Smoking cessation with ethnic minorities: Themes and approaches

Research investigating ethnic group differences in smoking prevalences, and smoking attitudes and behavior, is reviewed. Factors relating to the development of culturally sensitive smoking cessation interventions are discussed and several examples are provided of recent efforts to target smoking cessation initiatives toward minority communities. The problem of recruitment and retention of minority participants in health behavior research remains a vexing issue, which may best be addressed by incorporating smoking cessation interventions within regular health care, workplace, or school settings.     

Ethnic Resurgence,Minority Communities,and State Policies in a Network Society: The Dynamics of Malay Identity Formation in Postcolonial Singapore

While much has been written about identity formation and the politics of ethnicity among minority communities in various parts of modern-day Southeast Asia, the same cannot be said regarding the Malay community of Singapore. This article seeks to address this scholarly neglect by bringing into sharp focus the dynamics, processes, and circumstances that shaped Malay identity in postcolonial Singapore during the 1980s. By interweaving historical data with theoretical insights derived from the works of Andrew Willford, Manuel Castells, and Richard Jenkins, among others, this article provides an analytical reading of the global, regional, and local developments that brought about an ethnic resurgence within one of the largest minority groups in this island city-state. Such developments prompted the Singapore government to devise new laws and employ multi-faceted strategies to regain its legitimacy in the eyes of a certain segment of the population, and to enhance its ruling capacity. The problematics embedded within the state's interpretation of Malay identity and the effects of citizen resistance against state policies are considered in detail in the final sections of this article.     

The retreat of multiculturalism in the liberal state: theory and policy

This article discusses a recent retreat of multiculturalism in the liberal state. This retreat has occurred both at the level of theory and policy. With the help of some recent liberal critiques of multiculturalism, the first part maps out some shortcomings of the notion of minority integration through cultural recognition, particularly with respect to immigrants. The second part discusses a retreat from multiculturalism policies in three states that had been prominently committed to them: Australia, the Netherlands, and Britain. This practical retreat of multiculturalism is due to a variety of factors, their importance differing across cases: the chronic lack of public support for multiculturalism policies; inherent deficits and failures of multiculturalism policies, especially in socio-economic respect; and a new assertiveness of the liberal state to impose liberal principles.     

Decrypting cultural nuances: using drama techniques from the theatre of the oppressed to strengthen cross cultural communication in social work students

ABSTRACT

Despite widening participation in social work education in the UK, social work students from black and minority ethnic (BME) backgrounds can find that they have less positive experiences on social work courses than their counterparts. This can happen when courses do not equip students to navigate the subtle rules of communication with service users that are premised on dominant UK values. As a consequence BME students can be assessed as having poor interpersonal skills and poor skills in engaging service users. However, the issue is often more one of cultural differences and high expectations of cultural integration than one of incompetence.

This paper reports on a drama workshop using techniques from the Theatre of the Oppressed to foster awareness of the complexities of cross cultural communication that BME students may face. The workshop facilitates insight into the nuances of culturally informed values that differ from dominant UK values.

Drawing on student workshop evaluations, the authors highlight the positive use of techniques from the Theatre of the Oppressed as a pro-active pedagogical approach to equipping BME students with insight and skill to circumnavigate cross cultural communication in practice and develop awareness of empowering strategies to combat negative paradigms about BME cultures.     

Conducting evaluation in contested terrain: challenges, methodology and approach in an American context

Using case examples, the author describes circumstances under which violence and conflict, overt and covert, have impinged on his evaluation field work. When fear is pervasive, it constrains people's ability and willingness to participate in an evaluation and their candor if they do. It can also be dangerous. Safety and well-being of participants and researchers in his view take priority over the evaluation's goals. Evaluation involving people who are survivors of violence, torture and conflict requires special sensitivity and examples are offered of appropriate methodologies. Stakeholders in evaluations presumably have beneficent interest in a program's success. However in conflict situations ‘malevolent’ stakeholders, who standing to gain from a project's failure, will actively try to thwart it. Undermining the evaluation as well and impugning the evaluator's objectivity, skill, knowledge and credibility are among the tactics they employ. Evaluators are urged to stay attuned to field conditions, consider alternative methods and locations for collecting data and be self-conscious and deliberate about how their study and role are defined and understood by contending parties.     

The dog that hasn't barked: assimilation and resistance in Inner Mongolia,China

As one of China's five autonomous regions, Inner Mongolia has not been highlighted in the international news, and the Mongols have not demonstrated significant political will for greater autonomy in the way the Tibetans and the Uighurs have in recent decades. Why haven't the Mongols mobilized? This paper argues that the Mongols' lack of aspiration for greater autonomy is in part due to the relationship between Inner Mongolia and Mongolia as an independent kin state. The different trajectories of national identity construction in these two places and the perception of better living conditions in Inner Mongolia have made the Inner Mongols less anxious about their current incorporation within the Chinese state.     

Future perspectives on work and family dynamics in Southern Europe: the importance of culture and regional contexts

The Southern countries model (Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Greece) take a specific family-oriented approach to work–family reconciliation. They are family-oriented in that they entrust the family with more responsibilities that in other countries. Work–family reconciliation is considered as a political action that gives quite limited and unstable support to encourage women’s labour-market participation; this results in the poor development of external services and in few benefits for women, who have to undertake multiple roles inside and outside the family. In these countries, negotiation is left to the private spheres of the couple or local communities, so that each family can decide on the best way to use the existing policies and consider the possibilities available to them. In this sense it is not possible only to apply ‘outside models’ (such as the Nordic, French, German, etc.) to find an effective approach for these countries. The special issue, starting from the current situation explores possibilities for future scenarios in Southern Europe countries concerning work–family dynamics. It includes general comparative papers or case study on work-care arrangements, family and care policies, early childhood education and care (ECEC) with regard to family well-being, gender equality, fertility or father involvement in Southern European countries.     

Shifting categories,changing attitudes: A boundary work approach in the study of attitudes toward migrants

Considerable research exists that examines attitudes toward migrants. Most studies are quantitative, relying on surveys or survey experiments, but a growing body of literature explores such attitudes from a qualitative perspective. At the same time, the study of symbolic boundaries and how people use cultural repertoires of meanings to draw distinctions between “us” and “them” is increasing. This review looks at research, both quantitative and qualitative, which has put these two streams of work into conversation with one another. We organize this work along three dimensions: (1) the micro-level of individuals and their life-worlds; (2) the meso-level of negotiation among the moral communities of civil society; and (3) the macro-level of institutions and policy. We also highlight those studies that cut across levels. By doing so, we help bridge the quantitative/qualitative divide. Studying attitudes toward migrants through the concept of symbolic boundaries allows us to apply a more sensitive and meaning-centered approach toward attitude formation, contestation and change and to explore the linkages to available cultural repertoires.     

Elder mistreatment in underserved populations: Opportunities and challenges to developing a contemporary program of research

ABSTRACT

This article provides an overview of the status of research on elder mistreatment among underserved populations in the United States, including gaps in our current knowledge base and scientific and structural barriers to growing research on the exploitation, neglect, and abuse of older people from diverse and disadvantaged ethnic/racial, geographic, sexual identity, and socioeconomic groups. High-priority areas in need of new elder mistreatment research with underserved populations are identified, and suggestions are given for how this research can be facilitated by researchers, university institutional review boards, and funding agencies.     

Teaching in Iran: culture and consequences

The purpose of this paper is to examine cultural effects on interactions within a Canadian MBA programme delivered in Iran. The analysis helps illuminate some of the important cultural differences between the countries and their importance for international education. The study also illustrates how single cause explanations often provide simplistic interpretations of culturally influenced behaviours. Results indicate that underlying cultural differences create issues for teaching and learning, but that their impact is subtle and complex.     

Negotiating employability: migrant capitals and networking strategies for Zimbabwean highly skilled migrants in the UK

In this paper we focus on highly skilled migration from Zimbabwe to the UK, exploring these migrants’ social capital sources/structures and content. In doing so we pay attention to routes of migration and how they shape migrants’ networking capabilities and patterns. We further take a Bourdieusian perspective and explore the intersection between social capital and cultural capital in the process of migrants’ negotiation of employment opportunities, giving closer attention to how the distinctive habitus associated with being highly skilled migrants from Zimbabwe shape migrants’ attitudes towards work. By exploring the interplay between external processes and internalised structures, we bring to the fore the multiple positioning of our participants, who we see not as simply depending on social networks, but as complex actors whose negotiation of employability in the UK is shaped by various factors including intersecting aspects of differentiation.     

Bullying and ethnic diversity: investigating their relation in the school setting

This particular study investigated school bullying in relation to ethnic diversity in Cyprus. The research involved 469, 8–14 years old pupils of Cypriot origin and 83 pupils of non-Cypriot origin. Two different questionnaires, one for Cypriot and one for non-Cypriot students, were used and data was analyzed using the SPSS statistical package. The findings showed that ethnic diversity seems to be a factor that can precipitate school bullying and victimization in Cypriot primary and secondary schools, that non-Cypriot students feel more victimized than their Cypriot classmates and that they prefer to share their experiences relating to bullying with someone outside of the school. Additionally, the study revealed that verbal and psychological bullying were the most common kinds of bullying that Cypriot and non-Cypriot students faced, and that both groups limit their knowledge of each other to ‘songs, language, food and games’. The study also showed that the teacher’s role in facing and preventing bullying related to ethno-cultural diversity is critical. Finally, citizenship education and the use of mediation techniques are proposed as a means to foster non- Cypriot students’ social inclusion and, thus, prevent their victimization.     

Places of socialization and (sub)ethnic identities among Asian immigrants in the US: evidence from the 2007 Chinese American Homeland Politics Survey

This research provides an empirical assessment of the relationship between places of socialization and ethnic self-identity preferences among Asian immigrants in the US from separate parts of a politically divided homeland. Does place of socialization influence the (sub)ethnic self-identity of Chinese Americans raised in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong? How do socialization context and transnational political concerns, among other factors, help structure the relationship? Benefiting from recent advancements in targeted ethnic sampling and telephone survey methodology, this paper examines results of the 2007 Chinese American Homeland Politics Survey to study the contour and sources of ethnic identity preferences among Chinese in the US from separate homeland origins. The usefulness of a theoretical framework that contrasts primordial ties with transnational political ties in understanding the structuring of identity preferences at the subethnic level is tested.     

Between Two Worlds: Slovak Language and American Identity in Out of This Furnace

Abstract

Thomas Bell’s 1941 novel Out of This Furnace, a fictionalized account of his family’s immigration from eastern Slovakia to industrial Pittsburgh, is a significant example of the use of ‘mixed languages’ in ethnic American literature. It was translated from English into Slovak in 1949 as Dva svety (Two Worlds). The novel has bridged the gap between Slovak and American culture in the three ways explored here: Bell’s use of Slovak dialect, the Slovak translation, and two dramatic adaptations from the 1970s (an American play and a Slovak televised film). This case illuminates the complex relationship between ethnic American writers and their lands of origin, particularly in the case of less commonly spoken languages.     

Jordan's Principle and Indigenous Children with Disabilities in Canada: Jurisdiction,Advocacy, and Research

This article discusses Indigenous¹¹In this article, the terms Indigenous, First Nations, Aboriginal, and Treaty Indian are used interchangeably, and as needed to describe the political reality of the First Peoples of Canada. children with disabilities in Canada and examines their experiences with federal and provincial jurisdictional and funding disputes. It explores Canada's adversarial legal and policy techniques to delay implementation and funding of Jordan's Principle, a Canadian Human Rights Tribunal action seeking to address the delays, and the recommendations of a recent independent Canadian research project. Finally, it suggests ways to advance Jordan's Principle in Canada and elsewhere.     

The Ackerman Institute: a journey of culture and diversity over six decades. A conversation with Evan Imber-Black

The Ackerman Institute for the Family, established in 1960 by Dr Nathan Ackerman, stands as one of the oldest and most respected family therapy institutes in the United States. Ackerman pioneered the integration of systemic insights into group settings, emphasised the crucial role of family in therapy, and advocated for the advancement and acceptance of family therapy. ‘The Ackerman’ played a pivotal role in launching Family Process, the first journal dedicated to academic activities in family therapy. Diversity and inclusion have been central tenets of Ackerman philosophy, evident in its programs, training courses, and staff composition. This commitment has produced a veritable cadre of family therapy leaders who have contributed significantly to both the Ackerman Institute and the profession, influencing policy decisions and clinical practices. One of the most esteemed and respected thought leaders and innovators of our field, who played a vital role in the legacy of several institutions, including the Ackerman, is Dr. Evan Imber-Black. She served as a long-time faculty member and director of the Ackerman Center for Families and Health. Her expertise encompasses the exploration of family rituals and family secrets, with a focus on the importance of rituals in providing meaning, identity, and connection across diverse cultures and family life cycles. As editor of Family Process for 8 years, she highlights the importance of examining scholarly work in the context of cultures as a requirement – we do not stand outside the culture – we are active participants. This paper is based on a conversation with Dr Evan Imber-Black, held in June 2023, delving into her personal and professional experiences, her connection to the Ackerman Institute, and her influential work on family rituals and secrets. Through this exploration, the paper sheds light on her commitment to diversity and the lasting impact of Dr Imber-Black's contributions to family therapy.     

Resettlement and Border Crossing: A Comparative Study on the Life and Ethnicity of Vietnamese in Australia and Japan

Abstract: This paper deals with the life world and ethnic identity of Vietnamese residents who entered and settled in Australia and Japan as refugees after the end of the Vietnam War. It focuses on how social and cultural conditions in the host countries and global influences affect the lives of overseas Vietnamese and consequently transform their ethnic identities. Through this comparative research study conducted in Australia and Japan, I have focussed on Vietnamese religion, social networks, perceptions of the homeland and the host country, notions of Vietnamese identity between generations, and images of Vietnamese in the media of the host country. I explore the features of each host society in accepting refugees and also the commonalities and differences in how the overseas Vietnamese construct their life world and ethnic identity. I also discuss the “location of Vietnamese identities” in Australia and Japan. I will also rethink the meaning of “settlement” and “crossing borders” related to the politics of Vietnamese identities that confirm the importance of investigating the effects of displacement on the life of the Vietnamese diaspora in contemporary world context.     

Everyone deserves quiche: French school lunch programmes and national culture in a globalized world

Globalization poses many challenges for national cultural unity, especially in Europe. Some doubt whether national cultures will be able to survive, but there are many counter‐trends pushing to maintain national cultural unity. I analyse the dual trends of global diversity and maintaining unity through an everyday manifestation of French culture: elementary school lunches. French school lunch programmes are part of the nation‐building process because they are designed to teach students how to eat, which is especially important in France where the art of gastronomy is a key source of identity and pride. I analyse cultural influences on over 11,000 school lunch menu items from eight municipalities across two French regions. I also conduct in‐depth face‐to‐face interviews with the people who design and approve school lunch menus. My inquiry is guided by three key questions. First, to what extent are foreign influences included? Second, does openness to foreign influences vary across different parts of France? Finally, how are foreign cultures represented? My results suggest that foreign cultures are deployed to nationalize difference. The limited foreign influences that appear in school lunches are strategically chosen to appeal to and to educate students, but in a way that reinforces the centrality of traditional French cultural norms. This article contributes to our understanding of the tension between national culture and a globalizing world.