Rehabilitation in Principle and Practice: Perspectives of Inmates and Officers

This article addresses rehabilitation, its conceptualisation by officers and inmates, and its expression in practice within a select Norwegian prison. It reports on findings from a qualitative interview-based research project conducted as a pilot study, whereby semi-structured interviews were conducted with inmates and officers at the prison. Furthermore, the authors examine the principle of rehabilitation as it follows from Norwegian law and assess how it is implemented in practice in a Norwegian prison. The preliminary findings from the study reveal factors—such as inmate isolation and mental health challenges, drug use, unequal treatment, and limited capacity and resources—that are impacting the effectiveness of what the prison has intended to achieve and ask for further research and discussion in this area.publishedVersio

Human Papillomavirus Replication Regulation by Acetylation of a Conserved Lysine in the E2 Protein

The papillomavirus (PV) E2 protein is a sequence-specific DNA binding protein that recruits cellular factors to its genome in infected epithelial cells. E2 also binds to and loads the viral E1 DNA helicase at the origin of replication. Posttranslational modifications (PTMs) of PV E2 have been identified as potential regulators of E2 functions. We recently reported lysine 111 (K111) as a target of p300 acetylation in bovine PV (BPV). The di-lysines at 111 and 112 are conserved in almost all papillomaviruses. We pursued a mutational approach to query the functional significance of lysine in human PV (HPV) E2. Amino acid substitutions that prevent acetylation, including arginine, were unable to stimulate transcription and E1-mediated DNA replication. The arginine K111 mutant retained E2 transcriptional repression, nuclear localization, DNA and chromatin binding, and association with E2 binding partners involved in PV transcription and replication. While the replication-defective E2-K111R mutant recruited E1 to the viral replication origin, surprisingly, unwinding of the duplex DNA did not occur. In contrast, the K111 glutamine (K111Q) mutant increased origin melting and stimulated replication compared to wild-type E2. These experiments reveal a novel activity of E2 necessary for denaturing the viral origin that likely depends on acetylation of highly conserved lysine 111.IMPORTANCE HPV is one of the most common sexually transmitted infections in the United States. Over 200 HPVs have been described, and they manifest in a variety of ways; they can be asymptomatic or can result in benign lesions (papillomas) or progress to malignancy. Although 90% of infections are asymptomatic and resolve easily, HPV16 and -18 alone are responsible for 70% of all cervical cancers, which are almost entirely caused by HPV infection. Interestingly, 60 to 90% of other cancers have been linked to HPV. The goal of this research is to further elucidate the mechanisms that regulate and mediate viral replication

Integrating Racial Equity in Foundation Governance, Operations, and Program Strategy

· This article is intended to provide the field of philanthropy with a useful framework for organizing racial-equity efforts. · When the Washington-based Consumer Health Foundation became a staffed foundation in 1998, its initial grantmaking focused on health promotion and access to health care. As a learning organization, however, it took steps that led to greater support for efforts addressing the interconnectedness between health status and racial equity. This included support for advocacy as a strategy to create systems change benefiting low-income communities of color. · This commitment to racial equity is not a separate initiative; it is integrated into all aspects of CHF’s governance, operations, and program strategy: board and staff education on structural racism, developing diversity and racial equity indicators to guide operations, providing capacity-building support to grantees to enable racial-equity planning, and advocacy grantmaking in areas such as language access for populations with limited proficiency in English. · This article presents historical milestones and the key drivers that stimulated an organizational commitment to this approach, with examples of how racial equity is operationalized in all aspects of the foundation’s work and opportunities for continued growth

ECOLOGICAL DETERMINANTS OF PARENTING PRACTICES AMONG LATIN AMERICAN AND CARIBBEAN MOTHERS OF ADOLESCENTS: FINDINGS FROM THE NEW IMMIGRANT SURVEY

Latin American and Caribbean immigrants are the fastest growing immigrants in the United States. Prior studies suggest that Latin American and Caribbean immigrant families in the U.S. face a number of risk factors including poverty, linguistic barriers, and mental health problems. Growing concern exists about the factors affecting the development of Latino and Caribbean immigrant adolescents. Moreover, a separate literature indicates that new immigrant Latin American and Caribbean families may face particular challenges in parenting their children within a new environment. Few studies include Latina and Caribbean mothers of adolescents; or examine the influence of various contextual factors on the parenting behavior of new immigrants. This study addresses these limitations through the use of a cultural-ecological framework to explore the relationship between three selected ecological factors and parenting practices of Latina and Caribbean immigrant mothers of early and late adolescents. Data are drawn from a subset of 415 Latina and Caribbean mothers of an adolescent child age 10 to 17 in the New Immigrant Survey (NIS-2003). Multiple linear regression analyses were conducted to examine hypothesized models testing the relationship between maternal acculturation, extended-family coresidence, and religious involvement and parenting practices. After controlling for demographic characteristics, the findings revealed that one measure of maternal acculturation, years of U.S. residence, was related to lower use of cognitive stimulating activities and strict punishment discipline, as well as less parental school involvement. A second measure of maternal acculturation, English proficiency, was associated with lower use of cognitive stimulating activities, but greater parental school involvement. Greater maternal religious involvement was related to less emotional support, less parental school involvement, and more cognitive stimulation. All three ecological factors were unrelated to positive control discipline. The findings also revealed differences among adjustee mothers and new-arrival mothers. Implications for research and culturally appropriate interventions for Latin American and Caribbean families and their children are discussed

Ancestral Queendom: Reflections on the Prison Records of the Rebel Queens of the 1878 Fireburn in St. Croix, USVI (formerly the Danish West Indies)

This article is written in what can be described as the “post-centennial” era, post 2017, the year marked by the 100th anniversary of the sale and transfer of the Virgin Islands from Denmark to the United States. 2017 marked a shift in the conversation around and between Denmark and its former colonies in the Caribbean, most notably the increasing access of Virgin Islanders to the millions of archival records that remain stored in Denmark as they began to emerge in online databases and temporarily in exhibitions. That year the Virgin Islands Studies Collective, a group of four women (La Vaughn Belle, Tami Navarro, Hadiya Sewer and Tiphanie Yanique) from the Virgin Islands and from various disciplinary backgrounds, also emerged with an intention to center not only the archive, but also archival access and the nuances of archival interpretation and intervention. This collaborative essay, Ancestral Queendom: Reflections on the Prison Records of the Rebel Queens of the 1878 Fireburn in St. Croix, USVI (formerly the Danish West Indies), is a direct engagement with the archives and archival production. Each member responds to one of the prison records of the four women taken to Denmark for their participation in the largest labor revolt in Danish colonial history. Their reflections combine elements of speculation, fiction, black feminitist theory and critique as modes of responding to the gaps and silences in the archive, as well as finding new questions to be asked

"The Numbers Don't Work for Us:" An Alternative Model of Fundamental Causality from the Perspectives of African Americans in Urban Atlanta.

Racial/ethnic disparities between African Americans and Whites in a number of health outcomes continue to exist despite decades of intervention research and social policy changes. Several perspectives have been proposed to explain the existence of these disparities, including the fundamental cause perspective. The fundamental cause perspective is promising because it suggests that focusing on distal factors that influence multiple risk factors and health outcomes may be the key to eliminating longstanding disparities in health. Proponents of this perspective suggest that low socioeconomic status is a fundamental cause of health disparities and that there are others yet to be determined and explicated. This study informs the development of an alternate model of fundamental causality rooted in the perspectives of those living in a neighborhood characterized by poor health and social outcomes. Between April and August 2006 twenty residents (in two groups) from an urban Atlanta area used Photovoice to document their health and social realities. In total, they participated in seven rounds of picture-taking followed by seven small group dialogue sessions. Grounded theory analysis of the transcripts from these dialogues was used to develop an explanatory model of fundamental causes and their mechanisms. In contrast to the traditional framing of health in terms of physical health, residents defined community well-being and mental health as priority health concerns. Residents also identified the underlying factors and mechanisms that they believed contributed to poor community well-being and poor mental health. The most significant underlying factor was White and middle class Black indifference toward poor African Americans embedded in institutional practices and prevailing ideologies. This indifference contributes to neighborhood and housing disinvestment, speculative development, and displacement of families out of the neighborhood. The model also indicates that African Americans in this neighborhood use strategies such as help-seeking, resistance, cooperation, and organizing as strategies to mitigate the impact of these forces on community well-being and mental health. Implications for research, policy, and practice are discussed with special attention to the need for greater integration of the fields of public health and urban planning to protect the public’s health.Ph.D.Health Behavior & Health EducationUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/58537/1/yredwood_1.pd