An agency mapping of marginalized communities and aid providers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Malaysia

Background: Given the urgent need for help amongst vulnerable populations throughout the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, civil society organizations (CSOs) and members have stepped up to provide support for impacted communities. The process of responding to these urgent needs reflects the agency and resilience of civil society members in accessing or providing resources. There is still a lack of understanding of how is human agency exercised in the context of power imbalances. Such an understanding is important not only for creating an effective and inclusive aid delivery mechanisms but also improving preparedness for future public health and economic crises. Methods: This study utilizes Albert Bandura’s social cognitive theory to comprehensively map the agency landscape of aid providers and marginalized populations during the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic in Malaysia. Assuming that these populations’ main goals are access to aid while providers’ main goals are to provide aid, this study categorizes the different modes of agency involved and highlights environmental facilitators and constraints for each of these groups in achieving their goals. Data was collected through in-depth interviews with 34 participants. Using a hermeneutic content analysis based on a sample of 824 textual excerpts from the interviews, we explore the relationship between each component of the agency landscape to understand the relationships between them. Results: We find that marginalized populations are often unable to achieve their goals despite clear intentions to survive. Additionally, we find that proxy agency is problematic for marginalized populations and characterize why this is the case. Conclusions: Finally, we present policy recommendations which prioritise marginalized populations and their needs, while removing barriers to accessing aid.

A Brief History of Public Education and Its Impact on Marginalized Populations

The purpose of this chapter is to provide new school social workers with an understanding of the inequality that is rooted in public education and how it relates to their professional practices. An overview of the history of the U.S. public school system and the history of school social work is provided, focusing on the public school system’s role in the academic achievement gaps that continue to exist between marginalized populations and their peers. The school social worker’s roles as advocate and connector, facilitator, and clinician are outlined. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory, and strengths-based practice theories are discussed. Evidence-based strategies and resources that can be used to address the needs of marginalized populations are explained.

Ensemble singing for wellbeing and social inclusion of street children

With international agencies tapping music as a channel to address the social needs of marginalized populations, this study explored the outcomes of ensemble singing on the health and social integration of street children in the Philippines. Using mixed methods, perceived effects of ensemble singing on the wellbeing and social inclusion of street children were investigated, as well as the challenges of ensemble singing as a type of intervention for the health and social integration of marginalized groups and the implications of such music-based social action research for ensemble performance studies. Although challenges to ensemble singing were revealed by the children, both choristers and facilitators perceived a range of social, physical, psychological, and spiritual benefits. Facilitators reflected on the transformative potential of ensemble singing for the wellbeing of marginalized populations. This investigation anticipates further exploration on the transnational spectrum of ensemble music in relation to health, social inclusion, and music-based social action research.

Working With Marginalized Populations

This Eleanor Clarke Slagle lecture describes the author’s work with marginalized populations, including homeless adults with mental illness, premature aging conditions, and poor literacy; women who became homeless as a result of domestic violence; children in impoverished, urban school systems reading below grade level; and adults with severe and chronic mental illness that impeded their ability to secure employment, housing, and independent community living. The author illustrates how and why occupational therapy practitioners should become part of the primary care team that evaluates the impact of multiple disorders on marginalized populations’ daily life activities, provides services to optimize community participation, and provides environmental modifications to enhance safety and function.

The Reservations of the Funny: Ethics of Studying Funny Communication

Studying the funny trends within historically marginalized populations has historically been used as a means of making them seem nonthreatening to dominant cultures. Scholars, furthermore, have often applied dominant-culture contexts toward reading minority artifacts without taking the time to understand the premises for other cultures’ funny enthymemes (Epp 2010; Price 1994). This paper proposes two solutions to the dilemma of recognizing the importance of representing marginalized populations’ humor in the scholarly canon but also studying those funny artifacts with a mind toward ethics, using Native American humor as a representative case study.

Intersectionality as an Analytic Sensibility in Cultural Research

Intersectionality is gaining popularity as a lens through which the experiences of marginalized populations can be considered. However, in regards to cultural research, how can an intersectional sensibility be implemented to ensure the complete picture of a given phenomenon is captured? The purpose of this chapter is to understand how to engage intersectionality as a lens to conceptualize the cultural research process. How intersectionality can be framed as an analytic sensibility in psychological research is first examined. Then an ecological conceptualization of culture is highlighted that incorporates tenets of intersectionality, and an exploration is presented of how intersectionality disrupts dominant ideas within cultural research processes and methodologies. The chapter concludes by detailing how quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods research can reflect intersectionality as an analytic sensibility when aiming to conduct cultural research.