Sixteen years ofJapa: A content analysis of theJournal of the Australian Population Association

This paper presents results of a content analysis of all articles published in theJournal of the Australian Population Association during its sixteen-year history, 1984–99. The findings show that geographic focus, principal subject area and analytical procedure did not change significantly over the period. About three-quarters of articles focused exclusively on Australia and the most common subject areas were fertility and migration. Most articles had one author but this declined over time. Females constituted only one-fifth of sole and first authors and one-quarter of all authors; these proportions decreased in recent periods. About two-fifths of first and all authors were affiliated with the Australian National University. The findings are compared with those of a similar analysis ofDemography.     

Retrospective evidence of a decline of fertility and child mortality in Bangladesh

A detailed analysis of survey data collected in 1961–1962 for a sample of 4200 families in central East Pakistan produced consistent and reasonable estimates of birth and death rates for the preceding decade. Extremely high levels of infant and child mortality declined noticeably in the period 1952–1961. Age-specific birth rates to married women also decreased in the decade for women over the age of 19, while a small increase was recorded for married women aged 15 to 19. During the 1950s total marital fertility declined about one-fifth. Birth rates remained high in 1960 according to these estimates, but there is reason to anticipate further reductions in birth rates, particularly among older women. To improve understanding of the determinants of fertility and to aid in the formulation of policy to cope with population trends, statistical analysis must increasingly consider information on families over time. Retrospective household survey data may provide the empirical base for this line of inquiry.     

Demographers and Their Journals: Who Remains Uncited After Ten Years?

This research note examines the level of uncitedness and the impact of articles published in the years 1990–92 in 17 demography journals. After ten years 24 percent of the demography articles are still uncited and the average number of citations per article is seven. The ten‐year citation history reveals two novel insights. First, the impact of demography journals does not slow down significantly over time. The average number of citations in the first five years hardly differs from the average in the second five years, which suggests that one should be patient in assessing the full effect of demography articles. Second, the chance of being cited for the first time does not depend on the length of time an article remains uncited. In other words, the stigma of uncitedness does not play a significant role in the allocation of citations.     

Towards a Discursive Analytics of Movement: On the Making and Unmaking of Movement as an Object of Knowledge

This paper takes as its point of departure the expanding scholarly interest in issues of mobility and movement. It argues that movement is not only a physical activity which is entangled in power and meaning but is fundamentally discursively constituted. Through discussions of theory and of three examples taken from the Danish media, it is shown that the study of movement cannot be separated from that of discursive power. Access to and control over physical movement is unequally distributed. However, so is access to and control over assessing which activities can meaningfully be given the label ‘movement’ in the first place. Understanding movement in this way leads us to ask how various activities are given the status of ‘movement’, as well as how they are given meaning and importance, by whom and with what consequences. This involves asking how the poles between which movement takes place are themselves identified; how the distinction and the relationship between inside and outside are designated; and how distinctions between movement and stasis inform political and cultural struggle.     

Wing dimorphism and the migratory syndrome: Correlated traits for migratory tendency in wing dimorphic insects

The hypothesis that the morphological, physiological, and behavioral traits comprising the migratory syndrome in insects are genetically correlated through pleiotropic effects of genes controlling the titre of a common hormonal determinant is explored. Evidence that juvenile hormone (JH) influences the component traits of the migratory syndrome is presented, and thus JH is assumed to be the underlying, common determinant. However, readers are cautioned that this does not imply that JH is solely responsible for these traits, nor is this necessary for the arguments presented. For wing dimorphic taxa, the “correlated traits hypothesis” predicts covariance within wing morphs between JH titre and the proportion winged. Four simple genetic models for wing-morph determination are considered: single-locus with short-winged (SW) dominant; single-locus with long-winged (LW) dominant; polygenic, fixed threshold, shifting distribution; and polygenic, shifting threshold, fixed distribution. In each case, wing morphology is assumed to be a threshold trait with the liability being JH titre at some critical stage of development. All models predict covariation between %LW and the mean JH titre of at least one of the wing morphs, but the form and direction of the relationship depends critically on the genetic model used. The results suggest that we should expect the traits associated with the migratory syndrome, and hence the trade-offs associated with the evolution of wing dimorphism, to be correlated with proportion winged and, in this sense, to be frequency-dependent.     

Written In Blood

Though the heated scientific debate that sociobiology initially generated has largely subsided, speculation on the genetic basis of social behaviors remains a thriving academic discipline and provides valuable content that can be easily translated into compelling newspaper articles, popular magazines, and self-help mass market paperbacks. In Cosmopolitan magazine, statements reflecting the genetic gender-determinism of sociobiology appear in offhand remarks, personal anecdotes, and in lengthy quotations attributed to experts with PhDs. My textual analysis of this sociobiological common sense in Cosmopolitan articles from 1995–2005 represents an in-depth case study of the migration of gender-related science to a popular culture venue for women. I examine the sociobiological theory that norms of female attractiveness advertise reproductive capacity, drawing connections between scholarly works, popular self-help literature, and Cosmopolitan articles. The magazine invokes sociobiological logic to explain and legitimate the laborious techniques of femininity, positioning the female body as a commodity in the marketplace of evolved male desire and reducing it to the signs—real or cosmetically simulated—that reveal the body's underlying reproductive value. I also investigate how Cosmopolitan uses sociobiological common sense about men to construct, exaggerate, and excuse their bad behavior, requiring women to solve or tolerate it. Sociobiology responds to gender inequalities by offering a seemingly rational scientific model asserting that existing gender norms and differences are natural and inevitable.     

Estimating infant mortality trends from child survivorship data

Summary Brass's procedure for estimating mortality from census or survey data on numbers of children born to women by age group and numbers of children surviving is generalized to allow the estimation of mortality trends. The new procedure is applied to data for Costa Rica and peninsular Malaysia. The resulting infant mortality rate estimates are compared with rates calculated from vital registration figures. The comparisons suggest, surprisingly, that the estimates derived from statistics for women aged 30-50 are not noticeably inferior to those derived from those for women aged 20-30. This suggests that the common practice of disregarding statistics for women aged over 30 or 35 years may be a mistake. Figures are presented which suggest that estimates based on women aged less than 20 are likely to be very seriously biased because of differential infant mortality by age of mother at birth.     

Media Coverage of the Greenhouse Effect

Following brief reviews of (a) the decisive role of the media in American politics and (b) earlier studies of media partiality and superficiality, this paper examines media coverage of the greenhouse effect. It does so by comparing two pictures. The first picture emerges from reading all 100 greenhouse-related articles published over a five-month period (May–September 1997) inThe Christian Science Monitor, New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, andThe Washington Post. The second picture emerges from themainstream scientific literature. This comparison shows that media coverage of environmental issues suffers from both shallowness and pro-corporate bias. The biospheric implications of these two flaws are touched upon. Printers are educated in the Belief that when Men differ in Opinion, both Sides ought equally to have the Advantage of being heard by the Publick; and that when Truth and Error have fair Play, the former is always an overmatch for the latter. Dr. Benjamin Franklin Editor, The Pennsylvania Gazette, 1729–1748 I really look with commiseration over the great body of my fellow citizens, who, reading newspapers, live and die in the belief that they have known something of what has been passing in the world in their time. Thomas Jefferson, 1807 Third President of the United States, 1801-9     

On the theory of stable populations: A new and elementary proof of the theorems under weaker assumptions

Expositions and elementary proofs are given for the basic theorems of stable population theory: That a population subjected to vital rates (not necessarily constant over time) satisfying certain postulates will eventually "forget" its original age distribution and take on one (not necessarily constant over time) which depends only on its history of agespecific vital rates, a process called "weak ergodicity." That consequently the subsequent birth, death, and growth rates (none of these necessarily constant over time) depend only on the history of age-specific vital rates and not on the original age distribution. And, in particular, that these results apply to the special case, herein called "classic" stable population theory, in which the age-specific vital rates are constant over time, and in which after the "forgetting" takes place the subsequent age distribution and birth, death, and growth rates all become constant. This formulation of the theory differs from previous ones in two respects: First, the postulates required are weaker, and hence the theorems more general, than previously; in particular, this formulation permits the highest age of childbearing to change from cohort to cohort, which is important for populations practicing contraception. Second, none of the advanced mathematics used in previous formulations is needed; only the manipulation of sums and inequalities from high school algebra and the concept of "limit" from freshman calculus are required.     

Get a job and keep it! High school employment and adult wealth accumulation

Wealth inequality receives substantial scholarly attention, but mounting evidence suggests that childhood and adolescent traits and experiences contribute to financial disparities in the United States. This study examines the relationship between adolescent labor force participation and adult wealth accumulation. I argue that employed high school students gain practical life skills, abilities, and knowledge from work experience and business exposure that shape investment decisions and affect overall net worth. I use the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979 cohort, to empirically explore this idea. This study extends the wealth literature by identifying adolescent employment as an important mechanism that improves adult net worth and financial well-being.     

The Preliminary Demography of the 2001 Census of India

This note presents and comments on the provisional results of the 2001 census of India. For the first time since Independence in 1947 there is clear evidence that the country's intercensal rate of population growth has fallen significantly—from an average annual rate of 2.14 percent between 1981 and 1991 to a rate of 1.93 percent between 1991 and 2001. At the state level there has been little change in the rates of population growth in Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, but there are signs of—often quite considerable—reductions in growth rates for most of the remaining states. The provisional census results suggest that there has been a decline in India's population masculinity compared to 1991. But the note contends that this decline is probably largely spurious because females were less fully enumerated in 1991 than they were in 2001. Indeed the sex ratios of the states of Punjab, Haryana, Maharashtra, and Gujarat have become noticeably more masculine, which may partly reflect the influence of sex‐selective abortion.     

Investigating sexuality discourses in the U.K. secondary English curriculum

This article reports on findings from a small-scale study that investigated sexuality discourses in the U.K. secondary English curriculum. In addition to conducting a critical analysis of English curriculum documents, interviews were also conducted with some English teachers and young lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT)-identified people who attended, or had recently left, secondary school in Birmingham, U.K. Key findings indicate that issues around sexual diversity are noticeably absent from the curriculum, while other forms of diversity are more visible. This means that teachers are not explicitly encouraged to explore sexual diversity in their teaching, and the effects of this on young LGBT-identified people are overwhelmingly negative.     

“Everyone Can Make Games!”: The post-feminist context of women in digital game production

After over a decade of scholarly research and well-documented harassment, sexism, and other forms of exclusion and marginalization, digital games culture is currently the object of heightened attention and discourse related to diversity and inclusion. This paper considers the context of this shift with a particular focus on the relationship between gender-focused inclusivity-based action in the form of women-in-games incubators, post-feminist discourse, and the neoliberal context of digital games production. As opposed to rife anti-feminism and similar “backlash” sentiments, articulations of post-feminism within the digital game industry provide insights into the tensions inherent in introducing action for change within a conservative culture of production, particularly for women in the industry. At the same time, the contradictions and tensions of the post-feminist ethos allow for actions that function through this logic while subverting it. Through a brief consideration of three exemplary post-feminist articulations by visible female figures in the North American digital games community, this article explores the challenges and opportunities presented by the gaps and contradictions of post-feminism in games culture and production. It concludes with equal measures of caution and optimism, indicating future directions for study and activism.     

Intercountry adoption in the new millennium; the ``quiet migration' revisited

Intercountry adoption is not usually seen as a matter for demographers, although articles in the International Migration Review have looked at international adoption as a migratory process. This article outlines the author's estimate of the number of intercountry adoptions world-wide, using data recorded by 18 receiving states in the 1990s. Data from selected receiving countries are used to estimate the number of adoptions from states of origin. Comparisons are made with data for 14 countries over the period 1980–89 collated by Kane (1993).The global estimate of at least 32,000 adoptions in 1998 is much higher than thenumbers usually cited and suggest a rise of fifty percent over the previous decade.Total numbers are dominated by adoptions to the United States and from China andRussia. However standardisation against population size or number of live birthssuggests that the highest rates among receiving states are to be found in Scandinavia,while the highest rates for states of origin are in countries of Eastern Europe, followedby Korea – countries typified by very low birth rates. The article ends with a discussion of the implications of these findings for the future of international controls and the implementation of the 1993 Hague Convention.     

What we learned from the Dust Bowl: lessons in science,policy, and adaptation

This article provides a review and synthesis of scholarly knowledge of Depression-era droughts on the North American Great Plains, a time and place known colloquially as the Dust Bowl era or the Dirty Thirties. Recent events, including the 2008 financial crisis, severe droughts in the US corn belt, and the release of a popular documentary film, have spawned a resurgence in public interest in the Dust Bowl. Events of the Dust Bowl era have also proven in recent years to be of considerable interest to scholars researching phenomena related to global environmental change, including atmospheric circulation, drought modeling, land management, institutional behavior, adaptation processes, and human migration. In this review, we draw out common themes in terms of not only what natural and social scientists have learned about the Dust Bowl era itself, but also how insights gained from the study of that period are helping to enhance our understanding of climate–human relations more generally.     

Family matters: The impact of kin on the mortality of the elderly in rural Bangladesh

This study uses high quality longitudinal data on kin availability, proximity, and marital status from the Matlab surveillance area in rural Bangladesh to explore the impact of kin members on the survival of the elderly over a six year period. The results - from discrete time hazard models- suggest that the presence of a spouse, sons, and brothers substantially improves survivorship, but with differing effects by the sex of the elderly and the number of sons and brothers. This study offers little support of any of the following as mechanisms by which kin affect the survival of the elderly: changes in the economic status of the elderly as proxied by land holdings; improved access to instrumental support as proxied by the marital status of sons; decreases in social isolation as proxied by proximity of kin.     

The demography of American Indian families

This paper uses data from the decennial censuses to examine family structure and changes in family structure over time among American Indians. The information about the national Indian population indicates that the trends in family structure among American Indians are parallel in many respects to those in the general US population. That is, the percentage of young American Indian women who have never married has increased over time, the percentage of American Indian women who are divorced has increased over time, and the percentage of American Indian children who reside with a single parent has increased as well. The percentage of American Indian women who have never married and who are divorced and the percentage of American Indian children who live with a single parent are higher than those among the general population. The incidence of children living with single parents is especially high on some reservations which also have high levels of poverty and unemployment. Family patterns, however, vary considerably across reservations in ways that are not easily explained by differences in other demographic characteristics. These variations may be due to cultural and historical differences that are not captured in data collected in the censuses.     

Declining Segregation of Same-Sex Partners: Evidence from Census 2000 and 2010

Despite recent media and scholarly attention describing the “disappearance” of traditionally gay neighborhoods, urban scholars have yet to quantify the segregation of same-sex partners and determine whether declining segregation from different-sex partners is a wide-spread trend. Focusing on the 100 most populous places in the United States, I use data from the 2000 and 2010 Decennial Census to examine the segregation of same-sex partners over time and its place-level correlates. I estimate linear regression models to examine the role of four place characteristics in particular: average levels of education, aggregate trends in the family life cycle of same-sex partners, violence and social hostility motivated by sexual orientation bias, and representation of same-sex partners in the overall population. On average, same-sex partners were less segregated from different-sex partners in 2010 than in 2000, and the vast majority of same-sex partners lived in environments of declining segregation. Segregation was lower and declined more rapidly in places that had a greater percentage of graduate degree holders. In addition, segregation of female partners was lower in places that had a greater share of female partner households with children. These findings suggest that sexual orientation should be considered alongside economic status, race, and ethnicity as an important factor that contributes to neighborhood differentiation and urban spatial inequality.     

An Intersectional Analysis of LGBTQ Online Media Coverage of the Pulse Nightclub Shooting Victims

ABSTRACT

This study illustrates the radical potential of intersectionality to offer a more deeply critical analysis of hierarchies in lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) communities. The author examines how 377 reports from the five most-trafficked LGBTQ Web sites represented victims of the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, FL. Findings support previous scholarship that has emphasized Latinx exclusion, as the articles generally failed to present the victims in an intersectional way, focusing on their LGBTQ status and excluding their Latinx identities. At the same time, a significant minority of the reports emphasized Latinx queer people, most frequently in a way that continued to prioritize LGBTQ identification, sometimes even advancing stereotypical representations of Latinx communities as extraordinarily focused on faith, family, or “machismo.” Moreover, none of the articles considered xenophobia as a potential motivating factor in the shooting, and the reports typically presented policing agencies in a neutral, and sometimes even positive, way.     

Immigration cohorts and residential overcrowding in southern California

To what degree do immigrants reduce their high rates of residential overcrowding with increasing length of residence in the United States? This question is addressed through the application of a “double cohort” method that nests birth cohorts within immigration cohorts. This method enables duration of immigration effects to be separated from aging effects as cohorts pass through life course phases, when family sizes may be growing or shrinking. The analysis finds that cohort trends differ sharply from the cross-sectional pattern observed at a single point in time. Cohorts’ growth in income is found to contribute substantially to the decline in overcrowding over time. Cohort trends among Hispanic immigrants, however, diverge from those among others, indicating much less decrease in overcrowding and even increases over certain age spans.