<p>The first decade of the 21st century in the United States has seen the emergence of a number of protest movements based upon politically conservative ideas, including opposition to affirmative action, undocumented migration, and national health care, among others. Conservative social movement organizations like the Minutemen and the Tea Party have had enormous influence over American politics and society. Conservative movements such as these present challenges to existing ways of thinking about social movements. Most social movement research has centered on so-called progressive movements, like the Civil Rights Movement, which are assumed to be organized by an oppressed population fighting for rights they have been denied historically. However, conservative movements do not appear to involve an oppressed population fighting for rights denied to them. It seems that actually the reverse may be true: conservative protesters tend to be members of privileged populations in contrast to oppressed. But if conservative protesters tend to be privileged instead of oppressed, why then are they protesting? What are their goals?</p><p> To fully answer these questions, we must look beyond existing social movement theory. The purpose of my research is to extend social movement theory, particularly Rory McVeigh's theory of power devaluation by using Blumer's theory of racial group position and Bourdieu's conceptualization of capital to explore the motivations of conservative movements and how they construct movement ideologies. This research explores the goals and ideology of two conservative movements, the anti-illegal immigration movement and the anti-abortion/pro-life movement. To examine these movements, I first performed an ethnographic content analysis of over 1000 articles and posts from movement organization web pages. Second, I conducted nearly fifty semi-structured interviews with movement leaders and participants. Finally, I examined over twenty hours of speeches given at rallies and protest events. </p><p> Consistent with McVeigh's power devaluation theory and Blumer's theory of group position, I found that these conservative activists are motivated by perceived threats to privileges claimed as proprietary rights by their movement groups. Anti-illegal immigration groups perceive threats to existing privileges associated with employment, social services, citizenship, and cultural issues such as language, while anti-abortion groups cite threats to American morality. Furthermore, these groups make proprietary claims to these privileges based upon restrictive identity formations. While anti-illegal immigration activists identify as "American," they constrain who qualifies as an American based upon factors such as language spoken, cultural behaviors, and citizenship of parents. Similarly, anti-abortion/pro-life activists identify as "Christian," but exclude many who would be identified as Christian in the broader population based upon criteria including opposition to abortion and sexual preference. They also claim American is a Christian nation. Following Blumer's group position theory, I also analyzed those individuals from which these groups feel threatened: migrants crossing the border without documentation and women who get abortions. I found that conservative activists portrayed these individuals in terms of perpetrators and victims, providing only mixed support for group position. Finally, I examined the goals of anti-illegal immigration and anti-abortion/pro-life organizations specifically looking at non-policy-oriented goals. Anti-abortion/pro-life organizations emphasize changing American culture as much or, in many cases, more than changing laws. While most anti-illegal immigration organizations stress education as a goal, whether this is for the purposes of policy change or cultural change is unclear.</p> / Dissertation

Moving to Florida to retire has become commonplace among American elders, though we have seldom addressed how lesbians and gay men navigate sexual identity in retirement. I undertake ethnography of three suburban, retirement-aged residential communities in Florida in which lesbians and gay men make community in order to understand how identities are produced by and within communities, the significance of suburban gay communities in the post-gay community era, and how residents from each community engage dominant discourse. Sanctuary Cove 1 is a ―gay and lesbian‖ retirement community; Bayside Park is a ―women‘s-only‖ (lesbian) community; and Heritage Estates is a heteronormative retirement community with a growing lesbian ―network.‖ Drawing from conversations with thirty lesbians and four gay men, I compare community practices to support my argument that these are respective settings for accrediting, contesting, and privileging identities. By exploring how participants collectively construct and present sexual selves in disparate communities, I attempt to uncover the co-constitutive interaction between community and identity; while attention to the ruling relations of sexuality, sex, gender, race, and class engages the politics of privilege and stigma.

In an effort to match the structure of this paper to its content, a commitment of linking theory and practice, I use a framework that is a hybrid of theories rooted in practice. Frire's (1970) theory of liberation through social justice education, Bourdieu’s (1977) theory of cultural, economic and symbolic capital, Bhabha’s (1994) and Gutiérrez’s (2008) work around hybridization and Third Space, and my own understanding of critical reflection each contribute to my attempt to address the following questions: What does it mean to link theory and practice in social justice education? What do models from research tell us about how to link theory and practice? What implications does this research have for educators and students of privilege? In order to address these questions I 1. Discuss the theory as I have to come to understand it over the last three years 2. Analyze instances of teachers' attempts to merge theory and practice,and 3. Develop the curriculum for a professional development opportunity, putting into practice the theories I develop over the course of this paper. / text

Since the 1970s, racial progress in the United States has stalled and in some ways, even regressed. There continues to be vast disparities between racial groups, pointing to serious inequities and systemic racism within our institutions. White privilege, a product of institutional racism and white supremacy, is a collection of unearned social benefits and courtesies that are bestowed upon a select group of people by virtue of their being white (Delgado & Stefancic, 2001). This literature review examines the dynamics of white privilege and power using the tenets of critical race theory to explain how they are both protected and perpetuated by liberal colorblind ideologies, particularly in education. Naming and examining whiteness, as opposed to ignoring and/or denying its significance, is the first step toward transforming the existing racial hierarchies in society. / text

More than ever before, two imperatives, ‘the right to know’ and ‘the need to keep secret’, find themselves in a contest for a position of primacy in the contemporary legal system. The need to keep secret is antipathetic to the right to know. The Canadian Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms has entrenched a person’s right to disclosure of both exculpatory and inculpatory material in possession of the prosecution. Moreover, the common law has placed the additional responsibility on the prosecution to inquire of third parties as to the existence and production of material relevant to the defence. Despite the entrenchment of the right to disclosure the demands by the state have steadily grown for more evidence to be withheld from defendants, parties to proceedings and the public in general. The applications for in camera or ex parte hearings are common place and frequently acceded to. This thesis seeks to examine the clash of the two imperatives from the Canadian perspective. By using a comparative analysis of other jurisdictions throughout the thesis, it examines the various legislative instruments and common law employed in the Canadian Courts in respect of ‘ordinary’ criminal trials as well as trials of suspected terrorists, specifically, in respect of disclosure and the ability to withhold material from other parties and refrain from the obligation to disclose. The thesis includes a full analysis of disclosure options, public interest immunity, informer privilege, special advocates and other regimes, and claims of privilege in the interests of national security. The thesis provides a number of detailed recommendations as to how Canada can better balance rights of accused against the public interest and the needs of those who enforce the law.. The recommendations call for legal reforms, some new institutions for better accountability and new internal standards for those engaged in the investigation of crimes and national security matters. / Thesis (Ph.D, Law) -- Queen's University, 2012-04-25 15:01:59.292

<p>This dissertation offers an account of precarious neoliberal subjectivity by examining the suffering of the privileged as it relates to the practice of Western yoga in California's Silicon Valley. Yoga culture underlines creating connections and community. But my research, based on twenty-seven month fieldwork in an epicenter of the global high-tech economy, reveals that yoga practitioners actually seek to experience and create "space." I suggest that yoga practitioners often cultivate an interiority aimed at giving themselves room from the judgment and expectations of others. </p><p>This dissertation portrays the complicated lives of people who are more privileged than most. In so doing, this study questions the separation between "real" and "privileged" suffering; and it explores the ethical and political implications of the problems of the well-off. I suggest that the destructive aspects of neoliberal capitalism and late modernity do not hurt only the marginalized traditionally studied by anthropologists, but also--albeit in very different ways--those who supposedly benefit from them. The social scenes of modern yoga are sites of ambivalently embodied neoliberal logic, where clusters of promises and recipes for an "art of living" are critical about aspects of capitalism while enjoying its comfort. Even though the yogic ethic and politics do not adhere to the anthropological ideals of political action, Western yoga is often an ethical practice that does not simply reproduce neoliberal logic, but also shifts it slightly from within. By creating disruption of subjectivity and gaining space from old and habitual ways of being, yoga sometimes opens up a new territory of change and reflection.</p> / Dissertation

Thesis (M.A.)--Auburn University, 2008. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references.

PURPOSE: In the mouse, the macrophage adhesion G protein-coupled receptor (ad-GPCR) molecule, F4/80, is required for the development of regulatory T cells in two models of tolerance, the eye and gut. Since F4/80 is not expressed in humans, the purpose of this research is to determine the human analog of F4/80. F4/80 belongs to a novel family of Epidermal growth factor-seven transmembrane (EGF-TM7) molecules, which include the EGF module-containing mucin-like hormone receptor (EMR) molecules. In the human, EMR1 has sequential homology with F4/80 and EMR2 has shown immune suppressing function in tumor cells. Thus, we investigate the possible suppressor role of the EMR family in human ocular tolerance. METHODS: Human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (huPBMC) were treated with porcine TGF&beta;2 and LPS or an antigenic stimulant for at least six hours to generate tolerogenic antigen presenting cells (APC). Cells were characterized by flow cytometric analysis for expression of CD14, CD40, PDL1, ILT3, and EMR2. Later, T regulatory cells were generated by incubating tolerogenic APCs with autologous huPBMC for five to seven days. Post culture, the T cells were stained and characterized for expression of CD4, CD25, and FoxP3. RESULTS: Post treatment of huPBMC with TGFβ2 and antigen, the resulting tolerogenic APCs expressed PDL1, ILT3, and EMR2. CD40 remained unchanged and CD14 was constitutively expressed. Post five to seven day culture, tolerogenic APCs treated with TGFβ2 increased the CD4+ CD25+ FoxP3+ lymphocyte populations. CONCLUSIONS: The upregulation of EMR2 on human tolerogenic APCs suggests that EMR2 may have a role in inducing tolerance in humans. Much like its mouse counterpart, F4/80, EMR2 is an adhesion molecule that may facilitate the induction of naïve T lymphocytes to regulatory T lymphocytes. Once the F4/80 analog is established for humans, novel therapies may be developed to interfere or encourage signaling in the treatment of tumors or immune inflammatory diseases, respectively.

abstract: Scholars have written about the emotional agitation among White students in response to race-based issues (Higginbotham, 1996; Tatum, 1994; Vasquez, 2006). Research has implicated the emotional experience of guilt with the anti-racist concepts of White racial privilege and Black racial oppression. However, methodological issues in the research raise questions about our current understanding of this issue, which has implications on the ability of educators to create effective course curricula and optimal learning environments. Grounded in a theory of guilt and shame and drawing upon tenets of modern forms of racism, I examined the effects of anti-racist education on White students. Specifically, I tested the effects of two factors on four dependent variables. The first factor, called the content factor, was comprised of three levels that exposed participants to statements conveying institutional forms of White racial privilege, Black racial oppression, and a control condition. The second factor, called the race factor, was comprised of two levels that represented the racial background of a confederate instructor: A White instructor and a Black instructor. Interventions (i.e., factor levels), which were embedded within a standardized lecture on racial inequality, were randomly assigned to participants. Exposures to interventions and data collection were facilitated by the use of laptop computers. Main effects and interaction effects among the six conditions on guilt, shame, negation, and racist attitudes were examined. Given the role of self-awareness in experiencing guilt and shame, identification with Whiteness as a moderating variable was also tested. A sample of 153, self-identified White students with a mean age of 21 participated in the study. They were recruited from three, large public universities located in the Western, South Western, and Mid Western United States. Categorical predictors were dummy coded and hierarchical multiple regression was used to analyze the data. Findings suggest that the interventions of White racial privilege and Black racial oppression, as institutionally focused concepts, exert no effects on guilt, shame, negation and racist attitudes compared to a control condition. Findings showed a main effect for identification with Whiteness, but not a moderating effect. Implications, limitations, and future research are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Counseling Psychology 2012

This study investigated the academic self-efficacy and persistence goals of 72 diverse female Engineering majors. Social Cognitive Career Theory (Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994) coupled with Practice Theory (Bourdieu, 1998) and Social Capital Theory (Lin, 1999) served as the theoretical framework. The relationships between social cognitive variables (engineering self-efficacy, outcome expectations, interests) as well as the influence of contextual and cultural variables (perceived campus climate, distance from privilege, and access to resources) on female students' intent to persist in Engineering were examined. Hierarchical linear regression revealed that only outcome expectations significantly contributed to the prediction of female students' intent to persist in Engineering. Exploratory analysis revealed that outcome expectations were most influential in predicting Engineering self-efficacy. Including privilege and perception of campus climate into the model significantly predicted self-efficacy above and beyond the original SCCT variables. This study supports the addition of cultural contextual variables in the SCCT choice model and warrants future research with minority female populations. Key words: women in STEM, social cognitive career theory, privilege, persistence, underrepresented students