2005; Mendelson, 2004; Reddy, 1993). There has been very little research done to uncover possible reasons for such low academic achievement and high dropout rates for Indigenous students. Some of the research that has been done indicates that one challenge for Indigenous students is the difficulty in navigating the cultural differences between higher education and their Indigenous cultures. Biculturalism is the ability of an individual to navigate two different cultures (Bell, 1990; Das & Kemp, 1997). Several scholars have suggested that biculturalism is an important construct in understanding academic persistence among Indigenous students (Jackson, Smith & Hill, 2003; Schiller, 1987). This study explored biculturalism among Indigenous college students and how it impacts their higher education experience. Indigenous college students (n=26) from the southwestern United States and central Canada participated in qualitative interviews for the study. The interviews were transcribed and interpreted using a synthesis of qualitative methods. Several themes related to the participants' experience of biculturalism emerged from the qualitative analysis: institutional support for transition to college, racism, types of relationships to native culture, career issues, and family issues. The findings suggested that more needs to be done in terms of providing Indigenous students centers at universities, implementing mentor programs for incoming students, and educating future Indigenous college students, families, and communities about biculturalism and the culture of higher education. *Author's note: The term Indigenous will be used to describe Native American/American Indian, First Nation and Métis student participants. Interviews were collected both in the United States and Canada. The terminology used to describe these populations differs across cultures; therefore, Indigenous will be used as a more general term, to describe the participants. The terminology used by cited authors was retained.

[pt] O objetivo principal desta dissertação é mostrar a Gastronomia Carioca no cenário das diversas gastronomias brasileiras. Isso não seria possível sem fazer uma viagem histórica e geográfica, apoiando-se em metodologias qualitativa e quantitativa, com base em entrevistas e estatísticas. O trabalho apoia-se também em estudos realizados por algumas instituições especializadas, bem como em depoimentos de cozinheiros e de jornalistas gastronômicos. Depois de pouco mais de 500 anos da chegada dos primeiros colonizadores, a mistura étnica e identidade cultural refletida através da comida faz do Brasil um país imensamente diverso. O sincretismo cultural derivado deste fenômeno é encontrado na mesa de cada casa, restaurante e botequim brasileiro. Tal processo atua também sobre a culinária carioca. / [en] The main objective of this dissertation is to show the carioca gastronomy among the scenario of the several Brazilian cuisines. This would not have been possible without a geographic and historical journey, supported by qualitative and quantitative methodologies based on interviews and published statistics. This work is also supported on chefs and food journalists testimonies. More than 500 years since the arrival of the first colonizers, an ethnic blend and the cultural identity displayed through gastronomy have made an immensely diverse country out of Brazil. The cultural syncretism derived from this phenomenon can be found on the table of every Brazilian home, restaurant and bar (botequim). This process also acts upon Carioca culinary. / [es] El objetivo principal de ésta disertación es mostrar la Gastronomía Carioca en el escenario de las diferentes gastronomías brasileñas. Esto no sería posible sin hacer un viaje histórico y geográfico apoyado por metodologías cualitativa y cuantitativa, basado en entrevistas y estadísticas. El trabajo se apoya también en estudios lanzados por algunas instituciones especializadas, así como en testimonios de cocineros y periodistas gastronómicos. Después de poco más de 500 años de la llegada de los primeros colonizadores, la mezcla étnica y la identidad cultural reflejada a través de la gastronomía hacen de Brasil un país inmensamente diverso. El sincretismo cultural derivado de éste fenómeno lo encontramos también en la mesa de cada hogar, restaurante y bar (Botequim) brasileño. Tal proceso actúa también sobre la culinaria Carioca.