Moving from Place to Place: Exploring the Complexities of Being an Academic and Activist in/for Appalachia

Maintaining the life of being both an academic and activist can be emotional and immensely difficult. In our efforts to achieve career advancement and to help others we may find ourselves moving between many places and living out the contradictions and tensions that result from such movement. Often forced to produce inaccessible, jargon filled articles, the majority of academics rarely find the opportunity to give back to the communities where they conduct research. How do we as academics then, come to terms with the work that we do? Can we truly be both activists and academics and, if so, in what ways? This paper is a reflective article, interleaved with autobiographical details in hopes of enhancing my exploration of the academic-activist dichotomy. First, I examine the need for new economic development opportunities in Appalachia and explore my own attempts to document and foster alternative economic practices. Then, I highlight my own struggles as an academic, activist, and native working in Eastern Kentucky and the ways through which I attempt to blur the lines among these roles. Finally, I offer a few words to those who move from place to place in hopes of helping themselves and others. Throughout each section, I emphasize the power of place(s) in shaping my understanding of Appalachia and my duties as an academic/activist

Improved sampling of compressed gases for condensable hydrocarbon content

Sampling process was developed which uses commercially available high pressure filters and provides measurements in fraction of time required by older methods. Measurements show no significant difference in results between low pressure and high pressure samples. Filter method is slightly more accurate than scrubber technique

Redefining Development: Exploring Alternative Economic Practices in Appalachia

This dissertation examines alternative economic practices and regional economic development strategies in the Appalachian region. First, I deconstruct regional economic development policies and practices. I argue that policy documents produced by the Appalachian Regional Commission and the State of Kentucky have often limited economic imaginings through the perpetuation of regional stereotypes and short-term, decontextualized strategies. Then, I explore the existence of alternative economic practices as well as the contradictory role of the state within the context of Eastern Kentucky’s craft industry. Using a mixed methods approach, I investigate how the state simultaneously supports cooperative craft production by perpetuating a geographical lore pertaining to crafts produced in the State of Kentucky, and yet fosters a discourse of self-sufficiency via entrepreneurial workshops that often alienate cooperative craft producers. Finally, I highlight alternatives that have emerged in this industry in an effort to document economic diversity and redefine development

Chromatographic detection and analysis of traces of hydrocarbons

Special analytical column having in series two separate absorption sections charged with beads of porous polymer and a sample of gas detects traces of hydrocarbons. New method requires only 15 minutes for execution

Assessing computer -mediated communication discourse of a traumatic brain injury survivor

Speech-language pathologists and audiologists have begun using computer technology for information storage and retrieval and as one means of providing clinical services to communication-disordered patients. The purpose of this study is to develop a protocol to assess the written communication of brain-injured clients whose communication therapy milieu includes interactions with the world outside the treatment room through computer-mediated communication (CMC).;A panel of experts reviewed a series of discourse analysis procedures and rated their perceptions of validity, reliability, and ease-of use for the procedures as means of evaluating CMC discourse. The Computer-Mediated Communication Evaluation Protocol (CMC-EP) was developed based on the results of the analysis of the panel ratings and a post-rating consensus inquiry.;A series of e-mail messages and on-line text chats generated over a period of three years were evaluated using the CMC-EP. The results of the CMC-EP were examined to determine if patterns of change were revealed in the CMC discourse of a traumatic brain injury. The CMC-EP consists of four procedures: T-unit analysis, cohesion analysis, Correct Information Unit analysis, and three scales of the Rating of Communication Behaviors. Using the CMC-EP enables speech-language pathologists to complete surface/sentential analysis, cohesion analysis, informational analysis, and conversation analysis of CMC discourse

Enacting experimental alternative spaces

This paper analyses the experimental nature of alternative spaces and the affective, emotional and embodied experience their enactment generates. In so doing, it grounds the analysis on the intentional community of Damanhur (Italy), as an example of experimental spaces. Scholarship concerning intentional communities draws on utopian studies that consider them as utopian laboratories. More recently, non‐representational approaches have emphasised the processual nature of utopias, yet studies have overlooked the experimental nature of these alternative spaces. Drawing upon in‐depth ethnographic data, this paper engages with community experimentations that took place in Damanhur for residents and visitors. It illustrates how utopian enactment is experimental and thus, disordering, unsettling and creative. Moreover, I argue that experimentations are not limited to unsettling the social structure of the community and, when studying the enactment of alternative spaces, emphasis should also be on their capacity to affect the individual

Regionalism in theory and practice, or a plea for Appalachian Studies

Since the 1990s resurgence in concerns of regional identity and regionalism has occurred within the social sciences as well as in governance, planning, and politics in general. In terms of economic development, new geographical lores have been written and spoken, lores that often seem to foster narratives of multi-county cooperation and unity, as well as a shared geographical identity at the regional scale. Such lores however tend to render the role of the federal, state and local government in economic development policies and strategies invisible. In this paper the author seeks to provide a deeper understanding of the inter-connectedness of such lores and development practices in the Appalachian region. To begin, the author will provide an overview of literature pertaining to (1) regional identity, regionalism, and geographical lores and, (2) critical development discourses. Then, I apply these conceptual frameworks to data collected during a research fellowship held at the Central Appalachian Institute for Research and Development (Jan-Dec 2013) in an effort to explore the ways in which the Appalachian Regional Commission, the State of Kentucky, and regionally-based entities such as the Southeast Kentucky Chamber of Commerce perpetuate limited geographical lores in the form of development strategies which shape economic imaginings. I argue that development strategies in/for Southeastern Kentucky and Appalachia more broadly must be contextualized to be successful. It is only through an appreciation for the history of out-migration, low wages, exploitation, and lack of diversification that development strategies generating civic engagement and equal distribution to resources might be fostered

Recommendations for sex education curriculum components

Project (M.S.W., Social Work) -- California State University, Sacramento, 2013.The purpose of this research study was to explore the relationship between adult demographics and recommendations for sex education curriculum components/modules. This quantitative exploratory survey research study investigated the sex education curriculum components/modules recommendations from 30 men and women. This study employed a non-probability convenience sampling method. There were significant chi-square associations found between gender and condom use; female birth control; types of romantic and sexual relationships; sexual self-esteem and well-being regarding sex; and LGBTQ topics. Participants who stated that sex education should be taught in school also provided recommendations on the components/modules they felt ought to be included in the curriculum. The findings from this study suggest that there is a need for sex education curriculum creators to address the sex education recommendations of adults from various demographic backgrounds. Implications for social work practice and policy are discussed.Social Wor