Frankenstein: A Feminist Interpretation of Gender Construction

There is a long history of exploring Frankenstein through a feminist lens. A historical examination that explores Mary Shelley’s life and the literature that influenced her writing is key to understanding the feminist elements of Frankenstein. Additionally, this paper will call upon Judith Butler’s concept of gender performativity to examine the ways in which Victor’s monster constructs his own gender identity based upon his creator’s own flawed masculinity. Victor’s gender expression is defined by the time period in which he was created and also by the masculine literature of the time. While masculine literature helped to define both the monster’s and Victor’s gender, there is also a feminist current found within the text. When further examined, this feminist current reveals itself to be Mary Wollstonecraft’s work, Shelley’s mother, which functions to assert the feminist voice in the novel. In this analysis, gender construction and the creature’s birth will be examined. This paper asserts that the creature’s violent and toxic concept of gender stems from his parting with the De Lacey family, his books, and mainly from his relationship with his creator. Moreover, his gender construction is reinforced by his choice of victims and even further by how Victor responds to these killings. Furthermore, when the creature attempts to recreate Victor’s life the results only end in tragedy as the monster is not able to be part of the Social Contract Theory. In the end, Victor and the monster demonstrate the pitfalls of first-generation Romanticism and the inflation of self

Review of \u3cem\u3eInvisible in Austin: Life and Labor in an American City\u3c/em\u3e. Javier Auyero. Reviewed by Danielle Docka-Filipek

Javier Auyero (Ed.), Invisible in Austin: Life and Labor in an American City. University of Texas Press (2015), 280 pages, $24.95 (paperback)

Enemies of the Nation: Understanding the Hungarian State’s Relationship to Humanitarian NGOs

Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) occupy a very ambiguous role in society. Historically, NGOs have been both heralded as democracy in action and criticized for being complicit supporters of neoliberalism. Now, in certain contexts, they are rendered as enemies of the nation. In this article, we examine the evolution of nongovernmental organizations in Hungary, a nation where this transformation is exceedingly clear. Hungary provides a pertinent case example to explore the manner in which civil society as an amorphous, ill-defined category becomes a stand-in for whatever the state needs to protect its interests. The current discourse on NGOs in Hungary plays out during and in the aftermath of what has been dubbed the “refugee crisis” of the summer of 2015. Therefore, in this article we explore how the civil sector evolved in Hungary following the end of the Soviet era, the nongovernmental response to the refugee crisis, and the manner in which NGOs and individual volunteers have been characterized in political discourse as “enemies of the state,” due to the government’s anti-migrant stance. As a result of public rhetoric and policy changes, the civil sector in Hungary has no choice but to either shrink considerably or reframe their activities as decidedly anti-government

Mineral chemistry and thermometry of metamorphosed mafic rocks in the contact aureole of the Kiglapait intrusion

Includes bibliographical references.Includes illustrations.Mafic granulites surrounding the Kiglapait layered intrusion Labrador, were previously thought to represent a contaminated chilled margin (Outer Border Zone) of the intrusion. Mineral chemistry data combined with petrographic observations and bulk chemical analyses suggest that the OBZ mafic granulites were meta metamorphosed by the emplacement of the intrusion and are probably petrogenetically unrelated to it. Petrographic study suggests that systematic appearances and disappearances of various minerals occur in the mafic granulites as the intrusion is approached. These are: 1) actinolite out 2 ) sphene out 3) epidote - calcite out 4) chlorite out 5) clinopyroxene in 6 ) quartz out 7) orthopyroxene in 8 ) olivine in 9) magnetite in 10) hornblende - ilmenite outM.S. (Master of Science

Beyond the nuclear family? Familism and gender ideology in diverse religious communities

Religious familism, or ideology about ''the good family,'' has been central to the culture and practice of local religious communities in the United States. Recent research has suggested that the ''Ozzie and Harriet'' familism dominant among mainstream religious groups in the 1950s religious expansion has remained formative for many local religious communities in the intervening decades. This research suggests that religious familism shapes how gender is symbolized and enacted in local religious communities and leads to differences in the meaning of religious participation for contemporary men and women. However, this work has been based largely on studies of white, middle-class religious communities. In this article, we analyze the relationship between family ideology and gender in three congregations chosen to exemplify those social locations where we would expect considerable distance from the 1950s ''Ozzie and Harriet'' ideal-one Hispanic Catholic parish, one African-American congregation in the black Church tradition, and one white liberal Protestant congregation that has adopted an open and affirming stance toward homosexuality and same-sex unions. We find considerable innovation in family-oriented rhetoric and ministry, and a range of gendered practices that prove considerably more inclusive than those found in previous research. We also find considerable symbolic affirmation of the value of more traditional gender roles and practices, particularly in the realm of the family, than we expected to find. We explore the implications of these findings for how we understand the production of gender in local religious communities and for the capacity of local religious communities to become truly gender-inclusive spaces

Case studies in compassion: need interpretation, gender, and family in an era of faith-based provision

University of Minnesota Ph.D. dissertation. August 2013. Major: Sociology. Advisors: Dr. Penny Edgell, Dr. Kathleen Hull. 1 computer file (PDF); viii, 407 pages, appendices A-F.As a result of provisions codified in the 1996 PRWORA, and later, through presidential Executive Order, many Americans now encounter the welfare state through small programs run by local churches. Both liberal and conservative worship communities in the US have embraced and maintained a `traditional' family ideology in which nuclear family ideals are normative--despite increasing levels of diversity in the way the majority of Americans organize their family lives. The central concerns of this dissertation revolve around whether and how programs receiving funds associated with the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives (OFBCI) are organized around the needs of families that do not fit the traditional nuclear male-breadwinner ideal. I pose three primary questions: 1) How do institutionalized models of family and gender in faith-based organizations inform service providers' interpretations of clients' needs? 2) Do the models of family circulating in faith-based organizations have consequences for the ways these organizations become gendered social spaces? 3) In environments where models for the "Ideal Family" exist in tension with other forms of family life, will organizational rhetorics about family and gender reflect this diversity? To answer the above questions, interviews and participant-observation in four case study organizations (one theologically liberal, two theologically conservative, and one "community-based"), as well as 39 interviews with program authorities in 27 different organizations (drawn across a Midwestern, metropolitan area) were conducted. Although the organizations profiled exhibited a good amount of practices accommodating family diversity, organizational rhetorics did not always reflect the full diversity of participants' family lives. Significantly, I observed a deep ambivalence surrounding non-nuclear family models, a pattern I argue is attributable to the way such family forms call into question dominant beliefs and practices related to the social construction of gender. Furthermore, I found that in settings of community and faith-based social service provision, rhetoric associated with the ideology of religious neoliberalism is pervasive, and extends beyond the discourse circulated by the theologically conservative coalition of elites with which it is normally associated. I argue the pervasiveness of religious neoliberalism is driven by structural conditions compelling organizations to resort to individualistic "moral resources" in the absence of material resources, which limits providers' capacity to promote and access alternative discursive resources that might otherwise reference structural inequality. Lastly, my data indicates that organizations' self-definition as either community-based or faith-based does not indicate "more" or "less" religion, as many other analyses otherwise presuppose. The boundaries between organizations with religious characteristics and those with "non-religious," or more secular, self-presentations are porous, in that they shift over time and in both directions (i.e., organizations become more explicitly expressive of their religious character, or they choose to consciously abandon elements of their religious identity as time passes and their structure develops)

Report of early site suitability evaluation of the potential repository site at Yucca Mountain, Nevada; Yucca Mountain Site Characterization Project

This study evaluated the technical suitability of Yucca Mountain, Nevada, as a potential site for a mined geologic repository for the permanent disposal of radioactive waste. The evaluation was conducted primarily to determine early in the site characterization program if there are any features or conditions at the site that indicate it is unsuitable for repository development. A secondary purpose was to determine the status of knowledge in the major technical areas that affect the suitability of the site. This early site suitability evaluation (ESSE) was conducted by a team of technical personnel at the request of the Associate Director of the US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Geologic Disposal, a unit within the DOE`s Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management. The Yucca Mountain site has been the subject of such evaluations for over a decade. In 1983, the site was evaluated as part of a screening process to identify potentially acceptable sites. The site was evaluated in greater detail and found suitable for site characterization as part of the Environmental Assessment (EA) (DOE, 1986) required by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 (NWPA). Additional site data were compiled during the preparation of the Site Characterization Plan (SCP) (DOE, 1988a). This early site suitability evaluation has considered information that was used in preparing both-documents, along with recent information obtained since the EA and SCP were published. This body of information is referred to in this report as ``current information`` or ``available evidence.`