The Ascent, 2004 February

Student newspaper of Daemen College (formerly Rosary Hill College)

Sound Business: Great Women Of Gospel Music And The Transmission Of Tradition

From the 1930s to the present, women have played instrumental and visible leadership roles in the remarkable growth of African American gospel music. Through both creative and entrepreneurial activities, these women paved the way for the expansion of an emotive sacred music expression from the worship practices of southern migrants to audiences around the world. This dissertation focuses on the work of three cultural trailblazers, Mahalia Jackson, Aretha Franklin, and Karen Clark Sheard, who stand out in the development of gospel music as virtuosic vocalists and pivotal figures whose sonic imprints can be heard both in sacred songs performed in churches and in American popular music. By deploying exceptional musicality, a deep understanding of African American Christianity, and an embrace of commercialism, the three singers have conserved and reworked musical elements derived from an African American heritage into a powerful performance rhetoric. By using musical mastery, they have forged paths for gospel music as a commercial phenomena and a vehicle to transform discourses of race, gender, class, and religion. At the same time, they have managed other duties and responsibilities in their families, in their communities, and in the music industry, thus demonstrating that “greatness” in gospel music is the outcome of extraordinary skills and various interwoven forms of labor. Through the study of the musical lives of Jackson, Franklin, and Clark Sheard from an intergenerational perspective, this dissertation posits that they participate in making a feminist music culture that prioritizes spiritual authenticity and the commercialization of musical knowledge as a counter-hegemonic practice. Thus, their contributions should be first viewed as “cultural work,” a form of African American women’s activism that consciously advances a female musical perspective in the service of community furtherance. In broad terms, this exploration of women’s gospel music legacies elucidates the cultural, spiritual, and commercial processes that have shaped African American sacred music practices, and as such, it provides new insights into a creative domain which has produced the most influential vocal idiom in American popular music

Like White on Rice: Asianness, Whiteness, and Identity

The primary goal of this study is to examine the intersection between Whiteness and Asianness from the perspective of Asian Americans in order to acknowledge ways in which racial consciousness relates to communicative patterns and behavior. This primarily method is intensive-interviews of forty 1.5- and second-generation Asian Americans, ages 19 to 59, living in the San Francisco Bay Area and the Oklahoma City Metropolitan Area, including those with Asian Indian, Chinese, Filipino, Korean, and Vietnamese ethnic, national backgrounds. Surprisingly, most participants have never heard of the term model minority. Some who understand it embrace it whereas others do not. Asian Americans describe the performativity of their racial-ethnic identity through Twinkie/Banana, Whitewash, Chinesey, Azian, and FOBs. Informants equate Twinkie, banana, and Whitewash as "yellow on the outside, White on the inside." Some participants self-identify as a banana, Twinkie, or Whitewashed and offer complex reasons for doing so such as racial melancholia. Lastly, the participants present emergent ethnic discourse on FOBs (Fresh Off the Boat), Azians, and Chinesey--terms indicating differences within Asian American groups. The results indicate identity is a relational, discursive process situated in power and history, and subsequently reified in the body. Unlike Whites who create their own racial and ethnic discourses, Asian/Americans must compete and negotiate between the dominant racialized rhetoric and emergent ethnic discourse. If the dominant majority is creating the public perceptions of Asianness, it is impossible not to talk about Whiteness when analyzing Asianness in the United States

“I discovered race in America and it fascinated me”: Alienation, Exile and the Discovery of Cultures in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah

Depicting the economic and cultural problems facing its Nigerian immigrant protagonists, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel, Americanah provides a great opportunity for its readers to understand the increasing appeal of the idea of cultures among immigrants in the West. It shows how the problems accompanying cultural dislocation compel even alienated individuals who previously idealized the West to embrace their cultures and move away from universal and individualistic perspectives such as liberalism. Cultural dislocation not only helps immigrants discover the importance and particularity of their own culture but also the continuing influence of cultures in the West. Further complicating the picture, however, the novel also reveals how the culture discovered by immigrants in exile is distinctly different from the culture lived and understood by their counterparts in their native country. By frankly depicting both the cultural problems facing African immigrants in a racialized America and the prevalence and negative effects of Eurocentric cultural alienation among non-Western youth, Americanah helps us understand the surprising turn to cultures and away from liberalism at the start of the twenty-first century

The Forum: Spring 2002

Spring 2002 journal of the Honors Program at the University of North Dakota. The issue includes stories, poems, essays and art by undergraduate students.https://commons.und.edu/und-books/1048/thumbnail.jp

Klipsun Magazine, 2017, Volume 47, Issue 02 - Winter

Life is full of the unexpected. We like to think we have it all figured out, predicting and organizing the static nature of our daily lives. Yet, in a mere moment, life can knock the wind out of you and it is suddenly changed forever. It’s hard to cope with change, especially when it is an undesirable outcome. We are constantly fighting with reality, using our denial as a protective shield. We try to face change head on, but there is rarely an instance in which we can prepare ourselves for life-altering experiences. In this issue you will find stories of grief and loss, the relationship between old and new and discovering brightness in the midst of our weary journey. Each story in this collection encapsulates what it means to look toward the future. In the face of life’s seemingly infinite adversities, there is one constant: life goes on. There is no turning back, what’s done is done. We all must decide which path we want to take, but all any of us can really do is move forward.https://cedar.wwu.edu/klipsun_magazine/1262/thumbnail.jp

Vista: October 8, 1987

https://digital.sandiego.edu/vista/2015/thumbnail.jp

Identity in Sociocultural Context: Life Stories of Korean Youth in New York City

Despite the increasing number of Korean immigrants and children of Korean parents in the United States, there has been a dearth of research on these youth. The identity of Korean American youth has gained even less attention despite of its developmental importance. This research started from a recognition that the identity of Korean American youth has never been studied through their life stories. Thus, the goal of this research was to understand the identity of Korean youth in New York City through their life stories. I investigated how their life stories developed and what influences affected their identities while growing up as Korean Americans by employing McAdams’ life story model. By doing so, I expected to better understand the meanings of their lives and how they are related to their identity development. This study employed a qualitative methodology to examine participants’ subjective life experiences in the United States and the development of their identity in the process. I used McAdams’ life story model with its analytic schemes. Ethnographic techniques were also used in interviews and analyses to interpret the participants’ explicit and implicit expressions of Korean-ness. Because the purpose of this study was to explore the identity of Korean American young adults through their life experiences in the United States, ten second-generation Koreans in their late teens to twenties were recruited for the study. A primary focus was on the development of identity. To explore the identity of the ten Korean youth I had four overarching research questions: (1) What do individual life stories of Korean youth in New York City tell us about their identity; (2) How do their perceptions of ethnic identity relate to their life stories; (3) What are the meanings of “being a Korean” or “Korean-ness” in their everyday discourses; and (4) How do Koreans in the U.S. use societal images of Koreans to describe their life stories and those of Korean friends? The ten Korean youth interviews generated over 250 pages of transcripts, which were analyzed using the eight coding categories. The eight categories are: (1) theme of agency and communion; (2) two types of identity discourses; (3) neighborhood and cultural adaptation; (4) family relations and experiences; (5) friends, school, and Korean church network; (6) ethnic behaviors and practices; (7) changes in identity perception: Korean or American or both; and (8) prejudices and discrimination. The study findings revealed that the Korean youth’s awareness of Korean heritage occurred in facing many different life experiences. Parents, family, friends, school, church, and the Korean community in New York were all important contexts for the youth’s realization of their Korean-ness. Images of Koreans specifically and Asians in general influenced their awareness of Korean and Asian identity. The youth confronted racism, which along with American stereotypes and prejudices towards them raised their awareness of Korean and Asian identity. While a few youth perceived their Korean heritage would be hurdles to successful American lives, each realized that they had better embrace their Korean and American sides because their Korean heritage was undeniable. Although living between Korean and American life may on occasion be tough, the majority of the Korean youth felt comfortable accepting both Korean- and American-ness. They reported having made efforts to choose career paths to enhance their and their families’ lives. The life stories of the Korean youth, indeed, showed who they were and how they have been living in the United States. Thus, the identity of the Korean youth developed as their life stories were being written