No description available.

The main research question of this project asks: what role does Indian classical dance play in the identity formation of second generation Canadian women of South Asian origin as they negotiate their identities as Canadians living in a multicultural country? The research question is analyzed through the theoretical frameworks of both citizenship theory, identity theory, and Bourdieu’s notions of ‘habitus’, ‘field’, and cultural capital. Semi-structured interviews are conducted with dancers of 2 main dance styles (“Kathak” and “Bharatnatyam”) and of various ages over 18. Interviews are also conducted with a dance teacher/creative director and a dance company coordinator. Findings indicate that Indian classical dance influences identity formation in 3 main ways: in the way that the participants embody the dance forms of Kathak and/or Bharatnatyam, in the way they form their identities as individuals, and in the way they form their identities as multicultural Canadians.

<p> Ethnic discrimination stress (EDS) in the workplace among high-achieving Adivasis is a problem that has received little attention in research literature. This qualitative phenomenological study investigates the above problem by using Giorgi's descriptive psychological method. The method, selected due its scientific rigor, applies Husserlian concepts of phenomenological reduction, intentionality of consciousness, and imaginative variation, to identify and describe the psychological structure of the lived experience of EDS. The 15 participants in the study, selected on the basis of the scores of General Ethnic Discrimination Scale, were currently employed high-achieving male Adivasis above the age of 24. The saturation of the data was achieved with the analysis of 272 pages of interview transcripts of 10 participants. The study found that the participants had to face overt ethnic discrimination and microaggressions that were endemic and not just aberrant. The lived experience of EDS involved being constantly judged by negative stereotypes, and being exposed to marginalizing behaviors from the upper caste people. The participants believed that ethnic discrimination, in spite of their academic and career achievements, was meant to perpetuate upper caste hegemony. The resultant feelings of dehumanization, disillusionment, anger, combativeness, and helplessness from silencing led to demoralization. Coping with EDS involved an initial period of resentful submission with negative coping behaviors and a gradual movement toward change-oriented proactive responses. The findings point to a relationship between resilience and career achievement as well as to the need for both structural and paradigmatic changes in order to create a discrimination-free work environment. The findings reflect the tenets of critical race theory and call for paradigmatic changes in the caste mindset and the dominant discourse that is embedded with dehumanizing stereotypes of Adivasis that promote silencing and upper caste hegemony. The findings may be significant for mental health workers and educators to understand the inner world of discrimination and to find effective strategies for coping with EDS. By giving a scientific voice to the Adivasi struggle against discrimination, the study can support the efforts of the marginalized and the governments for the creation of a discrimination-free work environment.</p>

<p> The South Asian American population growth rate is high, however, there is little research regarding their mental health concerns and low utilization of services. One of the most understudied and complex issues is the interpersonal relationships of South Asian women, specifically the relationship between a daughter-in-law and mother-in-law. This study is a first to examine the relationship between a South Asian daughter-in-law and mother-in-law living in the US through a combination of feminist and relational-cultural perspectives. Also investigated are the help-seeking sources daughter-in-laws use for personal/emotional and domestic violence concerns. Participants in this web-based, descriptive study were 155 married (or previously married) South Asian American women (ages 18-69), who had a mother-in-law. Most identified as Muslims or Hindus. T-tests, correlations, and standard multiple regression analyses were used to examine the relationship between the daughter-in-laws' perceptions of their relationship with their mother-in-laws, cultural values, and formal and informal help-seeking for personal/emotional and domestic violence issues. Instruments used were adapted to be culturally sensitive. Thirty-five percent of the participants reported psychological abuse and 23% reported emotional abuse by their mother-in-laws. All identified caring and controlling aspects of their relationship with their mother-in-law. Most of the women did not meet full criteria for partner violence, however the daughter-in-law/mother-in-law relationship differed between the women who were abused by their partner and those who were not. Perceived care and control from mother-in-law was related to daughter-in-law's sex role expectations, partner violence, and help-seeking. Daughter-in-law's help-seeking sources differed depending on the type of problem; as with previous studies and cultural expectations most identified informal help-seeking sources. Higher care from mother-in-law predicted lower help-seeking intentions from mother-in-law for personal issues and domestic violence. Sex role expectations and partner violence predicted help-seeking from minister for personal issues. Intimate relations and partner violence predicted higher likelihood of help-seeking from minister for domestic violence. To promote interpersonal health among South Asian American women, it is necessary to explore and comprehend the nature of in-law relationships and study both positive and the negative in-law relationships. Implications of these findings for women's personal relationships, for clinical work and future research needs are discussed.</p>

<p> The overarching goal of this thesis is to explore and assess infrastructure-environment-health interactions in Indian cities, addressing social factors such as wealth and literacy, as well as the provision of multiple infrastructures. </p><p> Five main studies are conducted. First, exploration of Delhi all-cause mortality data and survey of local experts on associations between infrastructures, environment, and health outcomes. Key findings include: a) that 50% of deaths in Delhi are reported with cause not classified (demonstrating the need for bottom-up study to supplement hospital data) and b) that ~19% of classified deaths by cause in Delhi, India could be related to infrastructure or infrastructure-related environmental factors. </p><p> Second, review of epidemiology studies relating health outcomes to infrastructure and pollution exposure in Indian and Asian cities is conducted to help identify initial evidence and gaps for infrastructure-related health effects and quantification of differential risk based on social factors (e.g. low socio-economic status (SES)). </p><p> Third, top-down analyses using national survey of under age-five mortality rates (U5MR) by multiple infrastructure conditions are studied while addressing confounding social factors. A key finding is that the relative risk for under-five mortality rates are 860% higher in Urban India for those lacking multiple basic infrastructure provisions relative to improved conditions for low SES condition and limited literacy households. These analyses demonstrates limited literacy household sensitivity and importance of considering multiple infrastructures together over single infrastructure improvements. </p><p> Fourth, bottom-up comparative community study helps characterize infrastructure, environment, extreme weather conditions and local sustainability priorities. A key finding was that households deprived of infrastructure provisions would prioritize that first over pollution or extreme weather conditions. In addition, both low SES communities studied were different in their coverage of all infrastructures except cooking fuels. In the high SES area, infrastructure conditions were ranked as a highest priority (e.g. drainage) with pollution and climate-related extreme weather events still higher priorities than low SES areas, which selected water supply, parks and open space, and drainage as highest priorities. Multiple dimensions of access to healthcare conditions in the same neighborhoods were explored next with findings indicating the two low SES areas to have similar travel costs to reach care and different abilities to pay for care. The high SES area also had higher accessibility to care yet with quality of care less acceptable relative to low SES areas that had issues with wait times, affordability, and access- suggesting future study should address such factors and effects on health outcomes. </p><p> Finally, data availability, needs, and challenges are explored for computing health benefits of multiple infrastructure interventions, while also identifying preliminary intervention scenarios and who may benefit more or less by age, gender, and SES. </p><p> These efforts offer a preliminary approach to helping prioritize future decision-making in Asian cities by demonstrating initial methods that can be useful for modeling risks and interactions between infrastructure provisions, environment, and health.</p>

The main research question of this project asks: what role does Indian classical dance play in the identity formation of second generation Canadian women of South Asian origin as they negotiate their identities as Canadians living in a multicultural country? The research question is analyzed through the theoretical frameworks of both citizenship theory, identity theory, and Bourdieu’s notions of ‘habitus’, ‘field’, and cultural capital. Semi-structured interviews are conducted with dancers of 2 main dance styles (“Kathak” and “Bharatnatyam”) and of various ages over 18. Interviews are also conducted with a dance teacher/creative director and a dance company coordinator. Findings indicate that Indian classical dance influences identity formation in 3 main ways: in the way that the participants embody the dance forms of Kathak and/or Bharatnatyam, in the way they form their identities as individuals, and in the way they form their identities as multicultural Canadians.

This research study seeks to better understand the experience of South Asian immigrant women in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). The information gathered cannot be generalized to all South Asian and other immigrant populations nor is it the intent of this study. Instead, by examining the individual NICU experiences and challenges faced during this experience, themes emerge that can prompt neonatal nurses to examine their own practice with immigrant families. The main, overall theme identified in all participant responses was, Fear of the Unknown. Three subthemes that emerged from discussions regarding how participants experience nursing care were Trust, Teaching and Advocating. In terms of what participants identified as their most critical concerns while their infant was in the NICU, the three subthemes that arose were Language Barriers, Lack of Knowledge about the NICU and A More Comfortable NICU. On a broader scale, it is hoped that this research study will inspire all nurses to examine their interactions with all immigrant families in order to provide care that is holistic and individualized to the needs of their immigrant patient. / Graduate

This work represents a significant contribution to the body of knowledge in the area of renal transplantation as it brings together the research related to policy analysis, empirical research, and cultural and religious issues related to organ donation and transplantation among South Asians in the UK. The candidate's work in this area is the first in the UK to systematically document and map a national picture of kidney transplant waiting lists and to identify and examine the complex reasons underlying how and why patient ethnicity impacts upon the likelihood of receiving a kidney transplant. The candidate has also developed a new evidence-base exploring the adequacies of the existing procurement arrangements and the implications of introducing any alternative policies within the context of a multi-ethnic and multifaith UK. Finally, the candidate's work has focused on developing an evidence-base of the public perceptions, attitudes, and religious viewpoints towards organ donation and transplantation among a cross-section ofthe South Asian population. The candidate's published works have been the foundation blocks for stimulating and informing the debate on the provision of renal transplant services for minority ethnic groups through the generation of an empirical evidence-base in a subject area which has traditionally relied upon anecdotal evidence. The evidence-base illuminates a very complex issue which has multi-faceted solutions that need to be addressed in different settings.

This dissertation maps the emergence of a 'secularist ethics' in post-independence South Asian literature and film, an ethics which is a deeply felt poetic response to particular historical conjunctures marked by religio-nationalist conflict in the Indian subcontinent. It is my argument that literary and cultural productions, in striving to dream and envision a world free of violence, terror and religious intolerance, have some central contributions to make to contemporary intellectual and political debates on secularism. Through close readings of fictions by Salman Rushdie, Amitav Ghosh, Mukul Kesavan, Bapsi Sidhwa, Saadat Hasan Manto, Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, Rajinder Singh Bedi, Jamila Hashmi, Jyotirmoyee Devi, and Lalithambika Antherjanam, as well as films by M. S. Sathyu, Saeed Akhtar Mirza, Khalid Mohamed and Shyam Benegal, which are concerned to address the issue of peaceful co-existence between different religious communities and nations in the Indian subcontinent, I argue that literary and imaginative endeavors by way of their alternative secularist imaginaries enable us to begin to imagine the possibilities of more habitable futures. Significantly, the 'secularist' fictions and films I invite attention to in my project enable a revisioning of the secular in terms quite different from normative understandings of liberal secularism. Such a renewed secularism seeks to make visible the normalization and neutralization of majoritarian religious beliefs and practices as constitutive of the representative secular-nationalist self in post-Partition India; it also emerges, significantly, from a gendered critique of the deep-seated patriarchal norms underlying most religious communities. Responding to different moments of crisis, predominantly the Partition of India in 1947, the 1984 anti-Sikh riots, and the destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1992, the radical secularist poetics of these works call attention to the fundamentalist agenda of Hindu nationalism, the limit

This study is an investigation of embodiment. It is informed by the experiences and understandings of health, healing, violence and oppression among 15 young South Asian women living in Toronto, Canada. Their articulation of the importance of, and difficulties associated with, health and healing in contexts of social inequity contribute to understandings of embodiment as co-constituted by sentient and social experience. In my reading of their contributions, embodied learning – that is, an ongoing attunement to sentient-social embodiment – is a counter hegemonic healing strategy that they use. Their experiences and insights support the increasingly accepted claim that social inequity is a primary determinant of health that disproportionately disadvantages subordinated people. Furthermore, participants affirm that recovery and resistance to violence and oppression and its consequences must address sentient-social components of embodiment simultaneously. In this study, Yoga teachings provide a framework and practice to investigate embodiment and embodied learning. Following 12 Yoga workshops addressing health, healing, violence and oppression, I conducted individual interviews with 15 workshop participants, 3 Yoga teachers and 2 counsellor / social workers. Participants discuss Yoga as a resource for addressing mental, physical, emotional and spiritual consequences of violence and oppression. They resist New Age interpretations of Yoga in terms of individualism and cultural appropriation; they also challenge both New Age and Western biomedicine for a lack of attention to the consequences of social inequity for health and healing. This study considers embodied learning as an important healing resource and form of resistance to violence and oppression. Scholarship addressing embodiment in sociology, health research, anti-racism, feminism, anti-colonialism, decolonization and Indigenous knowledges are drawn upon to contextualize the interviews. This study offers insights relevant to health promotion and adult education discourse and policy through a careful consideration of the embodied strategies used by the participants in their nuanced negotiations of social inequity and pursuits of health and healing.