Is a “Christian America” a More Patriarchal America? Religion,Politics, and Traditionalist Gender Ideology

Recent research shows that Americans who adhere to Christian nationalism—an ideology that idealizes and advocates a fusion of Christianity and American civic life—tend to hold authoritarian and exclusionary attitudes, particularly regarding ethno‐racial minorities and nontraditional family forms. Such findings suggest a fundamental connection between Christian nationalism and rigid symbolic boundaries, which would likely extend to Americans’ understanding of gender roles. Drawing on notions connecting religious nationalism with defenses of patriarchal norms and utilizing a recent national, random sample of American adults, the current study examines the link between contemporary Christian nationalism and traditionalist gender ideologies. Our analyses reveal that Christian nationalism is the strongest predictor of holding a more traditionalist gender ideology, even after taking into account a host of political and religious characteristics. Moreover, the relationship between Christian nationalism and gender traditionalism holds across religious traditions, including more gender‐egalitarian groups like Mainline Protestants and even the unaffiliated. We conclude by highlighting the implications of these findings for understanding contemporary populist support for Donald Trump, which previous studies have shown is undergirded by both Christian nationalism and sexism.     

Beliefs, death, anxiety, denial, and treatment preferences in end-of-life care: a comparison of social work students, community residents, and medical students

This study examined cultural and religious beliefs, death anxiety, denial, and medical treatment preferences in end-of-life care in a sample of social work students, community residents, and medical students in a mid-western city of 49,000. Results indicated that most social work students, community residents, and medical students preferred palliative as opposed to life-prolonging care during terminal illness. The three groups differed in cultural and religious beliefs and all three reported a moderate amount of death anxiety. Students reported less denial of terminality than community residents. Implications for personal and professional preparation to provide end-of-life care are discussed.     

Giving Back and Staying Put: Volunteering as a Stabilizing Force in Relocation

Relocation in older adulthood has been shown to have health-related and environmental triggering factors. This study explores the relationship between volunteering in a community and relocation. Using data from the 2008 and 2010 Health and Retirement Study, which included 9,220 community-dwelling older individuals who were aged 65 years and older, our findings show that volunteering significantly reduces the likelihood of relocating out of the area, and such a relationship is partially mediated by having friends nearby. This study is innovative because it identifies a stabilizing mechanism important for understanding protective factors, such as volunteering, as a way communities can retain older adults.     

Assessing Performance Consequences of Changes in Educational Policy: Toward Systematic Experimentation

This paper argues that schools of social work should determine the empirical consequences of risk-taking changes in educational policy. A commitment to systematic experimentation rather than random innovation is urged in order to promote effective curriculum designs, establish an empirical basis for educational policy decisions, and provide quasi-theories about educational policy change. CSWE is seen as a potential coordinator and repository of data about the effects of changes in educational policy. Furthermore, most schools have the resources to carry out significant studies. With these commitments, we can make policy changes that are predictive of desired outcomes.     

The Moderating Effects of Skin Color and Ethnic Identity Affirmation on Suicide Risk among Low-SES African American Women

This study examined the influence of concurrent racism and sexism experiences (i.e., gendered racism) on African American women’s suicidal ideation and behavior in the context of disadvantaged socioeconomic status. Drawing on a stress process framework, the moderating effects of ethnic identity and skin color were explored using multiple regression analyses. Data were from 204 low-income African American women in the B-WISE (Black Women in a Study of Epidemics) project. Findings suggested that experiencing gendered racism significantly increased these women’s risk for suicidal ideation or behavior, though only among women with medium or dark skin color. Also, having strong ethnic identity buffered the harmful effects of gendered racism. The moderating properties of skin color and ethnic identity affirmation likely operate through psychosocial pathways, blocking internalization of negative stereotypes and reducing the level of distress experienced in response to gendered racism.     

SPLITTING THE ACADEMY: The Emotions of Intersectionality at Work

Using labor market theory, we assess how we have constructed the teaching of required courses on diversity, with the potential splitting of the academy into distinctive labor markets. In‐depth interviews with instructors of color and nonminorities who teach required diversity‐education courses at a predominately white university are qualitatively assessed and describe the differences in the emotional labor attached to this segmented academic market. We identify specific dimensions of diversity teaching that attach to the job conditions of secondary labor markets, including the distortion of work loads and evidence of differential barriers in the emotional labor attached. These labor market conditions may structurally limit opportunities for career survival and advancement of minority and female instructors.     

Reviews

Visual Anthropology: Photography as a Research Method, New Mexico University Press, 1986, By John, Collier, Jr. and Malcom Collier

Snapshot Versions of Life, Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1987, By Richard Chalfen

Six‐Guns and Society: A Structural Study of the Western, University of California Press, 1975, By Will Wright, St. Lawrence University

Bitter Melon: Stories from the Last Rural Chinese Town in America, University of Washington Press, 1987, By Jeff Gillenkirk and James Motlow

Committing Photography ‐ Yes and No, But Mostly Yes. A Review Essay of Committing Photography, by Su Braden, Pluto Press, 1983

Sociology in a Changing World, by William Kornblum, Holt, Reinehart, and Winston, 1987     

Female ejaculation: A case study

This case study provides objective evidence supporting the hypothesis that female ejaculation, a partial, infertile homologue of male ejaculation, exists. A karyotypically normal, multiparous woman suffered for a decade with urinary stress incontinence. During that time she had learned to inhibit an orgastic response which led to bedwetting. Although the liquid produced did not appear to be urine, she falsely concluded that her orgasmic expulsion was a manifestation of urinary incontinence. Using feedback from a Vaginal Myograph, she learned to do Kegel exercises properly, and the urinary stress incontinence soon disappeared. Around this time she became aware of the concept of female ejaculation and its possible association with an erotically sensitive area that could be stimulated through her anterior vaginal wall. Stimulation of this area, the “Grafenberg spot,” produced what she described as orgasm which felt “deeper” than orgasms in response to vulvar stimulation. Such an orgasm was often accompanied by expulsion of liquid from the urethra. Chemical analysis indicated that the expulsion was not urine. It contained prostatic acid phosphatase, an enzyme characteristically found in prostatic secretion.     

Muslims in Prison: Challenge and Change in Britain and France

Hans Entzinger and Jack Carter (eds.), International Review of Comparative Public Policy, Volume 1, Immigration in Western Democracies: The United States and Western Europe (Greenwich, CT and London: JAI Press, 1989). Pp.ix + 258. £43 (hardback). ISBN 1 55 938 109 4

Josef Hayim Yerushalmi, Freud's Moses: Judaism Terminable and Interminable (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1991). Pp.159. £16.95 (paperback). ISBN 0 300 04 92 18

Ronald Dotterer, Deborah Dash Moore and Steven M. Cohen (eds.), Jewish Settlement and Community in the Modern Western World (Cranbury, NJ and London: Associated University Presses, 1991). Pp.218. £22.95. ISBN 0 945636 3 X

Minority Rights Group, Minorities and Autonomy in Western Europe. Minority Rights Group, 379 Brixton Road, London. Pp.32. £3.75 (including postage). ISBN 0 946690 93

L. Eve Armentrout Ma, Revolutionaries, Monarchists, and Chinatowns: Chinese Politics in the Americas and the 1911 Revolution (Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press, 1990). Pp.xii + 227. $28. ISBN 0 8248 1239 5

David Leviatin, Followers of the Trail: Jewish Working‐Class Radicals in America (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 1989). Pp.ix + 298. £25. ISBN 0 300 04354 6

Richard Williams, Hierarchical Structures and Social Value: The Creation of Black and Irish Identities in the United States (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). Pp.190. £27.95 ISBN 0 521 35147 2

Michael Tadman, Speculators and Slaves: Masters, Traders, and Slaves in the Old South (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1990). Pp.xviii + 317. $27.9. ISBN 0299 11850 9

Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wippermann, The Racial State: Germany 1933–1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). Pp.xiv + 386. ISBN 0521 39114 8     

Leaving legacies: African American men discuss the impact of their fathers on the development of their own paternal attitudes and behavior

In recent years there has been an increase in research examining issues related to fathers. Despite these contributions to the literature, studies including primarily African American samples disproportionately feature fathers who are non-resident, low income, or incarcerated. Thus, little is known about African American men from across the social and economic spectrum. To fill this gap, this qualitative analysis features a diverse sample of African American men discussing their relationships with their fathers and influence of those relationships on their own fathering attitudes and behaviors. Findings revealed that most of the participants modeled their fathers’ behavior. The findings also revealed that participants described their parenting as attempts to leave their children and communities with a legacy of engaged fathering.