Library: Sociology

This study examines the role of occupational status in the racialization of Indian physicians in Southern California. Since the liberalization of U.S. immigration policy in 1965, the number of first and second-generation Indian doctors in the U.S. has grown to nearly seven percent of the nation's physician workforce; however, Indians constitute less than one percent of the total U.S. population. Overrepresented in one of America's most prestigious professions, Indians are more visible in U.S. medicine than in the U.S. at large. Previous scholarship in immigration research, Asian American St...

This dissertation concerns the structures and individual agency of Filipina brides who met their American husbands through Internet or pen pal advertisements. Popular media, legal scholars, and some feminists have largely described the phenomenon in terms of its oppressiveness toward the women involved, thus dismissing any agency on the part of the women. Similarly, much of the scholarship has located the American Internet grooms as ogres who are out to exploit these women for domestic and sexual services. If prominent researchers of this phenomenon are correct in their assessments that Filipi...

The purpose of the qualitative case study was to explore and identify the patterns and types of obstacles women in the information technology (IT) field experience in advancing to leadership positions and to explore the mentor-mentee relationship of female organizational leaders in the IT field and its effect on the advancement of women to leadership positions. The sample consisted of two groups of women, one in leadership (10 cases) and the other in nonleadership (10 cases) positions, in the IT field in the eastern United States. Content analysis and NVivo 7 software were used to analyze the ...

Internationally adopted persons confront multiple challenges in constructing their identities. This study of the narrative burden of self looks at and interprets the dynamic process in which internationally adopted people develop, coordinate and manage their sense of self, identity and cultural/racial personhood. Drawing on the theory of the Coordinated Management of Meaning (CMM), the study focuses on their use of orphaning and adoption stories to most skillfully position and tell one's origin story in concert with one's internal sense of self, and the pressures and forces found in interpers...

This study shall explore the social and political significance of the so-called kyureki, the Japanese lunisolar calendar that was abolished by the Meiji government in 1872. This calendar was the principal method of timekeeping in Japan from 604 to 1872, but has received little attention from English speaking scholars. This study argues that the study of the lunisolar calendar is essential to gaining a comprehensive understanding of pre-Meiji society and political history. Chapter 1 uses a detailed analysis of an actual lunisolar calendar coupled with passages from pre-Meiji historical and lit...

The presence and influence of the media in modern times has increased to a point where they have seamlessly permeated every aspect of contemporary life, a situation that has led some to attribute them ideal qualities to promote and strengthen human rights values, while others perceive their commercial interests as an obstacle to perform such a task. This dissertation analyses the role of the media in promoting human rights, based primarily on a theoretical discussion which examines the problem from four different angles: the idealistic perception mainly promoted by the United Nations; the real...

In recent years there has been a clear rise in scientific collaboration, as well as in studies on the subject. While most scholars examine disciplines traditionally known to be collaborative, such as physics and space research, this book focuses on biology. It investigates the growing collaboration in the life sciences, or the emergence of what is called 'big biology'. While the Human Genome Project is often presented as the first large-scale research project in biology, cooperation in the life sciences has a longer history. A comparison between centralised 'big physics' and 'big biology' reve...

In the sociological literature, Otherness is conceptualized as a condition of difference that is imposed upon a group by another more powerful group. In this qualitative, phenomenological study, it was determined that Americans of Korean descent do, in fact, experience Otherness and it is an integral part of their identities. However, the experience of Otherness can be divided into two separate but interrelated components: racial Otherness and cultural Otherness. It was also determined that the severity of Otherness experiences was shaped by the contexts of phenotype, socio-geographical locati...

In providing a comprehensive investigation of alcohol, cigarette, and marijuana initiation among adolescents, the overarching goals of the research were to build upon extant findings, address important gaps found in the literature, and contribute to the prevention science knowledge base. A four-fold purpose founded the study: 1) provide a systematic review of the soft drug initiation literature; 2) test a modified version of Kandel's (2002) drug sequencing hypothesis; 3) determine if predictors of soft drug initiation differ in kind or saliency by biological age and drug type; and 4) examine a...

The study investigated the failure to integrate faith in daily work--a multifaceted problem important for interdisciplinary studies in religion and society. The Purpose in Life (PIL) test and the Engagement in Meaningful Work Scale (EMWS) were used to research how religious faith impacted work perceptions of mortuary college students. Students from Gupton-Jones College of Funeral Service in Atlanta, Georgia and John A. Gupton College in Nashville, Tennessee were chosen as the respondents. The following research question was examined: What were the effects of religiosity on mortuary college st...