Return to search

My life is in their hands: Latina adolescent border-crossings, becoming in the shadows, and mental health in schools

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / This project endeavors to move beyond traditional conceptualizations of voice in
conventional qualitative research and instead focuses on embodied, liminal experiences
of Latina adolescents, the intersections of identity, gender, spirituality, ethnicity, etc.,
how these junctures broadly impact mental health, and more specifically, how we
perceive mental health and well-being within educational institutions. The study draws
upon an intervention pilot study that sought to increase resiliency and self-mastery in
Latino adolescents while simultaneously reducing their depressive symptoms. However,
this project aims to take these findings and focus upon the complex and multiple factors
that influence depression, including citizenship status, trauma in crossing the border from
Mexico into the United States, and racial and gendered oppression specific to the
experiences of Latina adolescent immigrants. Thus, this project explores ways in which
four Latina adolescents make sense of their lived experiences through a critical feminist
theoretical framework that integrates post/anti colonial feminism. The framework
provides a nuanced conceptualization of power, oppression, and marginalization that
creates opportunities to explore alternative notions of thinking that encourages new paths
to transform interdisciplinary, university, community, and family relationships
surrounding mental health concerns within educational institutions. Finally, theory,
research, epistemology, and ontology are interwoven to inform a methodology that is
fluid, interchanging, and always becoming.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:IUPUI/oai:scholarworks.iupui.edu:1805/11776
Date22 June 2016
CreatorsElfreich, Alycia Marie
ContributorsThompson, Chalmer, Dennis, Barbara, Helfenbein, Robert, Medina, Monica
Source SetsIndiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis
Languageen_US
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeDissertation

Page generated in 0.002 seconds