Hiding in Plain Sight

Abstract

“The Scarab” (1907), a sprawling Shingle-style house in Wellesley, Massachusetts, was built by poet and professor Katharine Lee Bates as a home for herself and her partner Katharine Coman, a social economist and labor activist. Both women had lived and taught at Wellesley College, founded as a single-sex institution for higher education in 1870, for over a quarter of a century. In their new home they adapted many of its hybrid spaces for living and working, surrounding themselves with friends, family, colleagues, and students to form a lively and engaged community of women. While it decisively broke with familiar conventions in both plan and program, “The Scarab” nonetheless fits comfortably in its leafy, suburban neighborhood, demonstrating that this committed couple could “hide in plain sight” while radically queering the terms of early-twentieth-century domesticity.     

Hidden in Plain Sight: Maroon Life and Labor in Virginia's Dismal Swamp

Nineteenth-century maroons in Virginia's Great Dismal Swamp formed communities within communities, whose members were set apart from others not so much by space (an impenetrable wilderness) but by the legal status they renounced, the fugitive status they embraced, and the common goal of creating meaningful lives neither fully within, nor completely apart from, surrounding slave society. The following analysis of one group of Great Dismal Swamp maroons offers scholars a new way to conceptualize marronage in nineteenth-century North America. Rather than look only to remote places for traces of maroon societies, researchers might also consider examining such communities in more settled areas, including centers of large-scale industrial operations, where fugitives carved out identities and negotiated their wages within a biracial labor system that relied upon and supported slavery.     

The Hidden Hitler and the Hidden Reader: Review of The Hidden Hitler by Lother Machtan

Machtan proposes that Hitler, before entering politics, was a practicing homosexual during his early adulthood. Later it became necessary for him to destroy evidence of this stage of his career. The difficulties of satisfactorily substantiating such a claim are discussed, with special reference to 19th-century gay figures. Machtan's book is criticized for not providing adequate analysis of social and institutional forces, as well as his assumption that such personal uncovering is intrinsically informative. Some speculations regarding the recurrent interest in the homosexuality of famous men is offered.     

What sounds beautiful is good: The vocal attractiveness stereotype

Two studies examined the effects of attractiveness of voice and physical appearance on impressions of personality. Subject-senders were videotaped as they read a standard-content text (Study 1) or randomly selected texts (Study 2). Judges rated the senders' vocal attractiveness from the auditory portion of the tape and their physical attractiveness from the visual portion of the tape. Other judges rated the senders' personality on the basis of their voice, face, or face plus voice. Senders with more attractive voices were rated more favorably in both the voice and face plus voice conditions; senders with more attractive faces were rated more favorably in both the face and face plus voice conditions. The effects of both vocal and physical attractiveness were more pronounced in the single channels (voice condition and face condition, respectively) than in the multiple channel (face plus voice condition). Possible antecedents and consequences of the vocal attractiveness stereotype are discussed. p]Her voice was ever soft, gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman.Shakespeare (King Lear, Act V, Sc. 3)This research was supported in part by National Institute Mental Health Grant RO1 MH40498-01A2. The authors would like to thank Thomas J. Hernandez, James R. Laguzza, Andrea Lurier, and Mary Elizabeth Sementilli for running the videotaping sessions in Study 1, and Craig B. Partyka, Kimberly A. Radoane, and Kelly B. Sanborn for running the videotaping sessions in Study 2. Grateful acknowledgment is extended to Kate Johnson and Michael Zygmuntowicz for running rating sessions in Study 2, to BiancaMaria Penati for running rating sessions and coding data in Study 2, and to Bradley C. Olson for his assistance with data analysis.     

What is Qualitative in Research

Qualitative Sociology - In this text we respond and elaborate on the four comments addressing our original article. In that piece we define qualitative research as an “iterative process in...     

The Process is Pedagogy: What Does Community Participation Teach?

Does participation in community activities increase the knowledgeand skills of the volunteers? If so, which knowledge and skillsare gained? What is the relationship between learning throughcommunity activities and a volunteer's age, gender, level ofeducation and level of involvement? To examine these questions, data from a survey conducted ina small American community were used. Respondents were askedif they had learned any new knowledge or skills, or had extendedtheir existing knowledge and skills from participating in communityactivities. The analysis shows that all volunteers increasedtheir knowledge and skills. Most of what they learned was generalknowledge rather than specific skills and was not new but extensionsof existing knowledge. The question format greatly influencedinterviewee response. The authors conclude that people's knowledgeand skills are increased by becoming involved in community activitiesand the greater their involvement, the greater the learning.The process is the teacher!     

What is Qualitative in Qualitative Research

Qualitative Sociology - What is qualitative research? If we look for a precise definition of qualitative research, and specifically for one that addresses its distinctive feature of being...     

What is Old is New Again: Achieving Effectiveness with Volunteer Programs in Kazakhstan

Abstact This study based on Kazakhstan nonprofit organizations (NPOs) is the first to address the important issue of the relationship between volunteer management and volunteer program effectiveness in an international setting. Our inquiry is informed by findings of US scholars that show that the adoption of a recommended set of volunteer management practices is related to the level of effectiveness achieved with volunteer involvement in NPOs. The paper advances a path model to explain volunteer program effectiveness, with volunteer management practices the crucial intermediate variable. Based on data collected in a survey of Almaty (Kazakhstan) NPOs in 2004, the empirical analysis yields considerable support for a path model that focuses on both the adoption of these practices and the attainment of program effectiveness. Given the heterogeneity of NPOs, not every organization can be expected to benefit from the adoption of the recommended practices. Nevertheless, results suggest that they offer one workable means for successfully integrating volunteers.     

The Impact of Sight Loss in Social Work Practice

Abstract

This article intends to familiarize the social worker with the various definitions of blindness and sight loss, common obstacles faced by persons with sight loss, general therapeutic issues, when and how to use self-disclosure of a disability, and the ways in which the social worker can use his or her disability, specifically sight-loss, as an instrumental therapeutic tool with clients. Case examples will be provided to illustrate effective interventions and the various ways in which a disability may impact a client or clients. In addition, a brief discussion of various theoretical approaches to understanding disabilities is outlined.     

Hidden in the Margins: A Qualitative Examination of What Professionals in the Domestic Violence Field Know About Transgender Domestic Violence

This qualitative study endeavored to examine the views and experiences of individuals who work with, and those who consider issues related to, transgender domestic violence in an effort to determine what (if anything) is known about this construct. Using a phenomenological approach, ten interviews were conducted with individuals who professionally confront transgender intimate partner violence. Overall, the study found that many individuals from different disciplines were in agreement concerning the paucity of resources for this population, and future research would benefit from quantitative research to understand more about transgender domestic abuse. Furthermore, criminal justice organizations should take active steps within their own agencies to appropriately address this problem for transgender victims of abuse. Finally, all of the participants stated their beliefs that transgender domestic abuse is a very serious problem and believed that more research should be done to better understand it before it can be addressed.     

What is in a family? Adolescent perceptions

The ways in which adolescents conceptualise families is not well understood. In this study perceptions of families by 232 adolescents were examined using vignettes describing groupings of people (e.g. married couple with children, two women and a child). Eighty per cent or more endorsed married and cohabiting families, lone‐parent households, and extended family members as families. Few differences were found according to their own family structure. Asian (Chinese) adolescents were less likely overall to endorse groupings as families. Love and affection were given as primary criteria for being a family. Overall, young people endorsed a diversity of family forms. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Hidden Side of Zero Tolerance Policies: The African American Perspective

Several papers have documented the disproportionate representation of African Americans in school discipline and incarceration settings as a result of zero tolerance policies. In 2009, a federal study of the Chicago Public School system found African American boys represented 23 percent of the school age population, 44 percent of students who were suspended, and 61 percent of students who were expelled within the 2007 school year. Twenty years after the implementation of the Anti‐Drug Abuse Acts of 1986 and 1988, studies show African Americans comprised a startling 74 percent of those incarcerated for drug offenses despite being only 15 percent of America's drug users. Despite overwhelming evidence that suggests African Americans are adversely affected by zero tolerance policies, African American perceptions of zero tolerance policies remain relatively hidden in the literature. The current review seeks to explore a seemingly bidirectional process that involves how zero tolerance impacts African Americans and how African Americans perceive zero tolerance policies.