scholarly journals In Pursuit of the American DREAM, or Mirage? Undocumented Youth in YA Fiction

Ad Americam ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 20 ◽  
pp. 15-28
Author(s):  
Brygida Gasztold
Keyword(s):  
Social Issues ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Undocumented Youth ◽  
National Debate ◽  
The Social ◽  
Ya Fiction ◽  
American Immigrant ◽  
American Law ◽  
American Society ◽  
The One

The problems of undocumented youth in contemporary American immigrant fiction have been given a major focus, as political shifts and competing agendas fuel an ongoing national debate. Especially for young people who are on the brink of adulthood, their status as documented or undocumented results in inclusion in or exclusion from social, economic and political spheres, which affect their daily experiences and influence their plans for the future. This paper will explore the ways in which illegal status informs, impacts, and shapes the protagonists’ identity. The concept of undocumented status is used in my paper as an analytical lens through which the novels are read. My choice of the comingof- age genre reflects the importance of adolescence as a crucial period in the formation of a person’s identity. I argue that young adult fiction with undocumented protagonists on the one hand gives voice to those who are silenced and forced to live on the margins of American society, and on the other hand familiarizes native-born Americans with the social struggles that might be distant from their own experiences but offer alternative ways of looking at the world. The narratives about “Dreamers” are part of a broader political discourse on the U.S. immigration. By exploring the relationship between fiction and the dominant legal system, they signal current social issues and offer a critique of exclusionary practices of American law and society.

Beyond Chrismukkah

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samira K. Mehta
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Religious Leaders ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
Mixed Marriages ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Sixties ◽  
Eye Opening ◽  
Tv Shows ◽  
American Society

The rate of interfaith marriage in the United States has risen so radically since the sixties that it is difficult to recall how taboo the practice once was. How is this development understood and regarded by Americans generally, and what does it tell us about the nation’s religious life? Drawing on ethnographic and historical sources, Samira K. Mehta provides a fascinating analysis of wives, husbands, children, and their extended families in interfaith homes; religious leaders; and the social and cultural milieu surrounding mixed marriages among Jews, Catholics, and Protestants. Mehta’s eye-opening look at the portrayal of interfaith families across American culture since the mid-twentieth century ranges from popular TV shows, holiday cards, and humorous guides to “Chrismukkah” to children’s books, young adult fiction, and religious and secular advice manuals. Mehta argues that the emergence of multiculturalism helped generate new terms by which interfaith families felt empowered to shape their lived religious practices in ways and degrees previously unknown. They began to intertwine their religious identities without compromising their social standing. This rich portrait of families living diverse religions together at home advances the understanding of how religion functions in American society today.

Differential Rates of Assimilation in an Ethnic Group: In Ritual, Social Interaction, and Normative Culture

1969 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 18-31
Author(s):  
Mary C. Sengstock
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
New York City ◽  
Ethnic Group ◽  
Group Identification ◽  
Ethnic Community ◽  
Cultural Life ◽  
Research Theme ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Society ◽  
The One

Pursuing a research theme similar to the one in the previous article by Russo, this study compares immigrant and non-immigrant retention of the social, but not the cultural characteristics of the ethnic pattern. The findings point in the same direction: some American reared members of the Chaldean ethnic group apparently continue to identify with their ethnic community after they have dropped many other aspects of their socio-cultural life-style. It appears that the pattern exhibited by the Italians in New York City and the Iraqi Chaldeans in Detroit is a common one and it suggests a further line of research into the sociopsychological variables supporting group identification in American society.

scholarly journals Existential Meditation on Morality: Janne Teller’s Nothing

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 25-35
Author(s):  
Stacy Graber
Keyword(s):  
Belief System ◽  
Middle School Student ◽  
Seventh Graders ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Award Winning ◽  
The Social ◽  
The One ◽  
Ontological Sense ◽  
Verb Meaning ◽  
The Town

The epigraph for this discussion on Janne Teller’s (2010) Nothing, an artful and iconoclastic work of young adult fiction from Denmark, comes from the notebooks of the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard. Intended as a critique of academia (British Broadcasting, 2013), the sentiment expressed is offensive and amusing. If we understand “the system” as code for academia (reflective of Kierkegaard’s contempt for the professoriate) (British Broadcasting, 2013; Kaufman, 1975), then Kierkegaard here implies that a bird on a branch is more seriously reflective than a professor at a university, or that a philosopher in a tree comes closer than an academic to the legitimate province of philosophy. To arrive at Kierkegaard’s sense of the mission or responsibility of philosophy, we must draw, again, from the author’s notebooks in which he writes: “What I really lack is to be clear in my mind what I am to do, not what I am to know, except in so far as a certain understanding must precede every action” (1835/2001, p. 15). This remark suggests that, for Kierkegaard, the protocol for moral action is personal, reflective, and perhaps necessarily undertaken at a remove, like the philosopher/bird on a twig. At the same time, as Kaufman has observed (Partially Examined Life, 2011), the statement represents Kierkegaard’s critique on the limits of reason or his objection to the academic premium placed on logic as the ultimate path to understanding. Therefore, the bird on a twig might be viewed as metaphoric of the retreat of the thinker to a place apart from institutionally sanctioned practices and beliefs. This situation is mirrored in another story of a thinker who took to the trees, Janne Teller’s (2010) Batchelder Award-winning novel, Nothing. In Teller’s stylistically austere, existential allegory, a middle school student named Pierre Anthon, who lives in the town of Tæring [“a verb meaning to gradually consume, corrode, or eat through” (p. 229)], announces that “nothing matters . . . [s]o nothing is worth doing” (p. 1). Thereafter, he quits school and takes up residence in a plum tree. From his position above the doings of Tæring society, Pierre Anthon pelts his peers from the seventh-grade class with over-ripe fruit and “truth bombs,” or deconstructive statements that threaten the social and ontological sense of order and coherence that the kids have always accepted without question. From there, the seventh graders work to assemble an object lesson that will disabuse Anthon of his skepticism, but their plan degenerates into chaos. In the end—true to its existential roots—Teller’s Nothing proposes no answers to the questions it raises, nor does it offer an alternative belief system to replace the one the philosopher in the tree debunks. The reader is left only with a menacing admonition from the narrator of the story, Agnes, and must make personal sense of the moral message conveyed by the text.

scholarly journals Understanding accounting as a social and institutional practice: possible exit of accounting science from crisis

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Serhii Lehenchuk ◽  
Iryna Zhyhlei ◽  
Olena Syvak
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Accounting System ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Institutional Practice ◽  
Corporate Scandals ◽  
The Social ◽  
Economic Reality ◽  
Economic Institute ◽  
The One

This article highlights the transformation of views on the understanding of accounting as a science in the new conditions for the functioning of enterprises operating in globalized markets in a dynamic competitive environment. The necessity of considering external factors (corporate scandals, financial crisis, etc.) in the development of accounting as a science is emphasized. The reasons for the need to confirm the scientific status of accounting are considered, the hypotheses concerning the gradual crowding out and replacement of accounting by information systems with artificial intelligence are refuted. Accordingly, the study aims to confirm the scientific significance of accounting and justify the need for its further development as a social science aimed at solving social issues and having a deeper social context. Various accounting models and identification of factors affecting their construction, as a result of which the goals of accounting are transformed, make the theoretical basis of this study. It is concluded that accounting is a social science that studies the features of the functioning of the accounting system as a social and institutional practice. Such an understanding of accounting science is considered one of the ways out of the existing crisis. The reasons for the lack of understanding among Ukrainian researchers of accounting as a social science are highlighted, and the ways to overcome them are suggested. It is proved that accounting, on the one hand, is a product of the social environment, an instrument for reflecting the economic reality of an enterprise. On the other hand, it influences the formation of social reality, being an instrument for shaping social processes and relations arising from the functioning of accounting as a separate socio-economic institute.

scholarly journals How good or bad was the Romanian strategy of transition

2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-54
Author(s):  
Catalin Zamfir
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Current Crisis ◽  
Strategic Vision ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social And Economic Development ◽  
New Vision ◽  
The One ◽  
Social Economic Development

Romania’s performances over the past 30 years are not impressive. The economy displays dramatic crises and modest increases, though there were years of important growth. The country faces unsolved chronic crises: agriculture and industry are in a state of confusion, lacking a strategic vision; underdeveloped public functions are facing severe social issues. Demographic decline, underemployment, and poverty are far from being significantly reduced. Also, the political factor, supposed to be the engine of development, seems to be locked in conflicts for power that express actually the lack of vision. The article argues that more than ever, Romania is at a crossroads. We enter inevitably into a new stage of our history. We might continue on the path we engaged on up to now, but the future does not seem by far the one we wish for. Or, we need rather to disengage from the process that kept us in a bottleneck and put forward a new vision, new options, and democratic-led decisions. In brief, a program for the social and economic development of the country. The article concludes that in order to surpass the current crisis a new model of social-economic development of the country should be enhanced, ensuring prosperity for the whole population.

scholarly journals Sherman Alexie’s Literary Works as Native American Social Realistic Projections

2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (11) ◽  
pp. 381
Author(s):  
Md. Amir Hossain ◽  
S.M. Abu Nayem Sarker
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Native American ◽  
Native Americans ◽  
United States Of America ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Psychological Trauma ◽  
The United States ◽  
Literary Works ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Society

This paper aims to look at the social realistic issues in the context of Sherman Alexie’s literary works. Alexie is one of the postmodern authors in the United States of America. He is very popular among his Native American society as well as community for representing social reality of his age. This paper is divided into several sections; each section shows a benchmark of the 21st century Social Picture of the Native Americans in the light of Alexian Literary Works. It also scrutinizes stories, and novels with a view to highlighting a faithful picture of Native Americans in the light of everyday social issues, including poverty, alcoholism, unhealthiness, racism, and suicidal act. Basically, the main part of my paper deals with social problems of Native Americans in the United States of America as depicted in Alexie’s literary works. It highlights an awareness of the Native Americans so as to keep themselves aloof from drug addiction, poverty, depression, and psychological trauma. Here I have also applied the critical theory of Social Realism with a view to unveiling a subtle literary affinity with Alexie’s works. In this study, I would like to show the significance of this study, and research methodology as well.

Cognitive Maps and Social Ecology in Young Adult Fiction (Based on a keynote address presented at the fifth national conference of the Shiraz University Centre for Research in Children's Literature Studies, Shiraz, Iran, May 2015)

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 142-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Stephens
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Social Ecology ◽  
Cognitive Mapping ◽  
Mapping Function ◽  
Space And Place ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Narrative Structures ◽  
Ya Fiction ◽  
The Graveyard Book ◽  
The One

The nexus of the conceptual domains of cognitive mapping and social ecology offers a constructive methodology for examining some aspects of Young Adult fiction, and in this article I explore what I see as the possibilities of this conjunction. On the one hand, social ecology (also referred to as ecocultural theory or the bioecological model) impacts upon representations of subjectivity within YA fiction, and on the other, the literal and metaphorical interpretations of space and place enabled by cognitive mapping function as a framework to structure discussion of the relationship between ecology and subjectivity. Because mapping is an activity performed both by characters within the text and through narrator–narratee transactions, it has a narrative function that mediates the core social ecology foci of proximal processes, characterisation, ecocultural orientation and the experience of temporality. Taking examples from Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book, David Almond's The Fire-Eaters and John Green's Paper Towns, the article explores some of the interactions between key cognitive and social processes and the narrative structures within which they are expressed.

scholarly journals Racial Identity Choice and its Consequences: A Study on Elizabeth Alexander’s Race

2021 ◽  
pp. 17-27
Author(s):  
Nur Saktiningrum
Keyword(s):  
Racial Identity ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
Sense Of Belonging ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Racial Passing ◽  
Internal Factors ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Society ◽  
The One ◽  
Physical Features

Race, as people understand it, is something that you were born with. One was born with specific physical features that by social construction, define one’s race. What if a person was born with physical features that enable him to choose whether to embrace the race defined by blood or the one defined by social construction? And are there any consequences of the choices made? This research studies the choice made by mulatto to pass as white and the consequences following the decision. The focus of the study is a poem written by Elizabeth Alexander entitled Race (2001). To answer the abovementioned questions, the poem is analyzed using a new historical approach. The approach enables the researcher to understand the historical background of and the author’s perspective on racial passing depicted in the poem and its relation to the reality of racial passing in American society. The results show that there are external and internal factors that make it possible for an individual to pass as a member of a different race from what he was. The external factors include the biological taxonomy that identifies him as belonging to a dominant race and the social construction that classifies people based on their physical features. The internal factor is the passer’s belief that by assuming a new racial identity, he will be able to lead a better life and be relieved from the oppression of the dominant race. Despite the privilege and opportunity that the new racial status can offer, racial passing can also bring some disadvantages such as the loss of the sense of belonging to the old racial identity, the feeling of insecurity, and the possibility of being disowned by one’s family. Keywords: racial passing, mulatto, biological taxonomy, Race, Elizabeth Alexander

Maximizing E-Learning to Train the 21st Century Workforce

2002 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cynthia Pantazis
Keyword(s):  
Learning Styles ◽  
Workforce Development ◽  
Training And Development ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Social ◽  
E Learning ◽  
Skilled Workforce ◽  
American Society ◽  
The One

Advances in technology have created an environment for a learning revolution. In the digital economy, technology enabled learning or e-learning is becoming an integral part of a larger system of practices and policies designed to prepare and support a high skilled workforce. The power of e-learning comes from the opportunity to leverage technology and information to alter the basic tenets of learning by eliminating the one-size fits all approach to instruction and customizing content to meet individual needs and learning styles. Because e-learning has the potential to significantly improve workforce development, the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) and the National Governors' Association (NGA) convened leaders from business, government, and education to examine how e-learning can equip workers with the skills needed to succeed. The culmination of this effort is outlined in A Vision of E-Learning for America's Workforce. The report makes the social and economic case for creating a sustainable e-learning environment for America's workforce and identifies priority areas for action for the public and private sectors to implement jointly.

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