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Narratives Of Islamic Self-Making: Black Muslim Youth In A Philadelphia Public School
Get PDFThe phenomenon I trace throughout this dissertation is how West African and African American Muslim youth navigate the complicated terrain of racial, ethnic, and religious identities within the localized context of their school, a charter school in Southwest Philadelphia named Honors Academy. I investigate the puzzle of how, given historical contestations among African immigrants and African American Black Muslims in the US, these youth, in interacting everyday with each other at school, make sense of the differences that become salient in school in their processes of becoming Black Muslims in the US. I consider the role the school and varied spaces in the school play in this process. How can we understand what sociocultural influences become salient within different contexts in the school and how these influences shape what aspects of being Black, Muslim, and ethnic become most significant within these youth’s interactions and discourses? I argue that Black Muslim youth at Honors engage in Islamic self-making, which is the process of engaging in diverse practices of religious self-fashioning, including but not limited to religious technologies. Black Muslim youth engage in Islamic self-making through praying, fasting, and dressing modestly, through making claims to public spaces, through market strategies such as selling Islamic themed products, and through creating religious material inscriptions. Islamic space-making, a form of Islamic self-making, takes place within the context of an increasingly market-driven public education and is embedded within larger social processes such as racialization, racial formations, and ethnicization. Specifically, within US Muslim communities, ethnoreligious hegemonies, a privileging of Arab, South Asian, and immigrant Islams over Black Islamic forms, operate alongside and work within US racial formations to maintain the logic of white supremacy. I note how ethnoreligious hegemonies shape Islamic self-making practices amongst Honors students and how differences between Black Muslim youth played a prominent role despite the MSA and Honor’s attempts to cultivate unity amongst their students. Islamic self-making emphasizes that there are multiple means through which Islamic selves can be cultivated and that this process is mediated differently across spaces. My spaces of investigation are identity affirming contexts, such as the Muslim Students’ Association (MSA) and African American History (AAH) class, which are grounded within a limited multicultural ideology at Honors but also occasionally creating alternative openings for religious expressions. Through each of these spaces, which include an afterschool club, classrooms, hallways, and a mosque, I consider specifically: How do religion, ethnic and family histories, and racial formations mediate forms of Islamic self-making for Black Muslim youth, within a racist, Islamophobic, and capitalist US context? This ethnographic account acknowledges the diversity of Black youth’s identities and counters the essentialization of Black experiences, while also investigating the link between religious expressions and racial formations
Self-Censorship And Strategic Omission In Moral Communication
Get PDFIn their words and actions, people are motivated to appear morally good, socially conscious, and politically correct. Yet while having a reputation for strong moral character can be extremely valuable, cultivating such a reputation can be a tricky business. Indeed, individuals who advertise their commitment to moral causes or who weigh in on hot-button social issues are often met with skepticism or scorn, and sometimes castigated as disingenuous braggarts or tactless virtue-signalers. To date, work in this area has focused primarily on the ways in which people try to broadcast their morality (e.g., by donating time and money, purchasing cause marketing products, voicing their political opinions online, or boycotting transgressive individuals or brands) and on how such strategies are received by others. By contrast, much less is known about the strategies people use to avoid moral and political communication. I present three essays which examine processes of self-censorship and strategic omission, and which highlight their unexpected costs. The first essay investigates people’s reticence to talk about their charitable giving and develops an intervention to remedy it, with an eye towards boosting word-of-mouth fundraising for nonprofit organizations. The second essay explores people’s discomfort sharing attitude-incongruent facts about charged social issues, even facts they simultaneously admit are true and relevant, conceptualizing this behavior as a potential source of misinformation and distortion. The third essay investigates moral neutrality, documenting people’s discomfort with sharing controversial moral opinions, but also their distrust of others who try to avoid moral issues. Drawing on experimental methods from psychology and behavioral economics, these three essays show not only that people use strategic omission strategies to protect their moral reputation and avoid morally-charged conversations, but also that such strategies frequently come with ironic costs for social discourse, for their reputations, or for the greater good
Women Prepare More Than Men In Competitive And Non-Competitive Environments, Which Aligns With Gender Stereotypes
Get PDFGender gaps in economic outcomes persist, despite women\u27s gains in education. Various explanations have been proposed for these persistent gaps, including gender differences in competitiveness. In both lab and field studies, women tend to compete less than men, despite performing just as well. Across three studies in Chapter 1 involving over 3000 participants recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk, we experimentally test whether variations of preparation (i.e., knowledge of an opportunity to prepare, limited opportunity to prepare, and unlimited opportunity to prepare) before performance reduce gender differences in willingness to compete. We also measure participants\u27 choice to prepare and elicit their beliefs about whether men or women will prepare more. First, we show that the preparation intervention does not increase women\u27s competitiveness across studies. Instead, we discover a novel gender difference in the choice to prepare before performance regardless of one\u27s competitiveness, risk aversion, and confidence. This finding aligns with participants\u27 incentivized beliefs - the majority of participants correctly predicted that women would practice more than men. Given this novel finding, Chapter 2 experimentally tests whether the gender difference in preparation may be exacerbated in competitive environments relative to non-competitive environments (N = 3980). Although we replicate the gender difference in preparation, we find no evidence that competitions increase preparation in men or women. This means that women prepare more than men regardless of whether they were assigned to compete. Again, this aligns with participants\u27 incentivized beliefs about gender differences in preparation. This dissertation discusses the downstream and potentially negative consequences of interventions designed to get women to compete, such as the one introduced here. It also discusses both the causes and implications of this newly discovered gender difference in preparation. Future research should explore the boundary conditions, moderators, and mediators of the newly discovered gender difference in preparation. Finally, rather than designing interventions that encourage women to compete more, we implore future research to focus on exploring interventions that change the system to be more gender-inclusive
Special Obligations And Emergency Conditions
Get PDFEach paper can be read independently, but the general problem that’s at the focus of this dissertation is the following. On the one hand, morality and justice appear to impose the same requirements on all. According to some of the most influential moral and political theories, what we owe to each other should be informed by ‘impartial’ requirements of fairness or respect for persons—requirements that apply regardless of whether the people you interact with happen to be relatives, friends, or members of the same society. Yet many would balk at the notion that we cannot permissibly favor some—they would charge that these sorts of views of morality or justice don’t do justice to the importance of ‘special’ relationships. This dissertation focuses on how we should think about resolving this tension between requirements, especially when it comes to national or democratic ties in emergency contexts. The first paper offers a critical analysis of the special relationship that nationalists claim we hold to co-nationals. The second paper assesses the limits of this relationship under the emergency conditions provided by the pandemic. The third investigates our special relationship to democratic society and the limits of action under the climate emergency. In ‘Against Cultural Identity as Grounds for the Intrinsic Value of Self-Determination’ I argue against the liberal nationalist claim that national self-determination is intrinsically valuable because it’s grounded in national cultural identity. In ‘Vaccine Nationalism and Basic Rights’ I argue that the case against COVID-19 vaccine nationalism is robustly overdetermined because it violates duties we have to uphold a basic subsistence right to health. In ‘Eco-Sabotage as Defensive Activism’ I argue that we can do justice to our commitments to democratic society and yet still engage in illegal and coercive property destruction with environmental aims
A Tale Of Two Transgenes: Aav-Dystrophin And Aav-Spike Reveal Common Themes For Gene Therapy And Vaccines
Get PDFAdeno-associated viruses (AAVs) are non-pathogenic, replication defective viruses that can facilitate long-term gene transfer to a variety of tissues in vivo. However, the limited DNA packaging capacity of AAV (~5 kb) poses challenges for the transfer of large genes. Additionally, while AAV is a minimally immunogenic viral vector, the risk of potential immune response against exogenous, AAV-delivered transgene products isn’t fully understood. Here I describe two in vivo AAV-mediated gene transfer projects that utilize engineered, miniaturized versions of larger genes to overcome the AAV packaging capacity for the disparate purposes of gene therapy for Duchenne muscular dystrophy and vaccination against SARS-CoV-2. Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a degenerative X-linked muscle disease caused by mutations that result in the absence of the giant, rod-shaped structural protein dystrophin. While we have previously demonstrated that systemic delivery of an AAV-deliverable miniaturized form of the dystrophin paralog utrophin (AAV-Utrophin) can complement for absence of dystrophin without the immunogenicity observed against similarly designed AAV-Dystrophin, we believe further improvements can be made to the design of the miniaturized utrophin proteins to improve their functionality and durability. Here we reconstructed the evolution of striated muscle as well as the piecemeal evolution of the dystrophin gene. Based on this evolutionary reconstruction of dystrophin’s origin, we propose a structural model for how the spectrin repeats within the rod domain of dystrophin and utrophin interact to form a continuous, interlocking structure. Using this structural model of the dystrophin/utrophin rod domain, we engineered a new AAV-deliverable utrophin protein (nano4-Utrophin) with a chimeric spectrin repeat capable of maintaining tensile strength along the entire truncated rod domain. We then demonstrate that following systemic administration using AAV9, nano4-Utrophin localizes to the sarcolemma, restores sarcolemmal localization of -Sarcoglycan, and prevents ongoing muscle regeneration in mdx mouse model of DMD. While this project utilized a paralogous protein approach to avoid transgene product immunogenicity, my second project capitalizes on AAV-delivered exogenous transgene immunogenicity. I demonstrate that a single intramuscular injection of AAV6 or AAV9 encoding a modified, N-terminal domain deleted spike protein induces robust cellular immunity and provides long-term protection in k18-hACE2 transgenic mice from lethal SARS-CoV-2 challenge, associated weight loss and pneumonia independent of vaccine-induced neutralizing humoral immunity. In both mice and macaques, vaccine-induced cellular immunity results in the clearance of transduced muscle fibers coincident with macrophage and CD8+ cytotoxic T cell infiltration at the site of immunization. Additionally, mice demonstrate a strong Type-1 polarized cellular immunophenotype and equivalent ex vivo T cell reactivity to peptides of wt and alpha (B.1.1.7) variant spike. These studies demonstrate not only that AAV6 and AAV9 can function as effective vaccine platforms, but also that vaccines can provide long-term efficacy primarily through the induction of cellular immunity
El Modo Melodramático Y Los Problemas Socioeconómicos De La Región Sur-Andina (1848-1906)
No full textEl siglo XIX latinoamericano ha sido estudiado principalmente desde dos perspectivas: primero, se han leído muchas de las narrativas de esa época como alegorías nacionales y, segundo, se ha sido entendido como el momento del empoderamiento de las mujeres escritoras en la esfera pública. Mi tesis explora la relación entre el modo melodramático y los efectos que los procesos de modernización socioeconómicos, especialmente los vinculados con los temas de raza, produjeron desde mediados del siglo XIX hasta inicios del siglo XX en el área sur-andina, Bolivia y Perú. En ese sentido, analizo esta etapa no solo como un tiempo de conformación de los estados-nación modernos, sino especialmente en los efectos del vínculo de dependencia económica neocolonial que se produce entre estos países y Gran Bretaña. Mi investigación argumenta que la convivencia de modos de producción capitalistas y coloniales se representa melodramáticamente a través de luchas entre el bien y el mal, pero que una lectura atenta puede concluir que estas dicotomías son falsas. En segundo lugar, mi tesis argumenta que el modo melodramático fue usado por los escritores y las escritoras de la época como una manera de expresar la ansiedad que las comunidades indígenas o mestizas aindiadas causaban a las élites de la época. En ese sentido, la defensa que muchas de estas novelas hacen de algunos personajes pobres e indígenas se evapora cuando estos son representados en masa y, por ellos, son considerados irracionales, bárbaros, peligrosos y no modernos. Entonces, muchas de las narrativas que mi tesis analiza nos ayudan a entender de manera más compleja los antecedentes del indigenismo
Layers of Maturation in Cortical Hierarchies
No full textHierarchies form critical scaffolds for top-down processing but are often multiplex. In the brain, multiple layers of complex hierarchies intersect, dissociate, and re-converge over the lifespan. Although aspects of local hierarchical organizations are well-mapped for sensory systems, the fashion by which hierarchical organization extends globally is unknown. Human neuroimaging provides a means by which to observe both the developmental emergence and functions of global neurohierarchical organization. Here, we leveraged these advances to distill multiple layers of hierarchical formation across diverse brain-tissue quantifications. We demonstrate that these layers form common and dissociable biomarkers of the developmental emergence of complex cognition. Our results indicate that multiplex neurocognitive development both processes across a normative hierarchical pattern and contributes to engraining the pattern into cortical function. Further, our results suggest that neurocognitive development is largely contemporaneous with neurocognitive aging in an integrated, flexible lifespan sequence
Electronic Structure Theory, Electronic Friction, and Berry Curvature: An Important Frontier Between Chemistry and Physics
No full textNonadiabatic dynamics play an important role within electron transfer processes, excitation energy transfer events, the linear/nonlinear spectroscopy of molecular open quantum systems, and molecular junction quantum transport. All of the phenomena listed above can involve multiple electronic states, and the transfer rates between such states can be significantly enhanced or suppressed by including the dynamics of the nuclear degrees of freedom. In order to simulate the relevant nonadiabatic dynamics, a precise and computationally feasible electronic structure theory is necessary. Most importantly, the theory has to be simple enough so that analytic gradients and derivative couplings, which are fundamental building blocks for running nonadiabatic dynamics, can be achieved. In the first half of this dissertation, we propose a novel electronic structure theory which is based on HF/CIS or DFT/TDDFT but solves a long-standing issue about the topology of potential energy surfaces near conical intersections as calculated by these popular methods. In the second half of the dissertation, motivated by recent experiments about chiral induced spin selectivity, we turn to systems of a molecule attached to a metal lead(s). We refine the friction tensor formalism (which utilizes a nonequilibrium Green’s function technique) to get the “nuclear” Berry curvature effects which is a result of nonadiabaticity. We demonstrate that even in the presence of electron baths, the nuclear Berry curvature effects can be as important as the friction applied to the nuclear wave packet. We further include spin degrees of freedom to show that, through spin-orbit interactions and nuclear Berry curvature effects, different spin carriers behave differently in a molecular junction, resulting in spin polarization
Noise, Sound, And Urban Coexistence: Interrogating Practices Of Sonic Management In Mexico City
No full textThis dissertation examines noise as a problem of shared urban life. In the context of Mexico City, often described as one of the world’s loudest metropolitan areas, I ask how residents and government interact around noise: how do government actors and city residents define, evaluate, and attempt to manage sound? Which and whose sounds are problematized as noise and in what contexts? How do anxieties about social difference, urban space, and rights to inhabit and shape the city motivate efforts to mitigate noise? I focus on “noise-hearers” in the city’s central Cuauhtémoc district where noise complaints and conflicts cluster to consider how noise conflicts emerge in situations of neighborhood change. This study is rooted in the specifics of Mexico City’s sound-world(s) but engages with global sound studies literature and frames noise as an important and broadly relevant urban question.
Using ethnographic methods, analysis of government documents and social media posts, as well as a quantitative and qualitative analysis of noise complaint data, my project moves between neighborhood spaces and government institutions. I develop the idea of sonic management to examine activities individuals or groups take to control sound, including residents and institutional actors. I find that efforts to control sound and failures to do so both shape urban social exclusion. Looking at noise complaints and disputes among middle-class social groups, I contribute to scholarship on neighborhood change in Latin America, rights to the city discourses, and sensory experiences of gentrification. Analyzing government processes for mitigating noise, I examine how bureaucratic procedures shape interactions between citizens and government, and frame potentially collective problems as individual grievances. My project highlights noise as a social and political question but in concluding I analyze available strategies to manage urban sound and noise as a public health, social and environmental justice, and quality of life issue
Bringing Identity To The Forefront: The Benefits Of Highlighting Identity And Diversity
Get PDFPrior research overwhelmingly shows that when information about an individual’s marginalized identity is communicated inadvertently (via a name that signals gender or race, for example), that information tends to trigger prejudiced behavior. As a result, both conventional wisdom and extant research suggest that women and racial minorities should obscure or de-emphasize their minority status to reduce their likelihood of experiencing discrimination. In this work, I propose that women and racial minorities might instead benefit from strategically emphasizing their demographic identity. This approach has two potential benefits: when a person’s marginalized identity is made more salient, (1) the potential for discrimination on the basis of that identity is also more salient, so decision-makers may be more likely to avoid prejudiced behavior and (2) it highlights an opportunity to support marginalized people, which may appeal to those who want to engage in pro-diversity behaviors. I also investigate whether and why marginalized people strategically choose teams to emphasize their identity, and how organizations might leverage these insights to motivate pro-diversity behavior in their employees. In Chapter 1, I share evidence from two audit experiments—one with politicians and another with students—as well as an online experiment showing that women and racial minorities benefit from explicitly mentioning their demographic identity in requests for help (e.g., by including statements like “As a Black woman. . . ”). Politicians and students responded 24.4% and 79.6% more often, respectively, when help-seeking emails included an explicit mention of the sender’s marginalized identity. In Chapter 2, I find that when women and racial minorities expect to compete for a job or promotion, they’re more willing to be tokens because they think standing out based on their demographic identity will be strategically beneficial, suggesting that they intuit the benefits of highlighting identity that I establish in Chapter 1. In Chapter 3, I build on these insights in an audit experiment exploring how feedback about either discriminatory or pro-diversity behaviors in one’s professional ingroup influences subsequent prejudice. Returning to the population of city councilors in Study 1, I first deliver PSAs with negative feedback (evidence that city councilors discriminate against Black constituents) or positive feedback (evidence that city councilors support Black constituents who emphasize their identity) then measure subsequent response rates to Black vs. White male help-seekers. Receiving negative feedback does not influence responsiveness to Black men relative to receiving no feedback, but positive feedback induces a regression-estimated 36.3% increase in city councilors’ response rates to Black men. Positive feedback seems to create new descriptive norms for pro-diversity behavior that councilors are motivated to maintain. Together, my dissertation illuminates the previously unexplored benefits of strategically highlighting marginalized identity, diversity, and bias, suggesting that women and racial minorities don’t always need to obscure or hide their identity to succeed