Developing a Social Justice-Oriented Workforce Diversity Concentration in Human Relations Academic Programs

Author(s):  
Marilyn Y. Byrd ◽  
Brenda Lloyd-Jones

There are limited human relations [HRL] programs in higher education in the United States, and even fewer that include an integrative concentration of social justice and workforce diversity. The purpose of this chapter will be, first, to identify the need for social justice and workforce diversity perspectives in HRL programs and then provide a philosophical and theoretical rationale for how an integration of these perspectives is critical to the advancement of HRL in praxis. Second, to develop students' awareness of ways that the organizational social culture operates to create social stratification and exclusion. Third, an experiential service learning component will be described as a necessary step for students to experience environments and contexts where social injustice is prevalent. The chapter will conclude with a proposal for a social justice workforce diversity certificate in HRL that recognizes professional competency and skill as a social change agent. This chapter advances the concept of organizational social justice (Byrd, 2012).

Author(s):  
Marilyn Y. Byrd ◽  
Brenda Lloyd-Jones

There are limited human relations [HRL] programs in higher education in the United States, and even fewer that include an integrative concentration of social justice and workforce diversity. The purpose of this chapter will be, first, to identify the need for social justice and workforce diversity perspectives in HRL programs and then provide a philosophical and theoretical rationale for how an integration of these perspectives is critical to the advancement of HRL in praxis. Second, to develop students' awareness of ways that the organizational social culture operates to create social stratification and exclusion. Third, an experiential service learning component will be described as a necessary step for students to experience environments and contexts where social injustice is prevalent. The chapter will conclude with a proposal for a social justice workforce diversity certificate in HRL that recognizes professional competency and skill as a social change agent. This chapter advances the concept of organizational social justice (Byrd, 2012).


2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelly S. Hall ◽  
Cheryl H. Keen

Recent college graduates in the United States are increasingly pursuing a year of service in programs such as Teach for America, AmeriCorps, and Volunteers Exploring Vocation. A cohort of 689 volunteers participating in 18 Volunteers Exploring Vocation programs across the nation was surveyed both at the beginning and end of their year of service. Principal component analysis was used to analyze the two surveys. Repeated measures captured volunteers’ motivations for entering the programs and opportunities important to them upon exiting programs. Upon entering, program participants were motivated by opportunities for discovery about themselves in relation to community and for exploring spirituality and careers, but were not anticipating friendships and social life as central to their volunteer year. Important to volunteers at the end of the year were opportunities to express compassion, to gain skills while working for social justice, and to explore careers in the context of friendships and social life. Consideration of these findings may increase the number of emerging young adult professionals who find meaning and purpose in their careers as agents for social justice on behalf of communities in need.


Journal ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melanie A. Medeiros ◽  
Jennifer Guzmán

Trends in higher education pedagogy increasingly point to the importance of transformational experiences as the capstone of liberal arts education. Practitioners of ethnography, the quintessential transformational experience of the social sciences, are well-positioned to take the lead in designing courses and term projects that afford undergraduate students opportunities to fundamentally reshape their understanding of the social world and their own involvement within it. Furthermore, in the United States, colleges and universities have become proponents of service learning as a critical component of a holistic educational experience. In this article, we describe how service learning can be incorporated into training students in ethnographic field methods as a means to transformational learning and to give them skills they can use beyond the classroom in a longer trajectory of civic participation. We discuss strategies, opportunities, and challenges associated with incorporating service learning into courses and programs training students in ethnographic field methods and propose five key components for successful ethnographic service learning projects. We share student insights about the transformational value of their experiences as well as introduce some ethical concerns that arise in ethnographic service-learning projects.


Author(s):  
Ramón J. Guerra

This chapter examines the development of Latino literature in the United States during the time when realism emerged as a dominant aesthetic representation. Beginning with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848) and including the migrations resulting from the Spanish-American War (1898) and the Mexican Revolution (1910), Latinos in the United States began to realistically craft an identity served by a sense of displacement. Latinos living in the United States as a result of migration or exile were concerned with similar issues, including but not limited to their predominant status as working-class, loss of homeland and culture, social justice, and racial/ethnic profiling or discrimination. The literature produced during the latter part of the nineteenth century by some Latinos began to merge the influence of romantic style with a more socially conscious manner to reproduce the lives of ordinary men and women, draw out the specifics of their existence, characterize their dialects, and connect larger issues to the concerns of the common man, among other realist techniques.


2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (1) ◽  
pp. 102-107
Author(s):  
Richard Francis Wilson

This article is a theological-ethical Lenten sermon that attempts to discern the transcendent themes in the narrative of Luke 9-19 with an especial focus upon “setting the face toward Jerusalem” and the subsequent weeping over Jerusalem. The sermon moves from a passage from William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying through a series of hermeneutical turns that rely upon insights from Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King, Jr., Will Campbell, Augustine, and Paul Tillich with the hope of illuminating what setting of the face on Jerusalem might mean. Tillich’s “eternal now” theme elaborates Augustine’s insight that memory and time reduce the present as, to paraphrase the Saint, that all we have is a present: a present remembered, a present experienced, and a present anticipated. The Gospel is a timeless message applicable to every moment in time and history. The sermon seeks to connect with recent events in the United States and the world that focus upon challenges to the ideals of social justice and political tyranny.


2021 ◽  
pp. 193672442110213
Author(s):  
Laura C. Atkins ◽  
Shelley B. Grant

This project expands discussions regarding critical ways that students’ diverse backgrounds and experiences intertwine with service-learning and social justice. Educators need to empower the next generation to explore their views, apply their skills, and engage with social issues. The research intersects with complex conversations about students’ perspectives regarding media representations, justice system responses, and views of at-risk youth. The project spanned four semesters of a sociology of media and crime course with service-learning mentoring. Qualitative reflection data drawn from 104 participating student mentors provided insights into how service-learners’ unique personal histories and sociological imaginations inform their views of youth, the mentoring experience, and social justice. The findings focus attention upon diversity within classrooms and expand the conversation about social justice praxis and service-learning pedagogy. Through reflexivity, the researchers consider their own social justice and service-learning practices, and add to the call for greater reflexivity within community-engaged sociology classrooms.


2021 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 265-275
Author(s):  
Lisa Cacari Stone ◽  
Magdalena Avila ◽  
Bonnie Duran

Purpose. Historical trauma has been widely applied to American Indian/Alaska Native and other Indigenous populations and includes dimensions of language, sociocultural, and land losses and associated physical and mental disorders, as well as economic hardships. Insufficient evidence remains on the experiences of historical trauma due to waves of colonization for mixed-race Mexican people with indigenous ancestry (el pueblo mestizo). Research Question. Drawing from our critical lenses and epistemic advantages as indigenous feminist scholars, we ask, “How can historical trauma be understood through present-day discourse of two mestizo communities? What are public health practice and policy implications for healing historical trauma among mestizo populations?” Methodology and Approach. We analyzed the discourse from two community projects: focus groups and ethnographic field notes from a study in the U.S.–Mexico border region (2012–2014) and field notes and digital stories from a service-learning course in northern New Mexico (2016–2018). Findings. Our analysis describes the social and historical experiences of Mexicans, Mexican Americans, Chicanas/os, and Nuevo Mexicano peoples in the southwestern border region of the United States. We found four salient themes as manifestations of “soul-wound”: (1) violence/fear, (2) discrimination/shame, (3) loss, and (4) deep sorrow. Themes mitigating the trauma were community resiliency rooted in “querencia” (deep connection to land/home/people) and “conscientizacion” (critical consciousness). Conclusion. Historical trauma experienced by mestizo Latinx communities is rooted in local cultural and intergenerational narratives that link traumatic events in the historic past to contemporary local experiences. Future public health interventions should draw on culturally centered strength-based resilience approaches for healing trauma and advancing health equity.


2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 478-529 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick R. Grzanka ◽  
Kirsten A. Gonzalez ◽  
Lisa B. Spanierman

The mainstreaming of White nationalism in the United States and worldwide suggests an urgent need for counseling psychologists to take stock of what tools they have (and do not have) to combat White supremacy. We review the rise of social justice issues in the field of counseling psychology and allied helping professions and point to the limits of existing paradigms to address the challenge of White supremacy. We introduce transnationalism as an important theoretical perspective with which to conceptualize global racisms, and identify White racial affect, intersectionality, and allyship as three key domains of antiracist action research. Finally, we suggest three steps for sharpening counseling psychologists’ approaches to social justice: rejecting racial progress narratives, engaging in social justice-oriented practice with White clients, and centering White supremacy as a key problem for the field of counseling psychology and allied helping professions.


2021 ◽  
pp. 009164712110116
Author(s):  
David R. Paine ◽  
Steven J. Sandage ◽  
Joshua N. Hook ◽  
Don E. Davis ◽  
Kathryn A. Johnson

Scholars and practitioners have increasingly called for the development of social justice commitment, intercultural competence, and appreciation of diversity among ministers and helping professionals. In religious contexts, individual factors may contribute to differences in the degree to which spiritual leaders emphasize intercultural and social justice initiatives. Personality factors, such as virtues and specific moral commitments, predict the degree to which people report positive attitudes and demonstrate mature alterity. In this study, we explored the degree to which intellectual humility predicted mature alterity outcomes after controlling for the effects of five moral foundations (care, fairness, loyalty, authority, purity) in a sample of Christian seminary students in the United States. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed for ministry and the helping professions.


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