Nepantlera Pedagogy in an Immigrant Youth Theater Project: The Role of a Hmong Educator in Facilitating the Exploration of Culture and Identity

Background/Context: Community-based youth theater programs afford youth opportunities to explore and “author” new identities by “performing writing.” Yet, we know much less about the ways in which immigrant youth are exploring struggles and changes within their families and ethnic community. We particularly lack research about the roles of immigrant adult educators in youth programs, and the significance to the pedagogical process of their experiences, being, and modes of interacting with young people who share with them a common ethnicity. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: The purpose of the study is to explore the role of a community-based Hmong immigrant educator as a “nepantlera,” or boundary-crossing “guide” in Hmong youth’s negotiation of culture and identity. It is guided by three questions: (1) How does nepantlera pedagogy move beyond self–other dichotomies? (2) How does nepantlera pedagogy facilitate rewriting the self to construct new visions of ethnic identity? and (3) How does nepantlera pedagogy entail risking the personal? Setting: The research setting was a Hmong community-based arts organization in an urban center in the Midwestern United States. Population/Participants/Subjects: Three 1.5-generation Hmong American adult staff of a community-based organization, one Korean American teaching artist from a local theater company, and 11 second-generation Hmong American adolescents participated in the study. Research Design: The study draws from a critical ethnographic investigation of the culturally relevant practices of a youth theater project within a Hmong coethnic organization. Data Collection and Analysis: Ethnographic data collection occurred over the 4-month program cycle of the theater project. Data sources include field notes from participant observations, semi-structured interviews, audio and video recordings of the activities, work products, and documents about the program and organization. The data were analyzed with thematic analysis techniques. Findings/Results: The findings suggest that the nepantlera pedagogy of the Hmong immigrant educator fostered opportunities for Hmong youth to (1) disrupt binaries between first-generation and second-generation immigrants by exploring not only differences but also commonalities; (2) imagine new ethnic selves by exploring and rewriting a Hmong edict against same-last-name relationships; and (3) experience the vulnerability of their Hmong educator through disclosure about his personal life. Conclusions/Recommendations: The nepantlera pedagogy of an immigrant educator within a coethnic community-based organization brings a perspective from the nepantla, or “in-between,” of culture and identity that provides immigrant youth with a deeper level of cultural knowledge and connectedness to navigate their multiple worlds.

Editorial: Collaboration in higher education: Partnering with students, colleagues and external stakeholders

Welcome to this Special Issue of the Journal of University Teaching and Learning Practice (JUTLP). This editorial provides an overview of Collaboration in Higher Education. Humans are social, inter-dependent beings, needing to be and communicate with each other. Being with other people provides an opportunity to grow and develop, creating a sense of self and identity. Together we construct, structure and restructure the stories that build the larger narratives of who we are, what we do and how we live, act and behave as people, professionals and larger communities. It is through our collaborations that we come together, and construct meaning and ourselves. As Higher Education continues to exclude and sideline, as it constrains and removes spaces and places for collaboration between service staff, faculty and students within institutions, between institutions, and with other stakeholders, there is a need to rediscover the power of collaboration. The articles included, build on practical experience, research data, personal and collective reflections, to outline how the contributors have navigated this tension to create spaces of voice and hope. Presented are case studies that are boundary crossing: across disciplinary boundaries; cross-institution collaboration; cross-boundary working; pedagogical co-creation and the re-conceptualising of learning; and students as partners, co-researchers and co-authors. Together they showcase refreshed notions of collegiality and collaboration in Higher Education that support new and more nuanced, and dynamic models of co-creation. We hope the Special Issue helps seed an ecology of collaborative practice for social justice – a more humane academia.

Construction of two-dimensional topological field theories with non-invertible symmetries

We construct the defining data of two-dimensional topological field theories (TFTs) enriched by non-invertible symmetries/topological defect lines. Simple formulae for the three-point functions and the lasso two-point functions are derived, and crossing symmetry is proven. The key ingredients are open-to-closed maps and a boundary crossing relation, by which we show that a diagonal basis exists in the defect Hilbert spaces. We then introduce regular TFTs, provide their explicit constructions for the Fibonacci, Ising and Haagerup ℋ3 fusion categories, and match our formulae with previous bootstrap results. We end by explaining how non-regular TFTs are obtained from regular TFTs via generalized gauging.

¿Salir o salir corriendo? Una aproximación a la construcción verbo + gerundio de modo en textos originales y textos traducidos al español

Salir or salir corriendo? An Approach to the Construction of verb + gerund of manner in Original Texts and Texts Translated into Spanish. This article deals with the gerund of manner in combination with verbs of motion. The starting point of this study is the theoretical framework proposed by cognitive semantics which maintains that a motion event can be divided into several components: MOTION, PATH, FIGURE and GROUND. With respect to the predominant lexicalization patterns, two types of languages are distinguished: satellite -framed languages (which encode the PATH by means of a “satellite”) and verb -framed languages (which express the PATH using the verb stem). In addition, it has been observed that speakers of the second group pay less attention to the expression of MANNER, a secondary component, and that there are significant restrictions affecting this component in “boundary -crossing” events. To explore the use of the gerund in combination with verbs of motion, the InterCorp and Araneum Hispanicum Maius corpora, hosted by the Institute of the Czech National Corpus, were used. The results indicate that the gerund of manner is most often used in combination with salir, ir, venir, and llegar, and the most common forms are cor‑ riendo, caminando, andando, and volando. They also show that the combinations with corriendo and volando are more frequent in the subcorpus of texts translated into Spanish than in the subcorpus of original texts. The author concludes that the dynamics of the event is important and that is why the MANNER information is kept in the translations.

Death and Dying: Boundaries and Roles of Families and Healthcare Workers During Patient End of Life

While death and dying often occur within or adjacent to the healthcare setting, grief & support of patients at end-of-life (EOL) remain largely within the realm of the family. Given this division of roles, healthcare workers intentionally set professional boundaries that balance their need to be empathetic and compassionate for patient and their families during EOL, while also maintaining a sense of objectivity and detachment which allows them to cope with patient loss and manage the competing demands of their workday. Tensions occur when healthcare workers are required to cross boundaries at EOL, either voluntarily or involuntarily. Using unobtrusive digital ethnography of a publicly accessible online forum for healthcare providers, this research investigates the boundaries set by families and healthcare workers at EOL, and how EOL circumstances sometimes require healthcare workers to cross or violate these professional boundaries. We suggest that the needs of the family at EOL (not necessarily the patient) serve as the catalyst for both boundary crossing & boundary violations for healthcare workers. Our data reveal that (1) boundary setting and training ought to address the patient-physician-family relationship (not just patient-physician), since the family members are such an integral part of EOL; (2) these EOL dynamics apply beyond the physician and should include all healthcare workers (nurses, etc.). As a result, patient & family centered care may not be fully achieved at EOL due to the ambiguity in the expected roles played by both families and healthcare workers during patient death and dying.

A Geant4 Fano test for novel very high energy electron beams

Objective: The boundary crossing algorithm available in Geant4 10.07-p01 general purpose Monte Carlo code has been investigated for a 12 MeV and 200 MeV electron source by the application of a Fano cavity test. Approach: Fano conditions were enforced through all simulations whilst varying individual charged particle transport parameters which control particle step size, ionisation and single scattering. Main Results: At 12 MeV, Geant4 was found to return excellent dose consistency within 0.1% even with the default parameter configurations. The 200 MeV case, however, showed significant consistency issues when default physics parameters were employed with deviations from unity of more than 6%. The effect of the inclusion of nuclear interactions was also investigated for the 200 MeV beam and was found to return good consistency for a number of parameter configurations. Significance: The Fano test is a necessary investigation to ensure the consistency of charged particle transport available in Geant4 before detailed detector simulations can be conducted.

Translating Obligations: Tamassuk and Fārigh-khaṭṭī in the Indo-Persian World

A necessarily widespread feature of language practice in the Persianate world was the need for translation of speech and text, with a range of lexical and semantic challenges involved in taking meaning from one language to another. This article focusses on legal translation, with its highly functional aims, by following the career of a pair of Indo-Persian legal forms known as tamassuk and fārigh-khaṭṭī, used for recording obligation and requital respectively. Tracing their reincarnations from Persian into Marathi, Hindi and Bengali, this article reveals several forms of boundary-crossing: doctrinal, jurisdictional, political and linguistic. In doing so, it explores the legal mindscapes in the early modern Indo-Persian world, spilling from the late Mughal into the colonial, and shows how multilingualism functioned within specific parts of the Persianate cosmopolis.

Steps toward a digital ecology: ecological principles for the study of digital ecosystems

The notion of digital ecosystems has become a fruitful metaphor for examining the effects of digitalization across boundaries of organization, industry, lifeworld, mind, and body. In business-economic terms, the metaphor has inspired IS research into new business models, while in engineering terms, it has led to important insights into the design and governance of digital platforms. Studying digital ecosystems in these terms, however, makes it difficult to trace and explain those effects of digitalization, which do not materialize predominantly in economic and engineering patterns. Important relationships and their effects may therefore go unnoticed. In response, I draw on the ecological epistemology of Gregory Bateson and others to contribute an ecological approach to digital ecosystems. Such an understanding, I argue, expands the possibilities for tracing and explaining the wide-reaching, boundary-crossing effects of digitalization and the runaway dynamics they may lead to. I suggest to do this based on three principles: (1) part-of-ness—phenomena are to be observed as always part of a larger ecosystem; (2) systemic wisdom—ecosystems have limits, which need to be respected; and (3) information ecology—ecosystems are not mechanical but informed, cognitive systems. As my contribution, I propose six avenues for future IS research into digital ecology.

Cultural Tariffs: Appropriation and the Right to Cross Cultural Boundaries

Why are some acts of cultural boundary-crossing seen as legitimate whereas others are repudiated as cultural appropriation? We argue that perceptions of cultural appropriation have formed in response to the emergence of cultural omnivorousness as a dominant form of high-statusconsumption. Boundary-crossing has become a source of cultural capital. Consequently, the right to adopt a practice from a culture that is not one's own is determined on the basis of the cost one is presumed to have paid. Cultural boundary-crossing is seen as legitimate only if the actor crossing has paid a sufficient cultural tariff. We test our theory in a between-subject (preregistered) experimental design, demonstrating that those who enjoy a privileged social position, as inferred from their social identity or socioeconomic status, have less normative latitude to cross cultural boundaries. This is explained by perceptions that these actors are either devaluing or exploiting the target culture. While symbolic boundaries and cultural distinctiontheories are inconsistent with our results, we find that Americans who are disenchanted about group-based social mobility are the ones most likely to be outraged by cultural boundary crossing. The imposition of a cultural tariff, we argue, is a form of symbolic redistribution.