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Love and Stereotypes: An Autoethnography of Intercultural Marriages
No full textThis research report delves into the complexities of intercultural marriage challenges deeply rooted in traditions, cultural beliefs, and stereotypes, shaping societal and familial attitudes and perceptions towards such unions. This study employs autoethnography (dialogues and composite characters) to explore resistance and shifts in attitudes towards intercultural marriages within society, family and friends. The research incorporates personal narratives to highlight how cultural essentialism, incompatibility, generational differences, and language barriers shape conversations around intercultural marriages. Using Fishers Walter’s (1984) Narrative Paradigm emphasizes how conversations and stories influence and shape people’s perceptions. In addition, Social Identity Theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) provides a framework for understanding how individuals in a societal group view others and how this can influence people\u27s perceptions towards the intercultural union.
Overall, this study challenges cultural stereotypes and argues that culture is not static but evolves as people get direct exposure, engage in open dialogues, and change societal norms. It calls for a rethink of intercultural marriage as a site for growth and bridging intercultural gaps rather than a space of conflict
Editorial: Pedagogical Reorientation for the Twenty-first Century
Get PDFIn this special issue, Ettingerian Matrixial Theory, Education and the Arts our intention is to attune with and bring together the cross-currents of creative and scholarly works that are emerging internationally between Ettingerian Matrixial Theory (EMT), Education and the Arts
DIVIDING UP THE MARITAL HOME
Get PDFFor many marital couples, the most valuable asset at the time of divorce is the home in which they live. If that home was brought to the marriage by one of the parties and the marital community helped pay down the mortgage, the couple may disagree about whether or how much of the value of the marital home is subject to distribution at the time of divorce. Different states have adopted different approaches to the conditions under which some of the value of the marital home is subject to distribution. The approaches are designed to achieve a variety of goals including reimbursing parties for past expenditures and distributing gains in a way that is fair both to the marital community and to the individual who brought the house to the marriage. Regrettably, many states do not take adequate account of the different implications of mortgage payments that mostly go towards interest and mortgage payments that mostly go towards the reduction of the principal owed. Marital communities may be awarded significantly more depending on when in the mortgage’s life the marriage exists. Such an approach may result both in dissimilar treatment of relevantly similar cases and in great unfairness, especially in cases where marriages are relatively short. This disparity in treatment can and should be rectified
Networked to Work?: An Analysis of a Community College Workforce Development Program
Get PDFBarriers to education and training can have a generational impact on socioeconomic status and economic development. Post-traditional students have been shown to experience a variety of barriers to education and family sustaining employment. Social capital has been shown to help alleviate some of the barriers for students resulting in stronger economic outcomes, such job retention, and higher wages.
The purpose of this case study was to determine if the Network2Work model at Piedmont Virginia Community College (PVCC) can affect outcomes for students from low socio-economic backgrounds by comparing Network2Work outcomes to non-Network2Work noncredit industry training outcomes. The research compared outcome metrics of the independent variable (Network2Work program) while controlling for potential intervening variables (employment, age, race, sex, and first-generation status) to examine the extent to which the Network2Work design contributes to credential attainment and employment. For this study, the term low-socioeconomic background included students who had low-income, working-class students earning less a family-sustaining wage, first-generation students, and students falling 200% below the federal poverty level
Traces of Communal Touch: Matrixial Encounters With Pre-service Art Educators Across Two States
Get PDFThe matrixial sphere, as put forth by artist and psychoanalyst Bracha L. Ettinger, is a shared and transsubjective space that is beneath the conscious, under the touchable and perceptible; it is a space where we encounter ourselves and one another in shared trauma, healing, art making, and the lived experience overall. This co-authored essay explores how a shared matrixial space and the matrixial gaze, which is not always visual, have been experienced through the square boxes of ZOOM as part of a collaborative, long-distance art exchange project. The project, focused on Spontaneous Creation-Making (SCM) sessions, as outlined in Barbara Bickel and R. Michael Fishers recent book Art-care Practices for Restoring the Communal: Education, Co-inquiry, and Healing. These exchanges took place over the span of one semester and consisted of two higher education pre-service art education professors in different North American states. This essay looks generatively at moments where the authors and their students found themselves in a creative space that was not entirely internal or external, not entirely here nor there in terms of location, product, and predictability of the process. Using the lens of the Ettingerian matrixial, the authors question, examine, and pursue an investigation of moments where they, alongside their students, encountered the matrixial space in and through the cross-country SCM project. Applications of this unique art exchange are suggested for other art educators and those pursuing art-care practices in general
Changes in Streamflow Statistics and Catchment Land Uses Across Select USGS Gages in Northwest and West-central Arkansas
Get PDFSince 1901, heavy rainfall events have increased in the United States in both intensity and frequency, and human population in the United States has increased, resulting in significant land use changes. Both trends contribute to an increase in observed flood magnitude and frequency. To determine if a relationship exists between land use/land cover and changing stream flows in northwest Arkansas, this study analyzed temporal changes in various flow statistics for 14 stream gages and compared the rates of change in flow statistics from gages on streams with watersheds that have varying land uses, i.e., urban, agricultural, and undeveloped. Mann-Kendall analysis was used to determine statistically significant changes in flow statistics, which were then compared to National Land Cover Dataset (NLCD) watershed land uses from 2001 and 2019. All analyzed gages had one or more flow statistics with at least a moderately significant increase, and all analyzed flow statistics showed at least moderately significant streamflow increases at two or more gages (P \u3c 0.100). There were no decreases of any significance in any flow statistic at any gage. In general, urban land development did not happen on native prairies and forests but on previously agricultural land. Significant positive relationships were found between maximum yearly flow and 2019 urban land use, urban land use change from 2001 to 2019, and 2019 Human Development Index (HDI). A similar relationship was found to exist between yearly minimum flow and 2019 HDI. These results highlight the importance of considering the cost of potential stream bank erosion and flooding in future land use planning, permitting, and zoning
On-field Agroecosystem Research Experience: An Undergraduate Perspective
Get PDFUndergraduate hands-on research can foster innovation and critical thinking among young scholars to delve into real-world challenges. Specifically, exploring the critical nexus between water usage and agricultural yield, can foster academic growth and holds the key to addressing global food security in an era of increasing environmental constraints, where students can unlock insights crucial to enhancing crop yield and sustainability. Investigating the intricate relationship between water management and crop productivity through undergraduate research is exemplified in this article. Undergraduate students acquired hands-on research experience by collecting, processing, and analyzing destructive (crop biomass samples) and non-destructive (plant height, nodes, and leaf chlorophyll content) cropping system data on soybeans under irrigated and dryland production systems, where they worked closely with the farmer. Identifying the current research problem and study site selection, scientific decision-making during the field study, developing critical thinking while ensuring research communication skills, and quality assurance and quality control through technology during data collection and analysis were learning outcomes. The research highlights the observed distinct performance between irrigated and non-irrigated soybeans using nondestructive plant health and growth indicators with plant biomass, following appropriate quality control and assurance steps. Statistically, irrigated soybeans outperformed non-irrigated soybeans in terms of average plant height at maturity (irrigated: 97.0±1.7 cm vs. non-irrigated: 37.4±0.6 cm; p\u3c0.01) and number of nodes on the mainstem (irrigated: 19.5±1.2 vs. non-irrigated: 12.6±0.8; p\u3c0.01). Findings from this study can help ensure quality control and assurance in future cropping system projects. Through the agroecosystem study, we exhibit the importance and role of undergraduate research opportunities in developing the next generation of problem solvers
DC AND AC CONDUCTIVITIES OF BIOCHAR-POLYMER COMPOSITES
No full textThe scope of this thesis was to study the electrical conduction properties of biochar-polymer composites in order to understand the fundamental mechanisms of charge transfer in them. Biochar is a type of porous carbon, which is a by-product, obtained by pyrolysis of organic waste. These materials can aid as components of multiple applications in a variety of fields, which includes biochar based conductive polymer electrodes for charge storage applications. Here we have investigated biochar polymer composites with four different compositional ratios of Biochar to Polymer (B:P). Specifically, samples with B:P ratio of 0.16:1; 0.375:1; B:P 1:1; and B:P 2:1 were fabricated by mechanically mixing commercially available Biochar and Poly Vinylidene Fluoride-Co-Hexafluoropropylene (PVD-HFP) by weight. These were characterized using Scanning Electron Microscopy and Electron Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDAX). DC and AC transport properties of two terminal devices fabricated from small strips of these samples were studied with in a temperature range of 290K \u3c T \u3c 430K. The DC conductivity values (σdc) were extracted from DC measurements as well as low frequency (5Hz) AC conductivity data obtained from Impedance Spectroscopy (IS) measured in the frequency (ω) range of 1 Hz \u3c ω \u3c 1 MHz. We found that in general σdc of the B:P composites studied increases with the content of biochar. Typical room temperature conductivity values of ~ 10-3 S/cm, were obtained for composites with B:P as 0.16:1; 0.375:1; and B:P 1:1. However, an order of magnitude increase (~ 10-3 S/cm) in conductivity was obtained for B:P composite with a ratio of 2:1. We also observed that the conductivities of these samples typically increased with increasing temperatures. The analysis of the temperature dependence of σdc for all the samples suggest the conduction mechanism perhaps follows a thermally activated Arrhenius type mechanism with activation energies ~10-2 eV. We also found that the AC conductance (σ (ω)) for all the temperatures studied obeys “universal” ac power law with σ (ω) ~ ωs, where ‘s’ is the power exponent. We found that the value of s is \u3e 1 (indicating a super linear nature) and is weakly dependent on temperature. These results indicate that perhaps the AC transport in biochar polymer composites studied follows a quantum mechanical tunnelling phenomena