Understanding the Link: “Homosexuality,” Gender Identity,and the DSM

This article reviews the historical and present notions of identity, in relation to sexual orientation and gender identity within counseling. It also discusses the link between the historical pathologizing of homosexuality and gender identity, as well as summarizes the implications of the diagnosis of gender dysphoria (GD) as outlined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (5th ed.; DSM-5). The ethics of maintaining GD in the DSM-5 and future diagnostic manuals is discussed. Finally, a brief explanation of the role of the counselor in working with transgender individuals is given.     

“The Vital Force”: Visuality and the National Economy

Although it has often been conceived as a material or already‐existing kind of category, the “economy”, before it can be governed, must first be “made up” and constituted in particular ways. This paper seeks to contribute to recent genealogies of the “economy” by highlighting the role of one particular “cultural” technology–the techniques of visuality–in the making up of the national economy during the interwar and postwar periods. To develop this analysis, this paper reviews the ways in which private and public financial initiatives turned to visuality and advertising as a way to appeal more directly to and mobilize working class and everyday populations. In these appeals to “popular finance” visual techniques were used to diagram both a reworked conception of the national economy as well as the modes of citizenship key to this rationality of national economic space. This case also helps underscore the heterogeneity with which the national economy was assembled as a mode of economic governance constituted in multiple and never‐completed kinds of ways. Highlighting this heterogeneity, this paper concludes, is important especially in the context of discussions of “globalization” which are, once again, provoking questions relating to the very making of economic space, practice and identity.     

From “dot.org” to “dot.gov”: Professional Crossings in the Brazilian National Policy on HIV/AIDS

This article reflects on the importance of the relations between state and society in policy-making in the area of public health. Several studies in various sectors such as health, education, and social services have made similar observations on organizational dynamics and the institutionalization of different models of partnerships or contracts, often based on the analytical model of three sectors. Individuals and their networks of relationships, however, remain an almost unexplored dimension in these types of research. Against this backdrop, this study seeks to analyze the movement of HIV/AIDS activists to governmental organizations working in this same field. The analysis raises questions concerning the forms of individual and institutional learning that help to maintain the distinct character of innovation of the Brazilian policy. Professionals who cross the borders hold a different profile once they have accumulated experience working with grassroots and local NGOs, and have also had the chance to be trained and enhance their technical and managerial capacities, since the government has supported NGOs for a long period. When combined, these experiences allow them to maintain relationships with social movements and give them the ability to navigate through the government bureaucracy and handle technical information about fighting AIDS epidemics, making it possible for them to negotiate strategic collaborations reflecting the interests of different groups. Hence, they constantly reflect on the differences between government and social spaces, and keep questioning and modifying their roles in the light of potential and existing complementarities.     

“FOB” and “Whitewashed”: Identity and Internalized Racism Among Second Generation Asian Americans

An analysis of 184 in-depth interviews with grown children of Korean and Vietnamese immigrants finds that the racial beliefs, meanings, and stereotypes of the mainstream society shape how they think about coethnics, generate local identities, and deflect stigma from themselves. We examine the terms FOB (Fresh Off the Boat) and whitewashed that were commonly deployed to denigrate coethnic others as too ethnic or too assimilated while casting those at the bicultural middle as the normals. We describe how this system of intraethnic othering serves as a basis for sub-ethnic identities, intraethnic social boundaries, and the monitoring and control of social behavior. We draw on the concept of internalized racial oppression in framing our findings.     

The End of Football and Fiesta? Social Insurrection and National Identity in Twenty-First-Century Brazil

ABSTRACT

Carnaval and futebol (football) have both been central to the construction of Brazil in the imagination of global audiences. This includes contributing to stereotypes of Brazil as a country of peaceful, festive, and sensualized people, even though historically Brazilian Carnaval and football have always been sites of social contestation and popular participation in the construction of collective identity. In recent years, Brazil has burst onto the global stage as a key player due to its economic rise, its more proactive international diplomacy, and its venture as the host of major global sport events. Protest and political violence have erupted on the streets of Brazil in a manner quite at odds with the circulating reports on the ‘success story' of Brazil. A combination of the country's increasing global prominence and developments in media and communication technologies of the global era means that global and local audiences have access to more detailed, nuanced, and grounded information about Brazil than has ever been possible before. This moment of intensified visibility has brought Brazil's imagined identity (both within Brazil and within the global imaginary) to a turning point; one where national symbols such as Carnaval and football are declining in relevance. In this article we argue that due to this combination of forces, Carnaval and football, at least in their manufactured forms that are visible to global audiences, no longer have the popular potency within Brazil that they once did, but have rather become what Bakhtin would call ‘mere spectacles’. We consider Carnaval and football within historical and contemporary context drawing upon a variety of sources, including secondary literature and mainstream and alternative media reports.     

“Giant Leap 1”: A Social and Emotional Learning program's effects on the transition to first grade

This study analyzed how student characteristics influenced the effects of a Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) program implemented in the first grade. A total of 14 teachers and 228 children participated in the study: 144 children participated in the SEL intervention program (including 65 pre-school children, group II), and 84 children composed the control group. The pre- and post-test assessments involved hetero- (teacher) and self-reporting (child) scales. The SEL intervention produced significant gains in the children's relationships with their peers, academic behavior, social skills, emotional knowledge, school learning skills, and school, behavioral, and social adjustment, independent of their previous skill level or gender. The SEL intervention was effective at improving the interpersonal strength of children with previously low skill levels, the intrapersonal and total strength of children of parents with a secondary level of education (groups I and II), and preventing the disruption of school functioning in children with parents with a higher education level (group II).     

Replication: Emotional well-being and unemployment – Evidence from the American time-use survey

We use data from the well-being module of the American Time-Use Survey (ATUS) 2010–2013 to reexamine the relationship between unemployment and emotional well-being. We replicate two previous studies (Krueger & Mueller, 2012; Dolan, Kudrna, & Stone, 2017) which have produced differing findings on this relationship, and analyze what factors cause the differences in their outcomes. We find that the results critically depend on the definition of employment statuses and the choice of well-being measure. The unemployed appear sadder and more in pain than the employed, but no other emotion queried in the ATUS has worse values for the unemployed than for the employed. Aggregate emotional well-being measures suggest that unemployment is not negatively related to emotional well-being. Applying a wider instead of narrow definition of unemployment tends to result in better emotional well-being scores for the unemployed, mainly because job leavers and new or re-entrants into the labor market report better emotions than the group of people who are unemployed due to an involuntary job loss.     

“Oh,No, I'm Not Infertile”: Culture,Support Groups,and the Infertile Identity

Abstract

Using in-depth interviews with forty subfecund women, I explore how subfecundity affects a woman's sense of self. I examine the role that culture plays in the content of our identities, particularly in disrupted lives. I examine the role that culture, in particular the culture within a support group, plays in the content of infertile identities. I examine how some women come to see themselves as infertile while others do not, and how the women come to think about infertility in relation to the self. I employ theories of cultural sociology and identity to provide a framework for explaining the ways in which subfecund women draw on the cultures of support groups in reconstructing their selves in the face of subfecundity.     

First Contact: Queer Theory, Sexual Identity, and “Mainstream” Film

This paper begins by raising questions about the role of queer theory in media critique, centering on a discussion of four recent mainstream mass-circulation films with significant lesbian and/or gay content. It is asserted that these films operate within accepted discourses on sexuality that require both the notions of public self-disclosure and of the truth of the hetero/homo binary. The methods used by media productions to disseminate that discourse from a lesbian/gay point of view are discussed in terms of the implications of such mass-circulation films being for many persons a first contact point with that discourse.     

“There are traitors among us”: On the Emotional Vicissitudes of Populist Politics

This article examines fellowship and accusations of betrayal among members of a populist movement in contemporary Argentina. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted among self-described “militants” of the Kirchnerist movement, a contemporary iteration of Peronism, this work makes a uniquely anthropological intervention into existing literature on populist politics, which tends to focus on populism’s demonization of the enemy of “the people.” In contrast, this article argues that a focus on the demonization of an external enemy misses essential dimensions of the social world of Peronist politics, which is primarily characterized by loving bonds of fellowship between Peronist militants. I show how, in moments of uncertainty, this emphasis on fellowship morphs into a preoccupation with treachery, such that concern with the potential insubordination of one’s fellow Peronists eclipses animus towards external enemies. This article argues for greater attention to the lived experiences of adherents to populist movements to encourage a more holistic and nuanced understanding of the social world of populist politics.     

“It Represents Me:” Tattooing Mixed-Race Identity

Abstract

Research on tattoos reveals that desire for something to “mark their bodies with indelible symbols of what they see themselves to be” has become a main driver behind contemporary tattoo acquisitions (Sanders 1989 Sanders, Clinton R. 1989. Customizing the Body: The Art and Culture of Tattooing. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. [Google Scholar]:61). One identity that researchers have recently begun to investigate with regard to expression via tattoos is race; however, exploration considering those with multiple racial heritages, that is, mixed-race people, is lacking. This article begins to illuminate this lacuna by drawing on in-depth interviews with mixed-race people in the United States and United Kingdom to examine the practice and meaning behind their tattoos. Finding both similarities and differences, both between mixed- and single-heritage individuals and between mixed-race people of different heritages, this study adds to scholarly knowledge of the ways in which various identities are being expressed, or not, via tattooing.     

Hybridity Brazilian Style: Samba,Carnaval, and the Myth of “Racial Democracy” in Rio de Janeiro

Through ethnographic and historical inquiry, this article inspects the usefulness of the concept of hybridity for an analysis of Rio's samba and carnaval. If differentiated from mestiçagem, the concept of hybridity can productively be put to use. The discourse on mestiçagem is the basis for dominant narratives of national identity and celebrates samba and other Afro-Brazilian cultural forms as symbols of Brazilianness and racial democracy. Such political use of culture was initiated by President Vargas's appropriation of subaltern performance genres in his populist project of modernity. At the same time, as expressions of Afro-Brazilian culture, samba and carnaval are contested performances; many celebrate the “racially democratic” character of samba spaces as a core domain of Afro-Brazilian sociability. This article traces the roots of samba and carnaval in Rio de Janeiro and examines their current import for a politics of identity by drawing from interviews and fieldwork at escola de samba Unidos da Cereja. The article stresses the methodological importance of addressing multiple practices and voices emerging in the context of samba performances. The concept of hybridity can thus describe Afro-Brazilians' use of culture in the negotiation of power imbalances and alternative values.     

Shifting STEM Stereotypes? Considering the Role of Peer and Teacher Gender

This study builds on research on the power of counter‐stereotypical cues, as well as intergroup contact theory, to consider whether interactions with a female teacher and female peers in a high school engineering classroom decrease male students' gender/science, technology, engineering, and math stereotypical beliefs and whether this varies according to the initial strength of their stereotypical views. Analyses reveal that among male students who initially reject stereotypes of male superiority, more female peers in the classroom leads to a further decrease in their stereotypical views by the end of the year. In contrast, boys who held strong stereotypical beliefs became less stereotypical by the end of the course when they had a female teacher. Implications for future research and current educational reforms are discussed.     

“Live in Israel. Live the Dream”: Identity,Belonging, and Contemporary American Jewish Migration to Israel

Most current sociological literature on migration examines international moves to the United States and internal migration. Scant research addresses religious migration out of the United States. Utilizing in-depth, semi-structured interviews, we explore motivations behind recent American Jewish migration to Israel and how Jewish identity plays a role in the decision to move. We find that a combination of religious and cultural factors, Zionism, social networks, and the desire for a new start play a major role in motivating migration to Israel. Jewish identity is a common thread across these motivations. Many participants created a strong bond between their Judaism and Israel, viewing their connection to Israel as a way to belong to a larger community and demonstrate their attachment to Judaism. We discuss the implications for studying religious emigration from the United States that move beyond traditional economic models.     

Finding “Me” Again: Women's Postdivorce Identity Shifts

The purpose of this study was to explore women's identity shifts as they navigate their postdivorce lives. We conducted in-depth, loosely structured interviews with 31 women who had been through at least 1 divorce. Interviews included questions about how women experienced life after divorce, specifically addressing changes they made to separate from the marriage and form a postdivorce identity. Patterns emerged regarding the process of identity change in 3 distinct domains: physical appearance, physical surroundings, and marital artifacts. Results are discussed in terms of the interplay between internal and external changes and the retrospective nature of the identity shifts.