If Human Rights Mattered

This article is a response to Judith Blau's ( 2016 ) essay, “Human Rights: What the United States Might Learn from the Rest of the World and, Yes, from American Sociology.” Here, I argue that if human rights mattered, then liberty could be assured. And absent human rights, liberty is a sham.     

Race in an epigenetic time: thinking biology in the plural

The notion that biological memories of environmental experiences can be embedded in the human genome and even transmitted transgenerationally is increasingly relevant in the postgenomic world, particularly in molecular epigenetics, where the genome is conceptualized as porous to environmental signals. In this article I discuss the current rethinking of race in epigenetic rather than genetic terms, emphasizing some of its paradoxical implications, especially for public policy. I claim in particular that: (i) if sociologists want to investigate race in a postgenomic world they should pay more attention to this novel plastic and biosocial view of race; and (ii) there are no reasons to believe that an epigenetic view will extinguish race, or that soft‐inheritance claims will produce a less exclusionary discourse than genetics (hard heredity). Quite the opposite, the ground for a re‐racialization of social debates and the reinforcement of biological boundaries between groups are highlighted in the article.     

The Role of Internal Health Locus of Control in Relation to Self-Rated Health in Older Adults

ABSTRACT

The present study examined how internal health locus of control is associated with older adults’ self-rated health. Multivariate analyses with older participants (aged ≥ 60) in the MIDUS II (n = 1,533) showed that internal health locus of control was not only directly associated with positive ratings of health but also interacted with gender and race. The positive impact of internal health locus of control on self-rated health was particularly greater in females and Whites than their counterparts. Findings highlight the important role of internal health locus of control in the psychological mechanism of health and call attention to group-specific strategies for health promotion.     

Ethnic Identity as a Predictor of Microaggressions Toward Blacks,Whites, and Hispanic LGBs by Blacks,Whites, and Hispanics

Results of the study suggest racial differences still exist when it comes to attitudes toward homosexuality in the United States. Findings indicate Black individuals hold significantly less favorable attitudes toward lesbian/gay/bisexual (LGB) individuals than non-Hispanic White individuals but not Hispanics, after controlling for demographics. Hispanic individuals’ attitudes toward LGBs were not significantly different from those of non-Hispanic Whites. Despite less favorable attitudes toward LGBs, however, Black Americans display a significantly lower likelihood of engaging in LGB-directed microaggressions than both non-Hispanic Whites and Hispanics. Finally, the results of the study indicate that as non-Hispanic White individuals’ ethnic identity gets stronger, their likelihood of engaging in microaggressions toward LGBs increases, more so than Black or Hispanic individuals.     

Using our voices,losing our bodies: Michael Brown,Trayvon Martin,and the spirit murders of Black male professors in the academy

Abstract

The recent deaths of Michael Brown, Trayvon Martin, and other Black males have generated new civil rights urgencies in Black communities and spirited academic discourses in higher education regarding the educational and social plight of Black males in America. Connecting the deaths of Black males to our lived experiences in the academy, we use a text messaging performative writing style to demonstrate how Black males are not only gunned down in the streets of America by police but also are metaphorically gunned down in the academy. That is to say, white colleagues and students attempt to use what we call the bullet of rejection, the bullet of silencing, and the bullet of disrespect to destroy us and our academic agenda. We conclude with a call to action for teacher education programs as a way to deepen their understanding of the racialized experiences of Black males in the academy and Black males in America.     

The Poverty Pimpin’ Project: how whiteness profits from black and brown bodies in community service programs

Tutoring programs that link colleges to public schools are seen as a way to improve the academic performance of K12 students while providing a practicum site for college-age students. Prior research on college-K12 partnerships focuses on how the academic achievement of both K12 and college students are enhanced by these relationships. This article challenges the stock story that such outreach programs are unproblematic and entirely altruistic endeavors and offers insight into the bumpy terrain of town–gown relationships complicated by race, class and academic divides. Using critical race methodology, this research tells a counter-story that highlights the white savior and poverty pimpin’ projects of outreach work.     

Making it relevant: how a black male teacher sustained professional relationships through culturally responsive discourse

What we know about the experiences of black teachers is limited, especially considering the vast amount of research conducted on and about black boys and young men. This article describes and analyzes how a black teacher at a suburban high school in the Midwestern United States negotiated professional relationships through culturally relevant discourse. Anthony Bell was the only black male teacher participating in a classroom discourse analysis study group at a diverse suburban high school. Throughout the course of the semester, Anthony’s stated objective for learning discourse analysis was to understand, structure, and facilitate more productive conversations with a struggling student teacher he was mentoring. Yet Anthony also used his discursive inquiry to “trouble the water” in his classroom and in the study group workshops. Participation in the study group provided Anthony with metalinguistic tools to critique his interactions with his students, student teacher, and professional peers. Anthony’s analyses of his own teaching, his student teacher’s work, the study group, and the school index themes in critical and critical race theory in education. As he became a teacher researcher, Anthony reported a greater sense of professional self-efficacy, eventually facilitating a successful workshop at a national teacher conference. Anthony’s case is an exemplar of the unique and critical role of black men who teach, as well as the imperative of practitioner research within the current climate in teacher education.     

Medicaid expansion and ethnoracial disparities in health insurance coverage

ABSTRACT

Medicaid expansion, as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), was touted by many policymakers as a potentially powerful force for reducing ethnoracial disparities in health insurance coverage. Using a unique county-level dataset at two time points (before and after the passage of the PPACA), we test whether Medicaid Expansion predicted change in ethnoracial disparities. Specifically, we use fixed-effect regression models to predict the Black-white, Hispanic-white, and Asian-white disparities in health insurance coverage. Using states that did not expand Medicaid as a counterfactual, our models show that this policy expansion was not significantly associated with a decrease in ethnoracial health insurance disparities. Overall, these findings suggest the need for scholars and policymakers to be more cautious and tempered about Medicaid expansion’s relationship with ethnoracial disparities in health insurance coverage. We discuss the implications of these findings for research on ethnoracial health insurance disparities, as well as policy efforts to increase coverage in minority communities.     

Racial and Ethnic Differences in the Prevalence of Depressive Symptoms Among U.S. Nursing Home Residents

This study aimed to examine racial and ethnic differences in significant depressive symptoms among long-term nursing home residents. We analyzed the 2014 national Minimum Data Set linked to a nursing home file and estimated multivariable logistic regressions to determine the associations of race and ethnicities with significant depressive symptoms (score ≥ 10 on the 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire [PHQ-9] scale) and whether associations were explained by resident and nursing home covariates. Stratified analyses further determined independent associations in subgroups of residents. We found that the prevalence rate of PHQ-9 scores ≥ 10 was 8.8% among non-Hispanic White residents (n = 653,031) and 7.4%, 6.9%, and 6.6% among Black (n = 97,629), Hispanic (n = 39,752), and Asian (n = 16,636) residents, respectively. The reduced likelihoods of significant depressive symptoms for minority residents compared to non-Hispanic Whites persisted after sequential adjustments for resident and nursing home covariates, as well as in stratified analyses. The persistently lower rate of significant depressive symptoms among racial and ethnic minority residents suggests that training of nursing home caregivers for culturally sensitive depression screening is needed for improved symptom recognition among minority residents.     

A Social Fields Theory of Pilgrimage: African American Christians in Israel and Palestine

What is pilgrimage and how should we understand its social significance? Traditional analyses of religiously motivated travel have focused on praxis and ritual. Contemporary analyses have further analyzed pilgrimage as a site where religion, politics, economy, and cultural production converge. This article argues that such convergence is best understood as the product of overlapping and interacting social fields and that particular pilgrimages—as sites of contestation and negotiation—take shape in the interstitial spaces between fields. Using the case of African American Christian pilgrimage to Israel and Palestine as the “Holy Land,” this article examines the relationship between overlapping fields and the negotiation of competing interests on pilgrimage. It suggests cultural framing work as a mechanism by which actors manage tensions between these fields and their interests.