The Hilltop 8-29-2006

https://dh.howard.edu/hilltop_0010/1308/thumbnail.jp

U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform

The U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform was created by Congress to assess U.S. immigration policy and make recommendations regarding its implementation and effects. Mandated in the Immigration Act of 1990 to submit an interim report in 1994 and a final report in 1997, the Commission has undertaken public hearings, fact-finding missions, and expert consultations to identify the major immigration-related issues facing the United States today.LBJ School of Public Affair

Recovering the Face-to-Face in American Immigration Law

Professor Failinger’s article begins with stories of the Chinese Exclusion period and modern Arizona border immigration. Tracing Emmanuel Levinas’ argument about violence and totalization of the vulnerable Other as it is manifested in discriminatory legislation in these periods, she argues for a return to the Face-to-Face in deciding immigration requests for admission to the U.S. through a rubric of equitable guided discretion

Community Leader-Scholars With Refugee Experiences: Collective Hope, Healing, and Multi-Generational Resistance

Through a Critical Refugee Studies (CRS) lens that inherently challenges power, encourages multi-disciplinary approaches, and centers refugee epistemologies, this study centers ways of knowing and being among a group of ten Community Leader-Scholars (CoLS) with refugee experiences. This dissertation posits that CoLS offer critical perspectives that introduce new logics that disrupt traditional spaces and power dynamics. I frame CoLS as undergraduate or graduate students (or recent alumni) with refugee experiences who have self-identified and illustrated a commitment to community well-being in one or more of their transnational communities. This study employed qualitative research methods that included 10 interviews and four focus groups with a subset of participants. CoLS resided in the United States at the time of the study and come from diverse places of origin, including Burma, Iraq, Eritrea, Rwanda, Nepal/Bhutan, Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Somalia/Kenya. Data revealed three main themes that make up a seemingly impenetrable barrier for CoLS. The first is the notion of being locked out of or severely constrained in a global capitalistic society. The challenge of accessing resources strains the movement away from survival mode and limits CoLS’ efforts toward collective uplift. Second, power dynamics manifested in contemporary neocolonial ways also limit forward movement. And finally, situating CoLS’ inherent collective way of being within a neoliberal, individualistic society in the context of the United States reveals notions of feeling stuck between two systems, isolation, and dehumanization. Centering CoLS’ epistemologies inspire a sense of collective hope—a participant-coined term—through the beginning of a new collective of CoLS that provides a space for belonging, learning, and the harnessing of multi-generational resistance. Theoretical and future research implications of this study include re-imagining frameworks based on the collective, and further exploration of a multi-generational resistance framework. Practical implications include a call for service providers, educators, and policy makers to contemplate the existence and manifestations of the three underlying themes named above in their work; and encourage the opening up of spaces to learn from and be guided by epistemologies of those with refugee experiences

The University of Dayton Exponent, December 1941

Published monthly, usually October through May, in the interest of the students of the University of Dayton. Contents include essays, editorials, poems, plays, histories, and other creative works.https://ecommons.udayton.edu/exponent/1360/thumbnail.jp

PROTESTING LIBERALIZATION IN INDIA: AN EXAMINATION OF DISCURSIVE STRATEGIES USED BY STREET-VENDORS, SQUATTERS, AND SMALL-RETAILERS TO CREATE AND UNIVERSALIZE RESISTANCE NARRATIVES

The retail sector in India is experiencing a shift from an industry dominated by small grocers serving the needs of local markets to one characterized by chain retailers, both national and international. The liberalization of the retail sector in the last decade has edged the street-vendors, squatters, and small retailers from the prime business spaces to marginalized peripheries, which had led to widespread localized protests by the small retailers all over the country. The Aminabad Market in a metro city in northern India provided a unique opportunity to study ongoing resistance against chain retailing. The retailers of Aminabad were at the center of the most vocal protests and organized numerous strikes that led to the government action. Within this setting, this study employed an ethnographic methodology to explore the narratives of resistance by the street vendors, squatters, and small retailers in a traditional market in India. The study further explores the protests that are constituted in ‘local’ market conditions; and how they can become the basis for universalization of ‘local’ resistance into the mass-based movements. For this purpose, the theoretical framework utilizing Harvey’s conceptualizations of local resistance movements as well as Williams’ concept of the “militant particularisms” and narrative storytelling were used in this study. To this purpose, the study examines small retailers’ participation, their use of communication strategies to develop resistance narratives, and the techniques used in universalizing the resistance. The implications of current study suggest that although the typical small retailers maintains a defiant narrative against chain retailing, the social, economic, political differences within prevent the formulation of a unified agenda that represents their diversity. The unresolved ideological, social, and economic particularities within small retailing have a divisive influence on their resistance movement. The study also discusses the use of “Participatory Action” approach for facilitating a productive participation among the constituents, which can be a way forward for future research. Participatory Action can actively facilitate the resolution of underlying ironies for reforming and recreating the institutions according to the small retailers’ needs and resistance discourse that reflects their collective expression

A Dream Deferred: A Study of the Detrimental Effects Associated with a Lack of Legal Status and Denial of Post-Secondary Education to Undocumented High School Graduates

This study documents the quest for a post-secondary education as experienced by unauthorized students entering this country as minor children due to the decisions made by their parents to enter the United States illegally. Using a qualitative and phenomenological approach, the study examined how unauthorized students coped with the discovery and the reality of what it means to be an unauthorized immigrant, and its effects on their lives. Eighteen unauthorized student participants revealed how their unauthorized status affected their opportunity to attend college, and also prevented high school or college graduates from obtaining legal employment. Some participants crossed the border between the United States and Mexico, and described the risks and dangers associated with crossing. Others told stories shared by family members as they were too young to remember the crossing, and how the “discovery” of their unauthorized status affected them. Participants’ stories reveal the anxiety and stress of living and working without the benefit of immigration reform or another remedy to permanently modify their status as unauthorized immigrants subject to deportation with the election of a new president. Their narratives reveal how participants experienced and coped with significant and recurring grief and loss due to the hazards encountered in living outside of the system as unauthorized people. The study includes recommendations for how K-12 educators, counselors, social workers, health care professionals, and college personnel should recognize the emotional trauma and support students seeking advancement in education or employment

Disparities between American and Chinese Perceptions on Chinese Foreign Policy

There has been a dangerous gap between American and Chinese perceptions of Chinese foreign policy, a gap contributing to acceptance of the Thucydides Trap. With the help of a theoretical framework and empirical evidence, this paper aims to summarize and understand the differences, in an effort to help overcome them and prevent a self-fulfilling prophecy. The author identifies five variables that shape perceptions and then categorizes Chinese foreign policy along several dimensions. Using the South China Sea and the Belt and Road Initiative as case studies, the author finds that US and Chinese interpretations of Chinese behavior along these dimensions are influenced by different variables. While the Chinese views are more affected by history, American perceptions are driven by considerations of power. The two countries understand both identity and norms differently, as well. By showing where the two countries\u27 perceptions diverge, the author hopes to help reduce misunderstandings. The paper concludes with some practical recommendations along these lines

BINATIONAL FARMING FAMILIES OF SOUTHERN APPALACHIA AND THE MEXICAN BAJIO

Over the last four decades, farming families throughout North America experienced significant transitions due, in part, to the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement. This multi-sited dissertation investigates the ways in which a network of binational (Mexican-American) families organize their small- to mid-scale farming enterprises, engage in global networks as food producers, and contribute to rural economies in the southeastern U.S. and the Mexican Bajío. To mitigate difficult transitions that came with the globalizing of agri-food markets, members of this extended family group created collaborative, kin-based arrangements to produce, distribute, and market fresh-market fruits and vegetables in the foothills of southern Appalachia and basic grains in the foothills of the Mexican Bajío. Members of extended binational families regularly negotiate social, economic, and political borders within and across regions, genders, and generations. This study shows how these binational kin use cooperative practices to navigate two distinct, yet interrelated, contemporary agricultural political economic environments in North America. The study counter-constructs stereotypes of Latinx and their roles in southeastern U.S. agriculture by focusing on a vertically integrated, kin group of allied, migrant farming families and theorizing them as binational collective strategists. Their stories and strategies provide insight into the importance of temporalities and practices of kin relatedness to agri-food enterprises and suggest possibilities for alternative distributions of surplus value within the globalized agri-food system