Women's community organizing for change has the potential to improve many aspects of women's lives, the lives of their families, and community members at large. Yet the role of women's organized action in shaping the social environment is not well understood and is rarely supported by the mainstream institutions of planning. In rural areas, women's contributions to community planning may be even less apparent given the voluntary nature of their work and the lack of sensitivity paid to women's particular needs. The purpose of this study is to contribute to contemporary planning thought by providing some insight in to why, to what extent, and how women successfully organize to meet their social needs in rural communities. Two themes are examined: (1) the motivating factors that led to the development of a women's planning rganization, the Nicola Valley Women in Action, (NVWIA) in Merritt, B.C., and; (2) the dynamic forces in this community that support and/or limit women's abilities to engage in gender-informed community planning. A literature review outlines the need for gender-sensitive approaches to planning and the potential of women's community organizing for change (feminist activism) to serve as a catalyst for gendersensitive planning praxis. To explore the experiences of a particular group of women engaged in community organizing from a feminist perspective, a case study of the NVWIA is described through a review of organizational material and interviews with members. The principal findings are: (1) there was a definite need for gender-sensitive planning to meet the social needs of women in Merritt; (2) factors such as the lack of gender-sensitivity in institutional planning, the existence of barriers to women's involvement, and the dearth of opportunities for women in Merritt to influence decision-making motivated the development of the NVWIA; (3) opportunities, including government incentive, municipal support, inter-agency co-operation, organizing skills and member initiative, enabled the NVWIA to successfully respond to women's needs; and (4) constraints, including the absence of funding, philosophical differences, anti-feminist sentiment, and limits to voluntary time, hinder the ability of the NVWIA to continue its efforts. The study highlights the value of supporting women's community organizing as a means of encouraging planning approaches in rural areas that are gender-sensitive. It concludes by identifying the implications for self-help and professional planners wishing to support women's organized action. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

A physically based model describing the mechanism of surface sealing of soil was evaluated in the context of aggregate stability. The intent of the model study was to better understand the effect of mixing fine-textured mineral subsoil with organic surface soil on structural stability and surface seal formation. The mixing results from tillage and harvesting operations, and management practices such as levelling. The index derived from the model showed that sealing of the shallow organic soil increased with an increase of mineral matter content. The mathematical formulation of the model was based on the principle of conservation of mass and Darcy's law for flow of water through a layered soil column. Assuming convective flow, it was shown theoretically that the rate of surface seal formation is proportional to the flux density of the filtrate, as assumed by Scheidegger (1974). In the model it was further assumed that the pore necks at the soil surface clog first before the seal develops. The assumption that convective flow alone was responsible for the movement of the suspension is likely incorrect for suspensions derived from medium or coarse textured soils, since sedimentation does influence the movement of larger particles. However, introducing a constant sedimentation parameter into the convective flow model did not improve the model. Therefore, it is likely a non-constant sedimentation parameter could improve the model considerably. The model showed that for sufficiently large times the flux density of a filtrate flowing through a soil column at a constant hydraulic head is proportional to inverse square root of time. Testing the model experimentally showed a good agreement between theory and experiment. A highly significant correlation between the soil stability factor derived from the model and aggregate stability suggests that the index is a soil structural attribute. The soil stability factor was exponentially related with aggregate stability and mineral matter content. However, whereas the relationship between the soil stability factor and aggregate stability gave a positive exponent, a negative exponent was obtained with mineral matter content. Further studies showed that structural stability and saturated hydraulic conductivity of the aggregate beds were positively and significantly correlated exponentially. However, saturated hydraulic conductivity and mineral matter content were negatively and significantly correlated exponentially. Collateral to the results of the model, the strong negative correlation between wet-sieved aggregate stability and mineral matter content confirmed the deleterious effect of mixing fine-textured mineral soil on the structure of the shallow organic soil. It was theorized that aggregates stabilized through clay-organic complexing are likely to be much stronger than aggregates stabilized through other mechanisms. This implies that whenever the mineral matter content is much higher than the organic matter content, the surplus mineral matter that does not interact with organic matter will be most dispersible. The high silt content of the mineral matter fraction is likely to be an important factor contributing to the decrease in structural stability with increasing mineral matter content. Once the clay and the organic colloids have interacted, the silt that remains is not capable of forming stable aggregates without colloids (Baver et al. 1972). From measurements of the air to water permeability ratio, the decrease in saturated hydraulic conductivity of the aggregate beds with increasing mineral matter content was attributed to slaking of the mineral matter fraction. However, it is possible for the soil with high mineral matter content to be stable if the mineral matter is allowed to be in contact with the organic matter for a long period of time. / Land and Food Systems, Faculty of / Graduate

There are two themes that are explored in this thesis. The first is an examination of the process of acculturation, defined here as the process of learning skills and strategies native to another group. The second is comparative and examines the causes for the relative success that the Portuguese had in learning to accommodate and be accepted in Canada. By the same token the sources of acculturative stress for the Sikhs will be identified. The two groups are comparable along several dimensions such as age, education, skills, knowledge of English on arrival and so on. Learning to be effective in Canada means understanding and acting appropriately in given contexts. The spheres that I have identified as important are the workplace and the community in which they live. The other spheres that come under scrutiny as a result of the spillover of public activities and experiences are the family, and the sphere of religious beliefs and practices. The workplace, I argue, is a central institution wherein acculturation is imperative. Secondly, the establishment of individuals in the community is a crucial factor. While the formation of an ethnic enclave might serve as a support system for newcomers, it also isolates and separates them from others. The Sikh definition of identity is hierarchical, with religion providing an anchorage for all other spheres such as the family, caste, village, and occupation. In sort, individuals did not experience life activities as differentiated or unrelated. Given the contexts of ambivalence and hostility they perceived and/or experienced in Canada, the acquisition of new forms of thought were neither seen as a challenge nor a necessity; but as a threat to their identity. The Portuguese model, on the other hand, recognizes the distinction between public and private lives. To them being "Portuguese" and/or "Catholic" are primarily private matters. Also, by and large they gave importance to individual achievement over corporate identity. To them, acculturation and ethnic identity were complementary modes for the definition of themselves within the Canadian context. / Arts, Faculty of / Sociology, Department of / Graduate

The thesis is an exploration of the current role of the small business forest sector in hinterland forest communities, and the extent to which their economic and social positions correspond to the role envisioned for them by two prevailing visions of the future of the forest industry. One, advocated by Canadian political economists, predicts a continuation, indeed an intensification of corporate concentration, with attendant downsizing and job losses. Corporate restructuring is seen in part to induce small business development, through subcontracting arrangements and local entrepreneurialism, as a response to losses of core forest industry jobs. The second interpretation, advocated by the alternative forestry school, views the current crisis in the forest industry as an opportunity to return to decentralised approaches to ecologically-based forest management which encourage 'democracy in the forests', leading to community and environmental sustainability. Local entrepreneurs are an important part of this new 'value-based' forest economy. Interviews with small forest operators reveal a diversity of economic and social identities that do not conform well to either of the positions ascribed to small business by the Canadian political economy or alternative forestry literatures. The representations of small business found in these two literatures homogenize and suppress this diversity, making it difficult to 'see' small forest operators as anything other than contractors to the conventional system of corporate forestry, or alternative operators in an ecosystem- and community-based forest economy. In the place of these singular, marginalizing representations, I argue, using poststructural and feminist approaches to economic geography, for a 'third way' of exploring small forest operator subjectivities through overdetermined multiple class processes. Exploring small forest operator identity through multiple class processes avoids the essentialism found in fixed representations. It recognizes the transformative potential of small business in the forest economy, without denying the potential for exploitation that exists both within small business and corporate forestry. Class processes rendered invisible in the Canadian political economy and alternative forestry narratives, such as unpaid labour performed by family members and volunteer work in local planning processes, as well as work performed for wages and profit, are considered in this multiple class processes approach. / Arts, Faculty of / Geography, Department of / Graduate

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

The stable isotopes of the conservative element boron, 11B and 1°B, have been employed as co- migrating isotopic tracers to determine the origin of nitrate observed in groundwater from a large capacity (2500 gpm) irrigation well in the Avra Valley of southeastern Arizona. The isotopic ratios of the conservative element, boron, provided an identifying signature for various nitrate rich source waters. Additional chemical parameters were also examined to corroborate the isotopic indications. Findings of this investigation indicate that most of the nitrate observed in groundwater from well CMID 18 at the beginning of the 1993 irrigation season was due to municipal wastewater contamination. As the irrigation season progressed, an increasing proportion of nitrate was contributed by irrigation return flow from neighboring agricultural fields.

In this research a model is developed to predict population for relatively rural areas experiencing rapid economic development. Of the many ways to predict population size, in this research a "demographic-economic" model is chosen for use. The economic variables which aid in projecting population are total employment, and net changes in employment associated with economic growth. The model developed for this research is applied to Oregon's Northern Columbia River Basin Counties of Morrow, Umatilla, and Gilliam. Each county is or is expected to experience rapid growth in its agricultural and/or industrial sectors in the next few years. Using employment projections to the year 1990, population projections are made at five-year intervals between the years 1970 and 1990. / Graduation date: 1977

Site index curves were constructed for the Emory oak (Ouercus emoryi) woodlands of the San Rafael Valley in southeastern Arizona. The woodlands primarily consisted of trees that were of sprout origin. Growth was rapid for 10 years, moderate from 10 to 20 years, and slow after 20 years. No trees in the study area were more than 40 feet tall. Stepwise regression analysis was used to analyze the relationship between site index and site factors. Important variables included available soil water holding capacity, percent volume of coarse fragments, radiation index, percent sand, litter depth, and soil pH. Two models were developed; the r² values were 0.56 and 0.49, respectively. Analysis of variance was used to test for differences between site index on different soil types and slope positions. All statistical tests were conducted using a 0.10 level of significance. The sample consisted of 100 trees. Most of the factors were involved with availability of water to the tree roots. Emory oak grows in a dryland area where water is a limiting factor. Therefore, the effect that soil and terrain has on the availability of water to tree roots is an important impact on the site index for Emory oak woodlands.