Adding Sexual Orientation to New York State's Human Rights Law: Initial Information About Implementation and Effectiveness

While previous research has focused on measuring employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and establishing the need for laws that protect against such discrimination, very little research has evaluated the effectiveness of current nondiscrimination laws. This exploratory research considers the addition of sexual orientation to New York State's Human Rights Law as it relates to employment. In an effort to better understand the implementation and overall effectiveness of the law, attorneys in New York who specialize in employment law were surveyed. The survey results, based on the responses of 34 attorneys, provide insights into how well the law has initially protected individuals from discrimination, and how well it has provided redress for claimants of employment discrimination. The initial results of the research suggest that employees mostly seek redress for a hostile work environment, that potential claimants are concerned with confidentiality and retaliation, and that more training for employees is needed to combat employment discrimination based on sexual orientation.     

The elites’ collective subjectivities of the history of ethnic politics in Malaysia

ABSTRACT

Malaysia is one of the multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and multi-religious countries in Southeast Asia. Due to the pluralistic nature of Malaysia, it has a political structure based on ethnic politics. The ethnic preferential policies affected most domains of this country. The objective of this article is to examine the origin and background of ethnic politics in Malaysia. Findings of this study indicate that, ethnic politics originated during the British colonial period, it became a tool used by the Barisan Nasional for the legitimacy of regime. Moreover, ethnic politics in Malaysia today is intertwined with religion. Besides, there is the dilemma of the choice between the interest of certain ethnic group and national interests. However, with the opposition coalition Pakatan Harapan won the election in 9th May, UMNO-led BN lost power and interrupted its 61 years control, which leaves us an interesting topic to think about the future of Malaysian ethnic politics.     

The Reception Given to Sadhu Sundar Singh,the Itinerant Indian Christian ‘Mystic’, in Interwar Britain

In 1920 and 1922, an Indian Christian called Sadhu Sundar Singh toured Britain. Widely renowned in the global Christian community in the interwar period, Singh was notorious for certain stories of miracles, for his appearance and for the ways in which he epitomised Eastern Christianity. Using Singh’s correspondence and a range of newspapers, this article argues that British audiences were attracted to Singh because of his appearance and ethnicity and because he conformed to stereotypes of essentialised Indian spirituality despite his Christian faith. It argues that the reception to Singh in Britain must be understood in relation to the perpetuation of Orientalist understandings of Indians and Indian religions in the interwar period.     

关于明代廷杖的仪式解读

廷杖是明代帝王对士人的公开处罚,作为帝王报复“犯上”朝臣的残忍攻击和污辱,其目的在于让民众意识到皇权的至高无上、不可侵犯,也是对其他官员和社会民众的恫吓,以儆效尤.若以仪式视角来审视,这种处罚形式承载着维护皇权的政治功能,是朝廷权力走向的一种“控制仪式”;就整个仪式原由和过程来看,廷杖是“重建”受到挑战的皇权的仪式;从仪式的终极性意义来看,廷杖处罚是受杖士人实现其人生终极意义的道德场域.廷杖伴随明朝始终,其最终消逝则反映了明代政治变迁与传统士人处世心态的微妙变化.     

Effects of Work Incentive Policies and Determinants of the Socioeconomic Status of Welfare Leavers in an Economically Disadvantaged Area

Abstract

This study explores how work incentive policies influence the socioeconomic status of welfare leavers. Logistic and ordinal regression methods were used to analyze 1999 statewide survey data on West Virginia WORKS leavers. This study found that people who had more months of eligibility remaining for TANF were more likely to have jobs than those with fewer months of eligibility. People who had been sanctioned for noncompliance with work requirementswere less likely to have jobs than those who had not been sanctioned. However, childcare assistance had a significant influence on the employment of welfare leavers. EITC was significantly associated with the expectation of high economic status. Policy implications are discussed.     

Orientalising deafness: race and disability in imperial Britain

This article explores the conflations and connections that postcolonial and disability scholars have drawn between ‘race’, ‘colonialism’ and ‘disability’ from a historical perspective. By looking at the connections drawn between ‘race’ and ‘disability’ in the context of nineteenth-century imperial Britain, I hope to probe beyond them to examine the origins and implications of their interplay. I do so by focusing on ideas about deafness, an impairment radically reconfigured in the colonial period, and inflected with concerns about degeneration, belonging, heredity and difference. Disability, I argue, not only operated as an additional ‘category of difference’ alongside ‘race’ as a way of categorising and subjugating the various ‘others’ of Empire, but intersected with it. The ‘colonisation’ of disabled people in Britain and the ‘racial other’ by the British were not simply simultaneous processes or even analogous ones, but were part and parcel of the same cultural and discursive system. The colonising context of the nineteenth century, a period when British political, economic and cultural expansion over areas of South Asia, Australasia and Africa increased markedly, structured the way in which all forms of difference were recognised and expressed, including the difference of deafness. So too did the shifts in the raced and gendered thinking that accompanied it, as new forms of knowledge were developed to justify, explain and contest Britain's global position and new languages were developed through which to articulate otherness. Such developments reconfigured the meaning of disability. Disability was, in effect, ‘orientalised’. ‘Race’ I argue was formative in shaping what we have come to understand as ‘disability’ and vice versa; they were related fantasies of difference.     

文学视角下的唐代诏敕研究--由唐武德九年六月至九月诏书看李世民弑兄夺权及李渊被迫让位的真相

初唐诏敕文是初唐时期皇帝于施政过程中发布的“王言政令”,是具有最高权威的下行政治公文,涉及到了当时的政治、经济、军事、律法、外交、教育、文化等多方面的史实,和《大唐创业起居注》、《唐太宗实录》等史籍一道,都属于第一手资料,史料价值很高,可补正史之阙。即便是那些旨在宣扬皇德的诏敕文,如皇帝的即位、改元、祭天、封禅诏书,也为我们考察当时的史实提供了很多有价值的线索。本文主要从文史结合的角度出发,通过考察唐武德九年六月至九月诏书,来挖掘其中隐藏的李世民弑兄夺权及李渊被迫让位的真相。      

文体学视阈下的诏令形成

诏令是以皇帝名义颁布的命令文书的统称,是带有法定权威性与强制执行性的国家下行公文。诏令体制在汉代正式确立,在此之前,命令体制经历了一番由口头下达到书面形式命令的漫长发展过程,亦为诏令体制的确立奠定了基础。作为皇帝发号施令的载体,诏令类文体在演进和发展过程中,其名称也随之经历了一个由模糊到精确的过程。     

从清初科试论侯方域的晚节问题

侯方域作为“复社四公子”之一,在明末清初的士林中颇具影响力和号召力。但因参加顺治八年（1651）乡试一事,侯方域在人格与道德上遭到世人质疑和批判。另外,又因为《桃花扇》中的戏剧形象深入人心,后人对他的认识亦多有争议,而这种对其为人的偏见甚至还延及了对其诗文的客观评价。本文本着“了解之同情”的学术态度,通过解析侯方域的诗文作品,对其从归隐到应试的心路历程进行全面观照,从而尽可能地还原易代士人的生存状况与心灵困境。     

元代书院与程朱理学的传播

元代建立之后,南宋遗民将书院作为研究与传播程朱理学的基地,以捍卫其作为"道统"维护者的尊严.在官方支持下,程朱理学以书院为依托实现了北传,不但将程朱理学的影响成功地向北方广大地区扩展,而且也使蒙古贵族对其有了更加深入的认识.随后,程朱理学被统治者提升为官方哲学,并规定为科举考试的主要内容.在学习程朱理学与科举应试相统一的思想指导下,元代书院的教学成为程朱理学传播与普及最重要的途径.