Sociology

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A Carnival of One’s Own: Contemporary Rap and the Commercial Appropriation of the Neoliberal Carnivalesque
(2013) Sacks, Susanna; McCormick, Lisa
I argue that the performance of deviant black masculinity – as articulated through images of bodily violence, criminal activity and exaggerated sexuality – represents a carnivalesque space, in which neoliberal life goals of individual`, competition and material success, are glorified and, ultimately, reified. By studying patterns of imagery in the lyrics of popular artists during the 1990s and 2000s, we see a clear correlation between rap’s increasing popularity and artists’ emphasis on political respectability, with the latter following closely on the heels of the former. We may understand this shift through an examination of three categories of rapper: the gangsta, who operates antagonistically to conservative social values while adhering to neoliberal ideologies; the entrepreneur, who successfully navigates the change from criminal to capitalism; and the integrationist, the product of rap’s new place in American society. The changing image of deviant masculinity in rap over the last two decades reflects shifts in media and political responses to the genre, so that it may fruitfully speak to rather than against imagined mainstream values: where rap music originally had to be deviant, its assimilation into popular cultural and media forms has led to the articulation of relatively conservative values by contemporary rap artists.
A prototype analysis of missing : centrality, valence, and correlates of the experience of interpersonal separation
(2003) Fiorentino, Remy
To date there has been no research on the experience of 'missing' in romantic relationships. The current study seeks to define and analyze the concept of missing from a prototype perspective. In Study 1, subjects listed features of missing. In Study 2, centrality and valence rankings for these features were collected, and a prototype of missing was created. Analysis revealed significant differences in how each gender defined missing. Analysis also revealed a number of significant correlations between specific feature ratings and attachment style, implicit theories of relationships, self-esteem, and neuroticism. The correlations between centrality/valence of features and certain personality traits, such as low self-esteem, suggest serious potential problems in the context of a 'missing' situation. Each independent variable yielded a prototype that differed significantly from the general prototype, suggesting that it may be crucial to relationship stability and satisfaction to understand how one's partner might define missing differently from one's self.
Americanized Buddhism and the Rise of the Individual-Experiential Religious Consciousness
(2018) Kaplow, Benjamin J.; Gould, Mark; Herrala, Mark
Drawing upon fieldwork conducted at two Buddhist centers in the Philadelphia area, I characterize the nature of religious commitment within Americanized Buddhism as part of a distinctly American transformation in religious thought, rather than a superficial modification of Asian Buddhist practice. This form of the religious commitment, the Individual-Experiential Religious Consciousness, is defined by the attributes of individualism, the primacy of experiential practice, and the universalization of religious validity, ritual, and access to religious truth. I claim that the Individual-Experiential Religious Consciousness is not limited to Buddhism, but is found in a variety of religious groups arising from the counterculture of the 1960s-70s. Utilizing Mark Gould’s theory of motivated religious disorder (Gould 2014), I analytically characterize the requisite causal conditions for the genesis of the Individual-Experiential Religious Consciousness, and aim to trace its institutionalization across religious movements. Drawing on a case study of Erhard Seminars Training, I argue that the Human Potential Movement and imported Zen of the 1960s and 70s were the first religious organizations to articulate this form of religiosity. Utilizing resource mobilization theory, I aim to articulate why the Individual-Experiential Religious Consciousness was first institutionalized in these movements. Lastly, by examining the organizational and religious composition of those early individual-experiential movements, I attempt to explain why they were superseded by the contemporary form of Americanized Buddhism.
An Apple a Day: An Exploration of Primary Care Physicians' Definitions of Health
(2022) May, Phoebe; McKeever, Matthew
This thesis examines how physicians define health and prioritize care, and whether or not these definitions and priorities vary given geographic location and demographics of patient population. 18 different primary care physicians, including pediatricians, adult primary care providers, and geriatricians and from different areas on the East Coast, were interviewed. They served patient populations of varying demographics, some in privileged communities and others in underserved communities. The doctors that worked in privileged communities defined health as an individual social concept, focusing on holistic evaluations of care. The doctors that worked in underserved communities focused on how larger social institutions impacted the health states of their patients. Given these social barriers, these physicians provided care practically, working to ensure the provision of basic, physical health care to their patient populations. This data exposes problems with the canonical distinction between illness and sickness, a central health definition framework in medical sociology. To expand this framework to more adequately reflect how health functions and is defined, I propose expanding the definition of 'sickness' to include holistic sickness and practical sickness.
Asian American Educational Experiences and the Malleable Persistence of Orientalism
(2016) Owyang, Kelsey; McKeever, Matthew
In this thesis, I examine contemporary stereotyping of Asian American students through the lens of the persistent and malleable legacy of Orientalism (Said 1978). I argue that Orientalism has evolved from a discourse of racial inequality facilitated by European conquest of Western Asia to a set of stereotyped attitudes and practices that relegate even American-born Asians to a lower social status than whites. Using interviews with twelve Asian American college students at three California universities, I examine the emergence and influence of Orientalist, anti-Asian stereotypes from two main sources: social interactions on campus and institutional treatment of Asian Americans within the university environment. I find that out-of-classroom educational experiences exert a significant influence on Asian American student identities and are key locations for the maintenance of Orientalist attitudes and practices.
Beauty is in the Mouth of the Beholder: Advice Networks at Haverford College
(2009) Orlansky, Emily; McCormick, Lisa
My study investigates media and personal influence on the everyday use of beauty products. Previous research identifies two roles in the spread of ideas from media: the influential and the imitator. Using social network analysis, I traced a beauty advice network by interviewing 30 women at Haverford College to observe the formation of local network structures in space and the location of imitators and influentials in two different groups. I speculate that friendship can overcome this space barrier and create bridging ties. I also introduce a new role in advice networks, the "transitional," who performs the dual function of influential and imitator. The practical and theoretical implications of the transitional for beauty advice are discussed.
Beyond Flesh and Blood: Gay and Lesbian Kinship Structures in Mid-Century America
(2015) Thorp, Makenzie; McKeever, Matthew
From the 1950s to the early 1970s, homosexual individuals experienced unprecedentedly widespread discrimination. This was largely due to the particular importance placed on the nuclear family at the time and the perception that homosexuality was incompatible with American family values. As a result, gay men and lesbians created countercultural community structures and spaces to facilitate new forms of kinship. These new kinship norms were shaped by choice, shared history, and community values, rather than biological connection. Due to the pervasive effects of gender roles, gay men and lesbians created separate communities with extremely different social, political, and spatial orientations. These distinct values resulted in contrasting kinship structures. However, as the twentieth century progressed, the gay and lesbian communities began to merge. This was brought on primarily by the emphasis on coalition building during the AIDS crisis. Consequently, the gay and lesbian community became more of a political conglomerate and its politics grew more assimilationist. This is exhibited by the prominence of same-sex marriage in the modern LGBT rights movement. The same-sex marriage movement illustrates that while gay men and lesbians have made tremendous political strides, adherence to normative family structures remains integral to acceptance and participation in American dominant culture.
Birthing Contradictions: Midwifery as a Profession and a Social Movement
(2014) Brashear, Hilary; McCormick, Lisa
In this paper I argue that midwifery as a profession is counter to midwifery as a social movement. A profession contradicts a social movement because professions are task oriented and conflict stays within the bounds of a system operating through rational-legal authority. Social movements can be seen as enacting charismatic authority, which is fundamentally opposed to rational-legal authority. Social movements are conflict oriented and want to change the system in which they exist. As a profession midwifery organizations and systems of education are focused on legitimating their jurisdiction over tasks by appealing to legal-rational authority. Conflict is avoided and the underlying philosophies of midwifery are expressed through a language of consumerism that works with current power systems rather than expressed as a political position challenging power. As a profession midwifery enables the potential for competition, desire for distinction, and different communities of midwives based on worksite, weakening solidarity for the potential mobilization of a social movement.
Blueprints and Bars: An Exploration into the Effects of Architecture Upon Rehabilitation in Correctional Institutions
(2007) Elton, Margot; Hohenstein, William
The United States Criminal Justice System claims to aim for rehabilitation of all inmates who pass through the prison system. However, only approximately 1 out of every 12 inmates is offered the type of extensive counseling and programming needed to promote reformation. In addition, the Federal Bureau of Prisons only spends between 2 and 3 dollars a day per inmate, not enough to provide inmates with anything more than the bare necessities. These statements beg the question: what is the true aim of the prison system, rehabilitation or simple incarceration? To fully understand the mentality of incarceration in the United States, the evolution of penological philosophy is traced from First Generation through to Third, or New, Generation prisons, looking at the manners in which these philosophies incorporated ideas of rehabilitation into the functionality of the prison institution. In conjunction with an examination of rehabilitation in correctional facilities, this paper considers architecture in the context of corrections. In the last two hundred years, prisons have been constructed in a variety of architecture styles— radial, circular, octagonal—in an attempt to find the design most conducive to inmate rehabilitation. This paper examines the most important designs in history, John Haviland’s Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia and Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon, in order to discover which aspects positively affect reformation of inmates and which create more problems than they solve. Following this is an examination of architectural issues important to consider when designing a prison, from lighting and noise level to inmate respect and the problem of inmate alienation from society. Finally, an ideal prison design is proposed, using the research compiled throughout the paper. This design takes many of its ideas from the Judicial Center of Leoben in Austria, and works to create a corrections facility that promotes the Third Generation penal philosophy as well as inmate rehabilitation.
"But You Don't Look Sick": Medical Gaslighting and Disability Identity Among Individuals Living with POTS and ME/CFS
(2021) Evenson, Sarah; Gould, Mark
Some chronic illnesses are routinely screened for, easily recognized by physicians, and have effective treatments or perhaps even acure. Others are less-easily detected. Conditions that have a wide variety of subjective symptoms and do not appear on routine laboratory investigations present a specific diagnostic challenge. Patients with such conditions often experience medical gaslighting because the physician is unable to provide an explanation other than "it's all in your head." POTS and ME/CFS are two conditions that allow us to observe this phenomenon. The mostly-invisible nature of these illnesses makes them an ideal case for studying the ways in which health, illness, and disability are seen in our society. Doing so illuminates the ways in which capitalism dictates our bodily experiences. Using the narratives of 477 survey participants and 59 interviewees living with POTS and ME/CFS, this paper hopes to explain some of the difficulties of living with chronic, invisible illness by focusing on experiences of medical gaslighting and ableist microaggressions. I also examine how these experiences, when combined with internalized ableism, shape people's decision to self-identify as disabled or not.
Classroom Structure and Student Achievement: A Theory and Case Study
(2011) Hulleberg, Anders; Gould, Mark
Over the preceding decade, elementary school students in the Middleton and Orchardville school districts performed comparably on the mathematics section of the yearly state-administered standardized test. During the same period, however, secondary school students from the same two districts consistently performed disparately on the same section of the same test. After reviewing and rejecting the prevailing perspectives on inequality in student achievement, I propose that the divergence in test scores results from a lack of cooperative learning in Middleton secondary schools. I construct a theory of the necessary and sufficient conditions for the successful implementation of cooperative curricula in a classroom, hypothesizing that at least one of these conditions is absent in Middleton. Data collected during participant observation research, though not representative of the two districts, suggest that cooperative learning is more prevalent in Orchardville.
Collective Realities: A Durkheimian Analysis of Evolution, Climate Change, and Southern Identity
(2017) Dwyer, Sarah; McKeever, Matthew
In this paper, I argue that the positioning of science and religion as necessarily oppositional institutions obscures their historical relationship, as well as the social and political mechanisms that have caused them to be positioned antagonistically in contemporary American cultural perceptions. I use Durkheim’s theory of religion, and specifically his concept of collective realities, to analyze the relationship between evolution, climate change, and American Protestantism. I conclude that the construction of a regional Southern identity has led to the development of a collective reality in which religion, not science, acts as the truth-bearing institution, and that the theoretical framework of collective realities can help explain why poor, white Southerners are disproportionately unlikely to believe in both evolution and climate change.
Contingency, Validity, and Consent: A Critique of Power in Williamson’s Transaction Cost Economics
(2010) Sanchez, David V.; Gould, Mark
In his Transaction Cost Economics, Oliver Williamson conceptualizes power as hierarchical fiat that is obeyed by agents out of their self-interest. This conception of power is consistent with the neoclassical nature of his theory, but it means that he cannot understand the motivation of consummate performance in the workplace (and hence the solution to the principal-agent problem), the constitution of valid power that is obeyed by an agent even when it is not in her self-interest, or the importance of reduced complexity for the successful operation of power. In contrast, conceptualizing power as a generalized medium of communication allows one to better understand the operation of power within the firm.
Crisis and Resolution in the Development of Judaism
(2014) Stadler, Christopher; Gould, Mark
In 587 B.C. the kingdom of Judah was invaded by the Babylonian empire, the Davidic king was dethroned, his heirs slaughtered, and Jerusalem and the Temple of Solomon were razed. These events motivated the construction of a new religious logic, characterized by universal natural law and covenantal particularism, which became constitutive of Judaism. I specify the conditions under which this cultural structure was generated and identify them historically. This serves as an exercise in constructing a model of cultural change in which cultural attributes can be given causal explanations.
Cultural Codes and Emotional Expression: The New Racism in Psychiatric Interviews
(2014) Howe, Nora; Gould, Mark
The tools used to make psychiatric diagnoses are unable to evaluate effectively the emotional expression of African American patients. The different histories and social positions of Caucasians and African Americans mean that the two groups have different cultural norms. Cultural norms, the learned and shared meanings that allow us to interact with others, regulate all facets of our behavior, including emotional expression. In this thesis, I analyze psychiatric transcripts of Caucasian and African American patients and find that the tools used for psychiatric diagnosis--the semistructured interview and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders--favor the emotional expressions consistent with Caucasian cultural norms. Further, the bias in the diagnostic tools creates the possibility that emotional expressions common to African Americans, such as anger and defensiveness, will be interpreted as psychosis. Psychiatric diagnosis and treatment of African Americans will remain ineffective and potentially harmful to patient wellness until psychiatric tools are restructured to account for the impact of cultural norms on emotional expression.
Cultural Roots of the Rule of Law: Exploring the Possibility of Confucian Legal Order
(2013) Ngai, Angelo; McCormick, Lisa
The goal of this paper is to make the argument that Confucian Chinese government capable of upholding the rule of law is possible. We address this question in three phases: 1) characterizing Confucianism’s influence in shaping the cultural logic and values of Chinese people, 2) deducing what kind of legal order Confucian values and cultural logic has the capacity to enable and 3) theorizing whether Confucian legal order has the institutional attributes necessary to uphold the rule of law. Using textual analysis of the Analects and Mencius, we argue that the cultural logic of Constitutional Democracy orients to human beings as discrete, autonomous and intrinsically isolated from one another while the cultural logic of Confucianism perceives individuals and their welfare to be inherently interconnected and part of a larger fundamental macro-order that precedes formal government. We argue that this fundamental difference, along with several others, results in Confucianism being incompatible with several of Constitutional Democracy’s most important features, such as inalienable individual rights and popular elections. We then speculate on alternative structural features Confucianism has the capacity to legitimate, and outline a hypothetical legal-order as an example of how these structures could be used to uphold the rule of law.
Doctors on Wall Street: A call for corporate responsibility through a sociological reconstruction of corporate law
(2018) Ferro, Marco; Gould, Mark
“Maximizing short term stock price” has become the watchword of the modern corporation. A law and economic conception of corporate law does not allow for a meaningful characterization of multiple principal – single agent relationships. The result is that within corporate law, executives of public corporations have fiduciary duties towards shareholders that do not extend to other stakeholders. This characterization of corporate fiduciary responsibilities leads to a set of socially undesirable outcomes that compromise product quality, undermine worker’s safety, and damage communities. To prevent corporate irresponsibility executives must be granted the space to make decisions in the interest of all corporate stakeholders. This is only meaningful, however, if corporate law is grounded in a sociologically reconstructed economic theory that allows managers to act as fiduciaries for multiple constituents.
Doing Time or Wasting Time?: An Analysis Of the Accessibility of Prison Programs in State and Federal Correctional Facilities
(2012) Hermanto, Juliaty; Yom-Tov, Anat
Nearly forty percent of released prisoners recidivate and are re-incarcerated within three years of their release. Released prisoners not only face the stigma of having a criminal record but also perpetual unemployment, court fees, and eroded network and family ties. The lack of access to employment opportunities, adequate housing, and basic necessities causes many ex-offenders to participate in illegitimate opportunity structures and as a result, they are re-incarcerated. Education programs, vocational programs, and substance abuse treatment programs have been effective in lowering rates of recidivism by providing offenders the means to access legitimate opportunities. However, as prison programs are a resource, how they are allocated amongst prisoners gives us insight into potential perpetuation of inequality. Do those with the lowest levels of education and least skills have access to resources that could better their chances in the “open” labor market? With data from the 2004 Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities, I estimate the likelihood of participation in prison programs based on a variety of factors such as race, age, mental stability, prior substance abuse, pre-incarceration capital, type of crime, and behavior within prison. Logistic regression is utilized to estimate probabilities. I also study the effects that these different factors have on the probability of participation by race. I found that (1) African Americans are more likely to participate in high school education programs, inside work assignments, and substance abuse programs; (2) having completed high school and having been employed prior to incarceration greatly increases the probability of participation in vocational training programs and outside work assignments; and (3) only a small percentage of those who have had prior substance abuse have access to substance abuse treatment programs.
East to West: International Educational Migration of East Asian Undergraduates to the United States
(2024) Foster, Jacob Seiji; McKeever, Matthew
Annual international tertiary educational migration has tripled over the past few decades. These millions of contemporary educational migrants represent enormous flows of people, goods, culture, knowledge, and money moving around the world. A large part of this growth is due to the immense quantity of students from Asia coming to popular anglophone destinations such as the US, the UK, and Australia. Conducting interviews with 12 East Asian international students, I explore how international students decide and understand whether to pursue a tertiary degree at an undergraduate institution in the US or in their home country. I challenge extant frameworks in the burgeoning international student migration literature by arguing that predominant approaches erroneously reduce the phenomenon of international educational migration to oversimplified macrohistorical analysis that disregards the holistic, micro individual judgments part of choosing where to pursue a degree. Through analyzing qualitative data from interviews, I find that those who came to the US all shared a background of past international experiences that influenced them in pursuing a degree overseas. Interviewees all claimed personal ownership over the decision to go abroad, expressing that they were not compelled, but many also explained that it was almost expected of them given their current trajectory. This has significant implications for the literature, as opposed to how it is commonly posited, the decision to go abroad is not of a moment—or even a period of time—but is formulated through other earlier choices. These choices are nebulously made by or for them by interested parties, often parents, and are compounded by various social influences and contextual factors. One significant inclination I highlight is a commonly-expressed intrinsic, high value placed on abstract, future freedom that they would receive as a product of going abroad as opposed to staying at home.
Education in Post-Colonial Tanzania
(2022) Todd, Seth; Gould, Mark
This paper examines public education in post-colonial Tanzania, primarily from the period of 1964-1985, when Julius Nyerere lead the country as its president. I examine the post-colonial, socialist ideology that served as the guide for post-colonial state building. In the education system specifically, I examine the "community schools" that were developed in accordance with the Arusha Declaration, which codified Ujamaa as the unifying ideology of the new nation state, and intended to build socialism through agricultural modernization. This paper argues that there were significant problems with the community schools that hindered the completion of goals outlined by the Arusha Declaration. Namely, the continued usage of British examination systems, the national curriculum that was used, and the national-local conflicts that occurred in educational administration. I do this by analyzing Nyerere's personal writings, workforce composition of the time period, and a case study of a prototype community school in the Kwamsisi region prior to national adoption of the structure.

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