Race, Ethnicity, and the Politics of Food

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clare R. Brock ◽  
Bartholomew H. Sparrow
Keyword(s):  
Health Outcomes ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Food Policy ◽  
Ethnic Politics ◽  
Social Programs ◽  
Healthy Foods ◽  
Basic Services ◽  
Blacks And Whites ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
American Society

Food policy intersects with racial and ethnic politics along several dimensions: the agricultural workforce, acculturation into American society, the availability of healthy food, and the provision of social programs. First, the demand for agricultural and other low-wage workers in the food industry has encouraged immigration but many of the undocumented suffer from lack of access to basic services and legal protections. Second, many of these recent immigrants are less likely to suffer from the diseases of over-abundance that affect many Americans. However, as immigrants become acculturated into American life, their health outcomes become increasingly similar to less educated and poorer blacks and whites. Third, diet-related diseases are part of a multifaceted problem: education and income are often barriers to procuring healthy foods. Fourth, white attitudes about minority groups is associated with less support for social programs that might improve minority health outcomes. This chapter links these distinct areas of research.

Crises, Race, Acknowledgement: The Centrality of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics to the Future of Political Science

2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-18
Author(s):  
Paula D. McClain
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
The United States ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
Ethnicity And Politics ◽  
American Society ◽  
American Political Science

The United States, and the world, is in the grips of a coronavirus pandemic, and in the United States, we are facing a crisis of faith in the fairness of our political institutions, particularly the ability of Black Americans to live without the fear of dying at the hands of the police for going about their daily lives. Race has been and continues to be intertwined with American government and politics, in general, and how the United States approaches crises, in particular. Racial minority groups have been scapegoats for the failings of American policy makers to deal with numerous crises historically and at present. Race and racism are also at the foundation of the origins of American political science. The racism at the roots of our discipline’s founding have created a blindness to the significance and importance of the field of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics (REP) to the study of politics, democracy, and how American society reacts during a crisis. Our discipline is also at an inflection point that requires us to acknowledge its racist origins, confront its continued influence on the present, and finally to move forward in recognizing the importance of REP to the health and future of the discipline.

Medical and Social Determinants of Brain Health and Dementia in a Multicultural Community Cohort of Older Adults

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
James E. Galvin ◽  
Stephanie Chrisphonte ◽  
Lun-Ching Chang
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Health Disparities ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Health Outcomes ◽  
Sex Education ◽  
Screening Program ◽  
Healthcare Services ◽  
Social Dimension ◽  
Medical Comorbidities ◽  
Race Ethnicity

Background: Socioeconomic status (SES), race, ethnicity, and medical comorbidities may contribute to Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders (ADRD) health disparities. Objective: Analyze effects of social and medical determinants on cognition in 374 multicultural older adults participating in a community-based dementia screening program. Methods: We used the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and AD8 as measures of cognition, and a 3-way race/ethnicity variable (White, African American, Hispanic) and SES (Hollingshead index) as predictors. Potential contributors to health disparities included: age, sex, education, total medical comorbidities, health self-ratings, and depression. We applied K-means cluster analyses to study medical and social dimension effects on cognitive outcomes. Results: African Americans and Hispanics had lower SES status and cognitive performance compared with similarly aged Whites. We defined three clusters based on age and SES. Cluster #1 and #3 differed by SES but not age, while cluster #2 was younger with midlevel. Cluster #1 experienced the worse health outcomes while cluster #3 had the best health outcomes. Within each cluster, White participants had higher SES and better health outcomes, African Americans had the worst physical performance, and Hispanics had the most depressive symptoms. In cross-cluster comparisons, higher SES led to better health outcomes for all participants. Conclusion: SES may contribute to disparities in access to healthcare services, while race and ethnicity may contribute to disparities in the quality and extent of services received. Our study highlights the need to critically address potential interactions between race, ethnicity, and SES which may better explain disparities in ADRD health outcomes.

Reflections on race, ethnicity, and NIH research awards

2022 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna K. Ginther
Keyword(s):  
Public Service ◽  
Cell Biology ◽  
Ethnic Disparities ◽  
Important Work ◽  
Professional Networks ◽  
Service Award ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
American Society ◽  
Nih Funding

It has been a decade since “Race, Ethnicity, and NIH Research Awards” was published. Receiving the American Society for Cell Biology Public Service Award allows me to reflect on this research and its impact. In this essay, I share the story of how my research interests and professional networks provided the opportunity to do this important work. I also make the case for improved data and mentoring to address race and ethnic disparities in NIH funding.

Spatial Analyses of Obesity and Poverty

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Drewnowski
Keyword(s):  
Health Outcomes ◽  
State Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
Healthy Foods ◽  
Distribution Of Wealth ◽  
Dietary Behaviours ◽  
Political District ◽  
The Impact ◽  
System Methodology ◽  
Zip Code

Obesity in the United States is a socio-economic issue. Recent advances in geographic information system methodology can provide a better understanding of the impact of neighbourhood deprivation on access to healthy foods, diet quality and selected health outcomes. Whereas state-level Centers for Disease Control maps are still best known, newer approaches have mapped obesity at different levels of geographic aggregation: county, political district, zip code or census tract. This chapter examines data from the new Seattle Obesity Study, which permits the mapping of dietary behaviours and health outcomes at the property parcel tax level – the finest level of geographic resolution possible. Analysis suggests that food-consumption patterns also show a spatial distribution, broadly following the geographic distribution of wealth and social class.

Worshiping across the Color Line: The Influence of Congregational Composition on Whites’ Friendship Networks and Racial Attitudes

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 100-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edward C. Polson ◽  
Kevin D. Dougherty
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Groups ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Ethnic Composition ◽  
Friendship Networks ◽  
Color Line ◽  
Recent Scholarship ◽  
Multiracial Congregations ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
American Society ◽  
Racial Ethnic

Religious participation has reinforced the color line in American society for generations. Despite rising racial and ethnic diversity across U.S. communities, most Americans continue to belong to congregations composed primarily of others from their own racial/ethnic groups. Yet recent scholarship suggests that the presence of multiple racial or ethnic groups in the same congregation is increasing. The authors examine how the racial/ethnic composition of U.S. congregations is related to white attenders’ friendship networks and comfort with other racial/ethnic groups (i.e., blacks, Hispanics, and Asians). Using national survey data, the authors find that whites in multiracial congregations report more diverse friendship networks and higher levels of comfort with nonwhites than do whites in nonmultiracial congregations. However, the influence of worshipping with another race/ethnicity seems to be most pronounced for whites in congregations with Hispanics. Moreover, neighbors and friends of other races have more impact on whites’ friendship networks and attitudes than do congregations. The authors discuss implications of these findings for understanding U.S. intergroup relations and the potential of congregations to address the color line.

A Review of the Validity of Juvenile Risk Assessment Across Race/Ethnicity

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Campbell ◽  
William Miller
Keyword(s):  
Risk Assessment ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Ethnic Minorities ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
The United States ◽  
Risk Assessments ◽  
Assessment Instruments ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
Racial Ethnic

Juvenile risk assessment instruments have provided juvenile courts with the opportunity to make standardized decisions concerning sentences and intervention needs. Risk assessments have replaced the reliance on professional decision-making practices in which court officials relied on their hunches or previous experience to determine what to do with youth once they became involved in corrections. A primary goal of juvenile risk assessment is to improve case management and help courts focus resources on juveniles who exhibit the greatest intervention needs. Further, juvenile risk assessments play a critical role in estimating which juveniles will likely reoffend by identifying factors that increase the propensity of future offending. Although some researchers believe that the implementation of standardized juvenile risk assessments is a good strategy for reducing biased decision-making for racial/ethnic minorities, other researchers have called into question the extent to which risk assessments overestimate risk for certain juveniles, especially those in minority groups who have a history of being marginalized due to their race, culture, or ethnicity. This article provides an overview of how well juvenile risk assessment instruments predict future delinquency across race and ethnicity. The review suggests that in general, risk assessments do a good job in predicting recidivism across racial/ethnic groups for diverse populations inside and outside the United States. However, there is still some room for improvement concerning the assessment of risk and needs for ethnic minorities. In addition, while there are some studies that do not report the predictive validity of risk assessment scores across race/ethnicity, risk assessments overall seem to be a promising effort to correctly classify and/or identify juveniles who are at greatest risk for future recidivism.

Building Filipino Hawai'i

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roderick N. Labrador
Keyword(s):  
Minority Groups ◽  
Community Empowerment ◽  
Community Center ◽  
Immigrant Communities ◽  
Class Culture ◽  
Race Ethnicity ◽  
The University ◽  
Popular Image ◽  
Culture And Language ◽  
Filipino Immigrants

Drawing on ten years of interviews and ethnographic and archival research, this book delves into the ways Filipinos in Hawaiʻi have balanced their pursuit of upward mobility and mainstream acceptance with a desire to keep their Filipino identity. In particular, the book speaks to the processes of identity making and the politics of representation among immigrant communities striving to resist marginalization in a globalized, transnational era. Critiquing the popular image of Hawaiʻi as a postracial paradise, the book reveals how Filipino immigrants talk about their relationships to the place(s) they left and the place(s) where they've settled, and how these discourses shape their identities. It also shows how struggles for community empowerment and identity territorialization continue to affect how minority groups construct the stories they tell about themselves, to themselves and others. The book follows the struggles of contemporary Filipino immigrants to build community, where they enact a politics of incorporation built on race, ethnicity, class, culture, and language. It focuses on two sites of building and representation, the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and the Filipino Community Center in Waipahu.

Explaining disparities in BMI trajectories among older adults: a test of the double jeopardy and intersectionality hypotheses

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-265
Author(s):  
Hui Liew
Keyword(s):  
Minority Groups ◽  
Black People ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
The United States ◽  
Longitudinal Change ◽  
Double Jeopardy ◽  
Birth Cohorts ◽  
Bmi Trajectories ◽  
Race Ethnicity

This study aims to assess how heterogeneity in BMI trajectories differs across birth cohorts, race/ethnicity, gender and the level of education in the United States of America. Specifically, it seeks to examine whether the combined effects of race/ethnicity, sex and education on the differences in the BMI trajectories reflect the processes associated with double jeopardy and/or intersectionality. The empirical work of this study is based on the 1992–2014 Health and Retirement Study (HRS). Findings from growth curve modelling provide partial support for the intersectionality hypotheses. Findings revealed that different dimensions of inequality (such as race/ethnicity, sex and education) interact and intersect with one another to influence longitudinal change in BMI. Health programmes to reduce, prevent, delay or reverse the progression of obesity among the elderly should pay particular attention to Black people, females and females from racial/minority groups (Black, Hispanic, Other).

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