This document summarizes an academic article about the impacts of militarization on the indigenous Chamorro people of Guam. Over 400 years of Spanish and U.S. military colonial rule has devalued Chamorro culture and identity. The U.S. now controls a third of Guam's land for military bases. Using an intersectional analysis of gender, indigeneity and citizenship, the document examines how militarization has affected Chamorro bodies, identities and social relations in complex ways. It also discusses the history of Spanish colonization, how this disrupted traditional Chamorro gender roles and social hierarchy, and the impacts of continued U.S. military presence and proposed military buildup on Guam today
This document discusses a proposed study to measure levels of patriotism among different groups in modern America. The researchers hypothesize that patriotism will be lowest among immigrants and minorities and highest among veterans and white citizens, due to current political and social unrest. They plan to survey participants of different ages, ethnicities, citizenship statuses, and military backgrounds using questions with Likert scale responses about patriotism, as well as open-ended questions. The results will analyze differences in patriotism levels between demographic groups and identify factors that influence patriotic feelings.
Ethocentrism and Cultural Relativism -A course of Sociology in Nepals B.Sc.Fo...Stxaviersinstitute
Nepal B.sc Forestry syllabus-Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism.This slides describes about the difference of Ethnocentrism and Cultural relativism also.
This document examines the causes of the 2011 Arab uprisings by testing the relationship between economic grievances, social fragmentation, and mass movement in the Arab world. It analyzes how class-based (horizontal) cleavages related to economic factors like corruption and unemployment compare to group-based (vertical) cleavages along ethnic, tribal and religious lines in predicting popular uprisings. The document reviews literature on the impact of both types of social divisions, finding that only perceptions of corruption were significantly linked to the Arab uprisings, while both high and low levels of ethnic fragmentation were also correlated with mass movement. Tribalism was found to negatively impact protests but it is unclear if this is due to regime type.
This document discusses the struggles Muslim Americans face in retaining their Islamic heritage and cultural identity. It explores how discrimination in schools can negatively impact Muslim American children's development and sense of belonging. It also examines how Muslim families try to counteract this by establishing Islamic schools that teach Muslim culture and traditions, or by homeschooling. However, being immersed in American pop culture and attending public schools still influences many Muslim American youth to adopt more Western views. The document also analyzes how events like 9/11 increased anti-Muslim sentiment and discrimination, making it difficult for Muslim Americans to feel accepted in their own country.
This document analyzes how racial identities have directly impacted socioeconomic success in the United States. It examines three examples: the Tape family achieving social "whiteness" and greater opportunities through appearing white; views of whites as greedy fueling stereotypes that reinforced their higher status; and police targeting of Chicanos based on race, which both caused harassment and led some Mexican-Americans to adopt a Chicano identity. Together these examples show how race and perceptions of race have dictated and maintained class differences in American society.
Remarks by Anc president Cyril Ramaphosa at the launch of the alliance anti-r...SABC News
George Floyd's death has sparked global outrage over racism. While progress has been made since colonialism and apartheid, racism remains deeply ingrained in many societies through economic, social, and psychological dimensions that reinforce inequality. To combat racism, governments and citizens must acknowledge its existence, give voice to marginalized communities, promote respect for diversity, and condemn all acts of intolerance through education, laws, and policies that promote equality and human rights for all.
Soc 320 explain why it is important/tutorialoutletBinksz
FOR MORE CLASSES VISIT
tutorialoutletdotcom
Black feminism remains important because U.S. Black women constitute an oppressed group. As a
collectivity, U.S. Black women participate in a dialectical relationship linking African-American women’s
oppression and activism.
The document discusses race and ethnicity variations in the United States, covering topics like historical context, assimilation, prejudice, discrimination, and family patterns among major racial groups. It provides details on the African American, Hispanic American, Asian American, and Native American populations, including their historical backgrounds, socioeconomic contexts, marital structures, parenting styles, and challenges faced.
This document discusses a proposed study to measure levels of patriotism among different groups in modern America. The researchers hypothesize that patriotism will be lowest among immigrants and minorities and highest among veterans and white citizens, due to current political and social unrest. They plan to survey participants of different ages, ethnicities, citizenship statuses, and military backgrounds using questions with Likert scale responses about patriotism, as well as open-ended questions. The results will analyze differences in patriotism levels between demographic groups and identify factors that influence patriotic feelings.
Ethocentrism and Cultural Relativism -A course of Sociology in Nepals B.Sc.Fo...Stxaviersinstitute
Nepal B.sc Forestry syllabus-Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism.This slides describes about the difference of Ethnocentrism and Cultural relativism also.
This document examines the causes of the 2011 Arab uprisings by testing the relationship between economic grievances, social fragmentation, and mass movement in the Arab world. It analyzes how class-based (horizontal) cleavages related to economic factors like corruption and unemployment compare to group-based (vertical) cleavages along ethnic, tribal and religious lines in predicting popular uprisings. The document reviews literature on the impact of both types of social divisions, finding that only perceptions of corruption were significantly linked to the Arab uprisings, while both high and low levels of ethnic fragmentation were also correlated with mass movement. Tribalism was found to negatively impact protests but it is unclear if this is due to regime type.
This document discusses the struggles Muslim Americans face in retaining their Islamic heritage and cultural identity. It explores how discrimination in schools can negatively impact Muslim American children's development and sense of belonging. It also examines how Muslim families try to counteract this by establishing Islamic schools that teach Muslim culture and traditions, or by homeschooling. However, being immersed in American pop culture and attending public schools still influences many Muslim American youth to adopt more Western views. The document also analyzes how events like 9/11 increased anti-Muslim sentiment and discrimination, making it difficult for Muslim Americans to feel accepted in their own country.
This document analyzes how racial identities have directly impacted socioeconomic success in the United States. It examines three examples: the Tape family achieving social "whiteness" and greater opportunities through appearing white; views of whites as greedy fueling stereotypes that reinforced their higher status; and police targeting of Chicanos based on race, which both caused harassment and led some Mexican-Americans to adopt a Chicano identity. Together these examples show how race and perceptions of race have dictated and maintained class differences in American society.
Remarks by Anc president Cyril Ramaphosa at the launch of the alliance anti-r...SABC News
George Floyd's death has sparked global outrage over racism. While progress has been made since colonialism and apartheid, racism remains deeply ingrained in many societies through economic, social, and psychological dimensions that reinforce inequality. To combat racism, governments and citizens must acknowledge its existence, give voice to marginalized communities, promote respect for diversity, and condemn all acts of intolerance through education, laws, and policies that promote equality and human rights for all.
Soc 320 explain why it is important/tutorialoutletBinksz
FOR MORE CLASSES VISIT
tutorialoutletdotcom
Black feminism remains important because U.S. Black women constitute an oppressed group. As a
collectivity, U.S. Black women participate in a dialectical relationship linking African-American women’s
oppression and activism.
The document discusses race and ethnicity variations in the United States, covering topics like historical context, assimilation, prejudice, discrimination, and family patterns among major racial groups. It provides details on the African American, Hispanic American, Asian American, and Native American populations, including their historical backgrounds, socioeconomic contexts, marital structures, parenting styles, and challenges faced.
Ethnocentrism refers to evaluating other groups based primarily on the standards and customs of one's own culture. It first emerged in social science studies in 1906 and can involve believing one's own ethnic group is superior. Ethnocentrism is common and can be seen throughout history in examples like European imperialism, Chinese cultural dominance, and Nazi Germany's oppression of Jews. While ethnocentrism helps reinforce group identity and loyalty, it can also promote discrimination, prejudice, and racism against outsiders.
This document discusses the social construction of race and racism in the United States. It begins by arguing that while the Pledge of Allegiance promises "liberty and justice for all," in reality most liberty and justice is reserved for white people. It then defines race as a social construct used to categorize and group people based on physical characteristics like skin color. The document explores different forms of racism, from overt racism to more subtle institutional and covert racism, and how racism is rooted in prejudice and discrimination that privileges white people and limits opportunities for minorities. It examines how racism is perpetuated through cultural forces like media stereotypes and the internalization of negative racial messages.
062517 - Emails To NIGERIA (FAMU BOT Issue)VogelDenise
17 USC § 107 Limitations on Exclusive Rights – FAIR USE
ATTACKS on Florida A&M University’s BOARD OF TRUSTEES + GENOCIDE Attacks IN AFRICA USING EBOLA. . . + GENOCIDAL Practices in Brazil Using ZIKA. . . . + MUCH. . .MUCH. . MUCH MORE TERRORIST, RACIST and DISCRIMINATORY Attacks = 1 COMMON CONNECTION BAKER DONELSON BEARMAN CALDWELL & BERKOWITZ (i.e. with its WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists Counterparts)!
SENDING A GLOBAL MESSAGE: GET THE UNITED STATES’ DESPOT and ITS MILITARY, GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS, etc. OUT OF YOUR COUNTRY AND OUT OF YOUR BUSINESSES!
There are those who may think that the KU KLUX KLAN’s and its JEWISH ZIONIST Counterparts’ Attacks on FLORIDA A&M University is a UNITED STATES’ DESPOT issue ONLY; however, it is NOT! Such Terrorist and Racist/Discriminatory Attacks is ALSO an INTERNATIONAL Issue.
YES, the Ku Klux Klan’s, Zionists’ and their Law Firm of Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz PLANNED, ORCHESTRATED and CARRIED OUT the Terrorist and Racist ATTACKS by INJECTING Blacks/African-Americans/Negroes with DISEASES as GONORRHEA, SYPHILIS and AIDS and MANY MORE Diseases for GENOCIDAL purposes!
WHEN the United States’ DESPOT’s WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists LAUNCHED the EBOLA Attacks on the AFRICAN Nations – i.e. for GENOCIDAL PURPOSES to GAIN Access and CONTROL of the Lands/Territories - it was the PUBLIC EXPOSURE by Community Activist Vogel Denise Newsome (a Florida A&M University Graduate and Alumni) that RESULTED in the ENDING of such MASS Terrorist Activities by the WHITE Man and its WEST Alliances/Co-Conspirators!
WHEN the United States’ DESPOT’s WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists LAUNCHED the ZIKA Virus/Attacks in RIO de JANEIRO in RETALIATION for that Nation WINNING the Bid to hold the 2016 Olympic Games, IT WAS THE WORK of Community Activist Vogel Denise Newsome PUBLICLY EXPOSING these Terrorist, Racist and Discriminatory practices of the United States’ DESPOT’s ZIONISTS to SABOTAGE the 2016 Olympic Games by RELEASING the ZIKA Virus in hopes of CAUSING PANIC and the FAILURE of the 2016 Olympic Games. Going as far as using its ZIONIST-Controlled Media Networks to EMBELLISH the LIES of one of the United States’ DESPOT’s TOP/KEY Swimmer (Ryan Lochte) WHO made a TELEVISED appearance CLAIMING to have been ROBBED – when he WAS NOT! Suppose RIO de JANEIRO didn’t have the CAMERAS available, the United States’ WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists WOULD HAVE used such Interviews to DESTROY the REPUTATION of a Nation-Of-Color!
Support the Work at: www.Cash.me/$VogelDeniseNewsome
International Donations may be made at: https://donorbox.org/community-activist-vogel-denise-newsome
With PEACE & LOVE
Vogel Denise Newsome – Community Activist
Post Office Box 31265
Jackson, MS 39286
(513) 680-2922
This document discusses the rise of neoliberalism and its negative impacts, particularly on youth and public memory. It argues that neoliberal policies have dismantled democratic institutions and social protections. This has increased inequality and precarity for young people, who now face a bleak future with few opportunities or security. Additionally, neoliberalism promotes "organized forgetting" of progressive ideas and social movements, instead celebrating individualism. The result is a rise in state violence and a surveillance system that views all, especially the marginalized, as potential criminals or terrorists. Recent youth protests against austerity and inequality have been met with police crackdowns, demonstrating how neoliberal states now merge violence and governance.
This document discusses the differences between race and ethnicity. Race is based on biological characteristics like skin color and hair, while ethnicity is based on cultural characteristics like shared ancestry, culture, and place of origin. It also discusses myths about race, such as the idea that any race is superior. Minority groups experience unequal treatment compared to dominant groups. Prejudice is an attitude while discrimination is an action. Theories of prejudice include frustration-aggression and the authoritarian personality. Global patterns of intergroup relations include segregation, assimilation, and multiculturalism. The document then discusses race and ethnic relations in the US for various groups such as Europeans, Latinos, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans.
This document discusses the concept of white privilege in the United States. It argues that whites have historically had advantages over other races in areas like education, career opportunities, interactions with police, and in how history is taught from their perspective. It also discusses how the definition of who is considered white has changed over time to include groups that were once not. While some privileges may also be given to minorities at times, whites generally have more privilege and advantage in politics, education, and society.
This document discusses the ethical arguments for and against Indian reservations in the United States. It asserts that while past injustices against Native Americans cannot be remedied through privileges for Native people alone, reservations are still justified based on treaties and constitutional guarantees of sovereignty. However, for reservations to appropriately address "enduring injustices," they must provide Native citizens with the same rights and standards of living as other Americans, without being exclusively ethnic or allowing dysfunction. The document argues compensation for past wrongs should focus on addressing present disadvantages, not past victims or entire ethnic groups.
This document discusses the increasing racial diversity in America and examines what race means. It notes that as the country becomes more multiracial, tolerance seems to be growing. The document explores the history of race in America from the treatment of Native Americans to laws banning interracial marriage. It highlights how the 2000 census allowed people to identify with multiple races, showing that mixed-race individuals now make up around 2.4% of the population. The future projections suggest multiracial individuals will soon be the majority. Overall, the increasing diversity reflects the country's movement toward acceptance rather than just tolerance of different races and backgrounds.
This study examines how mass media misrepresentation of Muslims has affected the cross-cultural adaptation experiences of Muslim refugees and students in higher education in the US. The study will conduct focus group interviews with Muslim students who have refugee family members to understand their experiences with discrimination and how media portrayals have complicated their social integration. Examining this issue is important given the growing Muslim refugee population in the US and the impact of media framing on shaping public perceptions. The results could help inform policies supporting refugee integration and cultural understanding.
Chapter 9 inequalities of race and ethnicityKent Hansen
The document discusses concepts related to minorities, race, ethnicity, and stereotyping. It provides definitions for key terms like minority, race, and ethnicity. Some of the topics covered include common stereotypes associated with different racial and ethnic groups, how stereotypes can impact treatment of groups, and different patterns of assimilation and conflict between minority and majority groups in society. The document also examines prejudice, discrimination, and the experiences of several minority groups in the United States like African Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, and Asian Americans.
Rev. William F. Hartigan Medal - Essay SubmissionAnthony V. John
1. Hispanic/Latino parishes emerged in the late 1960s as Catholic migrants mobilized to integrate into American society and address challenges like undocumented migration and lack of political representation.
2. U.S. foreign policy in Latin America, including military interventions and support for authoritarian regimes, contributed to economic instability and violence that drove Latin American migration to the U.S. in large numbers starting in the 1980s.
3. Hispanic/Latino parishes have created faith-based movements advocating for immigration reform, greater political influence, and social justice, drawing on Catholic social teaching and grassroots organizing models.
The document discusses racial and ethnic groups in the United States, including African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans. It notes that minority groups have faced various forms of discrimination and difficulties gaining acceptance and equality in US society. While progress has been made since the civil rights movement, many minority groups still face socioeconomic disadvantages and underrepresentation compared to white Americans.
To what extent is human identity mediated? INTRO, not finishedaquinasmedia
Human identity, especially for African Americans, is often mediated by external forces according to the document. Historically, Western media has negatively portrayed African physicality since 1915 and the belief that "black is bad" stems even further back. If "white is good" then "black must be bad" according to binary opposition thinking. Additionally, an article discusses how the term "African American" does not always apply and that ethnicity is still often seen as a "cultural determinant" in mainstream media. The document also gives an anecdote where a Caucasian girlfriend asked a boyfriend not to call himself "black" as it made her uncomfortable, showing societal pressure for African Americans to be defined by others. However, younger audiences are
A multiracial family is a family with ancestors from two or more different races. The US Census recognizes 5 racial categories but Hispanic is considered an ethnicity. Approximately 7% of US adults are multiracial and 4 in 10 adults identify as multiracial. Multiracial adults are less likely to be college graduates compared to other adults. They are also more likely to have a spouse that is also multiracial and identify with the Democratic party. Multiracial buying power has grown exponentially from $661 billion in 1990 to $3.4 trillion in 2014. Multiracial consumers heavily use smartphones and apps to express their identities. TV shows and advertisements are increasingly representing multiracial families but children's books still primarily feature Cauc
Diversity has historically been a problem in the US and higher education due to founding mono-culturalism, but moving forward requires cultural self-awareness, understanding differences, embracing variety of perspectives, and establishing diversity audits, plans, and personal action commitments to build a more inclusive future.
This document outlines the course description, requirements, policies, schedule, and learning outcomes for an interdisciplinary course on Pacific Islander history and culture (ICS 21) paired with a composition course (EWRT 1A). The courses will examine the experiences and contemporary issues of Pacific Islander communities in the US through readings, discussions, presentations and writing assignments. Students will analyze the impact of colonialism, compare social and cultural patterns, and apply oral storytelling traditions. Requirements include journals, presentations, in-class and take-home essays, and a research paper. The tentative schedule provides an overview of topics to be covered each week such as oral histories, militarization, resistance movements, and decolonization.
The document outlines the schedule for different groups at a summer camp, including Groups 1, 3, 4, 7A, 7B, 9A and 9B. It then lists time for counselors and ends by returning to the campers and concluding until the following year.
1) The document discusses the process of colonization and decolonization. It outlines 5 steps of colonization: denial, destruction, denigration, surface accommodation, and transformation/exploitation of indigenous cultures.
2) It then outlines 5 phases of decolonization: rediscovery/recovery, mourning, dreaming, commitment, and action. Rediscovery involves curiosity about one's history and culture after years of colonial domination promoting inferiority.
3) The author provides examples of rediscovery from their own experience and in Hawaiian society since the 1960s as awareness of injustice and illegality in the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom grew, sparking cultural and political revival. Rediscovery is an ongoing process for many to
The document discusses the benefits of exercise for mental health. Regular physical activity can help reduce anxiety and depression and improve mood and cognitive functioning. Exercise causes chemical changes in the brain that may help boost feelings of calmness, happiness and focus.
1) The human colonization of the Pacific Islands occurred in three main phases, with the earliest peoples settling Near Oceania like New Guinea and the Bismarck Archipelago over 35,000 years ago.
2) Between 3,500-2,800 years ago, the Lapita people colonized Remote Oceania using advanced seafaring skills, spreading as far as Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. They left behind distinctive Lapita pottery.
3) The third phase saw the settlement of East Polynesia around 1,200 years ago, with peoples reaching places like Hawaii, New Zealand, and Easter Island remarkably quickly, showing sophisticated navigation abilities.
This document discusses two perspectives on Oceania - as "islands in a far sea" and as "a sea of islands". The first view emphasizes the small isolated land areas, while the second sees Oceania holistically with a focus on the interrelationships between the islands and sea. The author argues that the traditional worldview of Oceanic peoples was of a large interconnected region, rather than isolated small islands. Promoting the view of Oceania as confined and dependent risks perpetuating the belittlement of islander cultures and limiting their autonomy. The author advocates shifting to a perspective that recognizes the historical and cultural significance of the seas in Oceania.
This document outlines the syllabus for an interdisciplinary course on Pacific Islander history and culture. The course will examine the experiences of various Pacific Islander communities in the United States through readings, presentations, essays and a research paper. Students will analyze patterns of social culture and values, the impact of colonialism, and the oral storytelling tradition. Assignments include journal responses, oral history presentations on students' family migrations, in-class and take-home essays, and a research paper on a topic approved by the instructors. The course will cover topics like family dynamics, contemporary issues, militarization, Christianity, resistance movements and decolonization.
Ethnocentrism refers to evaluating other groups based primarily on the standards and customs of one's own culture. It first emerged in social science studies in 1906 and can involve believing one's own ethnic group is superior. Ethnocentrism is common and can be seen throughout history in examples like European imperialism, Chinese cultural dominance, and Nazi Germany's oppression of Jews. While ethnocentrism helps reinforce group identity and loyalty, it can also promote discrimination, prejudice, and racism against outsiders.
This document discusses the social construction of race and racism in the United States. It begins by arguing that while the Pledge of Allegiance promises "liberty and justice for all," in reality most liberty and justice is reserved for white people. It then defines race as a social construct used to categorize and group people based on physical characteristics like skin color. The document explores different forms of racism, from overt racism to more subtle institutional and covert racism, and how racism is rooted in prejudice and discrimination that privileges white people and limits opportunities for minorities. It examines how racism is perpetuated through cultural forces like media stereotypes and the internalization of negative racial messages.
062517 - Emails To NIGERIA (FAMU BOT Issue)VogelDenise
17 USC § 107 Limitations on Exclusive Rights – FAIR USE
ATTACKS on Florida A&M University’s BOARD OF TRUSTEES + GENOCIDE Attacks IN AFRICA USING EBOLA. . . + GENOCIDAL Practices in Brazil Using ZIKA. . . . + MUCH. . .MUCH. . MUCH MORE TERRORIST, RACIST and DISCRIMINATORY Attacks = 1 COMMON CONNECTION BAKER DONELSON BEARMAN CALDWELL & BERKOWITZ (i.e. with its WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists Counterparts)!
SENDING A GLOBAL MESSAGE: GET THE UNITED STATES’ DESPOT and ITS MILITARY, GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS, etc. OUT OF YOUR COUNTRY AND OUT OF YOUR BUSINESSES!
There are those who may think that the KU KLUX KLAN’s and its JEWISH ZIONIST Counterparts’ Attacks on FLORIDA A&M University is a UNITED STATES’ DESPOT issue ONLY; however, it is NOT! Such Terrorist and Racist/Discriminatory Attacks is ALSO an INTERNATIONAL Issue.
YES, the Ku Klux Klan’s, Zionists’ and their Law Firm of Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz PLANNED, ORCHESTRATED and CARRIED OUT the Terrorist and Racist ATTACKS by INJECTING Blacks/African-Americans/Negroes with DISEASES as GONORRHEA, SYPHILIS and AIDS and MANY MORE Diseases for GENOCIDAL purposes!
WHEN the United States’ DESPOT’s WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists LAUNCHED the EBOLA Attacks on the AFRICAN Nations – i.e. for GENOCIDAL PURPOSES to GAIN Access and CONTROL of the Lands/Territories - it was the PUBLIC EXPOSURE by Community Activist Vogel Denise Newsome (a Florida A&M University Graduate and Alumni) that RESULTED in the ENDING of such MASS Terrorist Activities by the WHITE Man and its WEST Alliances/Co-Conspirators!
WHEN the United States’ DESPOT’s WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists LAUNCHED the ZIKA Virus/Attacks in RIO de JANEIRO in RETALIATION for that Nation WINNING the Bid to hold the 2016 Olympic Games, IT WAS THE WORK of Community Activist Vogel Denise Newsome PUBLICLY EXPOSING these Terrorist, Racist and Discriminatory practices of the United States’ DESPOT’s ZIONISTS to SABOTAGE the 2016 Olympic Games by RELEASING the ZIKA Virus in hopes of CAUSING PANIC and the FAILURE of the 2016 Olympic Games. Going as far as using its ZIONIST-Controlled Media Networks to EMBELLISH the LIES of one of the United States’ DESPOT’s TOP/KEY Swimmer (Ryan Lochte) WHO made a TELEVISED appearance CLAIMING to have been ROBBED – when he WAS NOT! Suppose RIO de JANEIRO didn’t have the CAMERAS available, the United States’ WHITE Jews/Zionists/Supremacists WOULD HAVE used such Interviews to DESTROY the REPUTATION of a Nation-Of-Color!
Support the Work at: www.Cash.me/$VogelDeniseNewsome
International Donations may be made at: https://donorbox.org/community-activist-vogel-denise-newsome
With PEACE & LOVE
Vogel Denise Newsome – Community Activist
Post Office Box 31265
Jackson, MS 39286
(513) 680-2922
This document discusses the rise of neoliberalism and its negative impacts, particularly on youth and public memory. It argues that neoliberal policies have dismantled democratic institutions and social protections. This has increased inequality and precarity for young people, who now face a bleak future with few opportunities or security. Additionally, neoliberalism promotes "organized forgetting" of progressive ideas and social movements, instead celebrating individualism. The result is a rise in state violence and a surveillance system that views all, especially the marginalized, as potential criminals or terrorists. Recent youth protests against austerity and inequality have been met with police crackdowns, demonstrating how neoliberal states now merge violence and governance.
This document discusses the differences between race and ethnicity. Race is based on biological characteristics like skin color and hair, while ethnicity is based on cultural characteristics like shared ancestry, culture, and place of origin. It also discusses myths about race, such as the idea that any race is superior. Minority groups experience unequal treatment compared to dominant groups. Prejudice is an attitude while discrimination is an action. Theories of prejudice include frustration-aggression and the authoritarian personality. Global patterns of intergroup relations include segregation, assimilation, and multiculturalism. The document then discusses race and ethnic relations in the US for various groups such as Europeans, Latinos, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans.
This document discusses the concept of white privilege in the United States. It argues that whites have historically had advantages over other races in areas like education, career opportunities, interactions with police, and in how history is taught from their perspective. It also discusses how the definition of who is considered white has changed over time to include groups that were once not. While some privileges may also be given to minorities at times, whites generally have more privilege and advantage in politics, education, and society.
This document discusses the ethical arguments for and against Indian reservations in the United States. It asserts that while past injustices against Native Americans cannot be remedied through privileges for Native people alone, reservations are still justified based on treaties and constitutional guarantees of sovereignty. However, for reservations to appropriately address "enduring injustices," they must provide Native citizens with the same rights and standards of living as other Americans, without being exclusively ethnic or allowing dysfunction. The document argues compensation for past wrongs should focus on addressing present disadvantages, not past victims or entire ethnic groups.
This document discusses the increasing racial diversity in America and examines what race means. It notes that as the country becomes more multiracial, tolerance seems to be growing. The document explores the history of race in America from the treatment of Native Americans to laws banning interracial marriage. It highlights how the 2000 census allowed people to identify with multiple races, showing that mixed-race individuals now make up around 2.4% of the population. The future projections suggest multiracial individuals will soon be the majority. Overall, the increasing diversity reflects the country's movement toward acceptance rather than just tolerance of different races and backgrounds.
This study examines how mass media misrepresentation of Muslims has affected the cross-cultural adaptation experiences of Muslim refugees and students in higher education in the US. The study will conduct focus group interviews with Muslim students who have refugee family members to understand their experiences with discrimination and how media portrayals have complicated their social integration. Examining this issue is important given the growing Muslim refugee population in the US and the impact of media framing on shaping public perceptions. The results could help inform policies supporting refugee integration and cultural understanding.
Chapter 9 inequalities of race and ethnicityKent Hansen
The document discusses concepts related to minorities, race, ethnicity, and stereotyping. It provides definitions for key terms like minority, race, and ethnicity. Some of the topics covered include common stereotypes associated with different racial and ethnic groups, how stereotypes can impact treatment of groups, and different patterns of assimilation and conflict between minority and majority groups in society. The document also examines prejudice, discrimination, and the experiences of several minority groups in the United States like African Americans, Latinos, Native Americans, and Asian Americans.
Rev. William F. Hartigan Medal - Essay SubmissionAnthony V. John
1. Hispanic/Latino parishes emerged in the late 1960s as Catholic migrants mobilized to integrate into American society and address challenges like undocumented migration and lack of political representation.
2. U.S. foreign policy in Latin America, including military interventions and support for authoritarian regimes, contributed to economic instability and violence that drove Latin American migration to the U.S. in large numbers starting in the 1980s.
3. Hispanic/Latino parishes have created faith-based movements advocating for immigration reform, greater political influence, and social justice, drawing on Catholic social teaching and grassroots organizing models.
The document discusses racial and ethnic groups in the United States, including African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans. It notes that minority groups have faced various forms of discrimination and difficulties gaining acceptance and equality in US society. While progress has been made since the civil rights movement, many minority groups still face socioeconomic disadvantages and underrepresentation compared to white Americans.
To what extent is human identity mediated? INTRO, not finishedaquinasmedia
Human identity, especially for African Americans, is often mediated by external forces according to the document. Historically, Western media has negatively portrayed African physicality since 1915 and the belief that "black is bad" stems even further back. If "white is good" then "black must be bad" according to binary opposition thinking. Additionally, an article discusses how the term "African American" does not always apply and that ethnicity is still often seen as a "cultural determinant" in mainstream media. The document also gives an anecdote where a Caucasian girlfriend asked a boyfriend not to call himself "black" as it made her uncomfortable, showing societal pressure for African Americans to be defined by others. However, younger audiences are
A multiracial family is a family with ancestors from two or more different races. The US Census recognizes 5 racial categories but Hispanic is considered an ethnicity. Approximately 7% of US adults are multiracial and 4 in 10 adults identify as multiracial. Multiracial adults are less likely to be college graduates compared to other adults. They are also more likely to have a spouse that is also multiracial and identify with the Democratic party. Multiracial buying power has grown exponentially from $661 billion in 1990 to $3.4 trillion in 2014. Multiracial consumers heavily use smartphones and apps to express their identities. TV shows and advertisements are increasingly representing multiracial families but children's books still primarily feature Cauc
Diversity has historically been a problem in the US and higher education due to founding mono-culturalism, but moving forward requires cultural self-awareness, understanding differences, embracing variety of perspectives, and establishing diversity audits, plans, and personal action commitments to build a more inclusive future.
This document outlines the course description, requirements, policies, schedule, and learning outcomes for an interdisciplinary course on Pacific Islander history and culture (ICS 21) paired with a composition course (EWRT 1A). The courses will examine the experiences and contemporary issues of Pacific Islander communities in the US through readings, discussions, presentations and writing assignments. Students will analyze the impact of colonialism, compare social and cultural patterns, and apply oral storytelling traditions. Requirements include journals, presentations, in-class and take-home essays, and a research paper. The tentative schedule provides an overview of topics to be covered each week such as oral histories, militarization, resistance movements, and decolonization.
The document outlines the schedule for different groups at a summer camp, including Groups 1, 3, 4, 7A, 7B, 9A and 9B. It then lists time for counselors and ends by returning to the campers and concluding until the following year.
1) The document discusses the process of colonization and decolonization. It outlines 5 steps of colonization: denial, destruction, denigration, surface accommodation, and transformation/exploitation of indigenous cultures.
2) It then outlines 5 phases of decolonization: rediscovery/recovery, mourning, dreaming, commitment, and action. Rediscovery involves curiosity about one's history and culture after years of colonial domination promoting inferiority.
3) The author provides examples of rediscovery from their own experience and in Hawaiian society since the 1960s as awareness of injustice and illegality in the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom grew, sparking cultural and political revival. Rediscovery is an ongoing process for many to
The document discusses the benefits of exercise for mental health. Regular physical activity can help reduce anxiety and depression and improve mood and cognitive functioning. Exercise causes chemical changes in the brain that may help boost feelings of calmness, happiness and focus.
1) The human colonization of the Pacific Islands occurred in three main phases, with the earliest peoples settling Near Oceania like New Guinea and the Bismarck Archipelago over 35,000 years ago.
2) Between 3,500-2,800 years ago, the Lapita people colonized Remote Oceania using advanced seafaring skills, spreading as far as Fiji, Tonga, and Samoa. They left behind distinctive Lapita pottery.
3) The third phase saw the settlement of East Polynesia around 1,200 years ago, with peoples reaching places like Hawaii, New Zealand, and Easter Island remarkably quickly, showing sophisticated navigation abilities.
This document discusses two perspectives on Oceania - as "islands in a far sea" and as "a sea of islands". The first view emphasizes the small isolated land areas, while the second sees Oceania holistically with a focus on the interrelationships between the islands and sea. The author argues that the traditional worldview of Oceanic peoples was of a large interconnected region, rather than isolated small islands. Promoting the view of Oceania as confined and dependent risks perpetuating the belittlement of islander cultures and limiting their autonomy. The author advocates shifting to a perspective that recognizes the historical and cultural significance of the seas in Oceania.
This document outlines the syllabus for an interdisciplinary course on Pacific Islander history and culture. The course will examine the experiences of various Pacific Islander communities in the United States through readings, presentations, essays and a research paper. Students will analyze patterns of social culture and values, the impact of colonialism, and the oral storytelling tradition. Assignments include journal responses, oral history presentations on students' family migrations, in-class and take-home essays, and a research paper on a topic approved by the instructors. The course will cover topics like family dynamics, contemporary issues, militarization, Christianity, resistance movements and decolonization.
Presentation slides from Brightline Lawyers accompanying a discussion with Brisbane web design and technology professionals concerning client engagement terms
Australia is made up of people from various ethnic and racial backgrounds. However, despite the diversity in the racial ethnicity that exist among the people here, there are two major divisions that are used to define or classify these differences that exist. A person may be classified as either Indigenous or non-indigenous. This classification is made on the basis of one’s origin and physical attributes or origin. Despite the division that one belongs to, there are a number of advantages and disadvantages that either of these group faces (Milness, 2001 p.44).Considering that the world has evolved and people in this century have adopted modern civilization, there are silent voices among the two groups that claim that the two groups have concerning their identity. These concerns are based on the claims that the non-indigenous people define and identify the indigenous people basing on racial grounds.
review of the history of interaction between Native Americans and th.docxcarlstromcurtis
review of the history of interaction between Native Americans and the colonists who established themselves in the Americas, documents centuries of hostile actions that led to the virtual elimination of native peoples. Colonization of the Americas resulted in the loss of their traditional lands, and was followed by political and economic domination and by numerous efforts to exploit their labor. During certain periods they were forced to accept "civilization" and enter the American mainstream life. An examination of their history demonstrates that Native peoples may have experienced the entire spectrum of intergroup relations. This essay will require you to discuss their history of intergroup relations, by responding to the questions posed the section titled Prepare and Submit.
dentify the Minority Group Responses Native Americans engaged in, providing examples.
Which consequences of Minority-Group status apply to the Native American experience?
Identify the Dominant-Group Responses that apply to the Native American experience.
Discuss Minority-Minority relations between Native American tribes.
Identify and discuss the "Theories of Minority Integration" which are discussed in Chapter 4, that apply to the Native American experience
...
The document discusses the concept of American isolationism and argues that it is an oversimplified and inaccurate term to describe U.S. foreign policy. While isolationism implies a complete separation from other nations, the U.S. has been engaged commercially, culturally, and ideologically with other countries since its founding. Applying realist, liberal, and identity perspectives shows that the U.S. has never fully withdrawn from global affairs due to economic interdependence, alliances, and a sense of mission to spread democratic values. The term isolationism fails to encompass the multi-faceted nature of America's international role and needs to be redefined or replaced to more accurately capture U.S. foreign relations.
This presentation provides a general history of American slavery (with greater emphasis on its development than on its antebellum incarnation) to give students some understanding of the institution. It is the fourth in a series of presentations designed for college students in a seminar on The Civil War and Reconstruction. Students will spend more time engaging antebellum slavery (the slavery that is more familiar to most Americans) in class.
Toward Rethinking Self-Defense in a Racist Culture...by Dhoruba Al Mujahid Bi...RBG Communiversity
This document discusses rethinking the concept of self-defense against racist aggression. It argues that prevailing ideas in US society are based on the notion of white skin privilege and European superiority. This justified the use of violence against people of color throughout history, including the genocide of Native Americans and establishment of slavery. The author asserts that force and violence are deeply ingrained in American culture and institutions. While non-violence is encouraged for oppressed groups, the majority is trained in the use of force. This creates a double standard that imbalance between the beneficiaries of a racist system and its underclass.
Captain America’s Empire Reflections on Identity,Popular CuTawnaDelatorrejs
Captain America’s Empire: Reflections on Identity,
Popular Culture, and Post-9/11 Geopolitics
Jason Dittmer
Department of Geology and Geography, Georgia Southern University
This article introduces comic books as a medium through which national identity and geopolitical scripts are
narrated. This extension of the popular geopolitics literature uses the example of post-11 September 2001 (‘‘9/11’’)
Captain America comic books to integrate various strands of theory from political geography and the study of
nationalism to break new ground in the study of popular culture, identity, and geopolitics. The article begins with
an introduction to the character of Captain America and a discussion of the role he plays in the rescaling of
American identity and the institutionalization of the nation’s symbolic space. The article continues by showing
how visual representations of American landscapes in Captain America were critical to constructing geopolitical
‘‘realities.’’ A reading of post-9/11 issues of the Captain America comic book reveals a nuanced and ultimately
ambiguous geopolitical script that interrogates America’s post-9/11 territorialization. Key Words: popular culture,
American identity, nationalism, post-9/11 politics, Captain America.
Scale, Hegemony, and the Culture Wars
P
opular geopolitics, or the construction of scripts
that mold common perceptions of political events
(Ó Tuathail 1992; Dalby 1993; Sharp 1993), is
key to a full understanding of both national identities
and global orders. One of the fundamental assumptions
of the primary global ‘‘geo-graph’’ (Ó Tuathail 1996), or
inscription of the earth’s surface, is the division of the
world into discrete states, each one ostensibly inde-
pendent, sovereign, equal, and occupied by a discrete
culture or nation. Other scholars have questioned the
ontological primacy of such states and nations (Ander-
son 1991; Agnew 1994) and have concentrated on how
bounded territories and identities are constructed and
policed (Paasi 1991, 1996).
The division of the international political system into
sovereign states remains a largely unchallenged premise
of popular discourse. Indeed, challenges to the assump-
tions of the international system are seen as challenges
to a moral geography of extreme importance: ‘‘Bush [in a
victory speech after the first Gulf War] did not justify
why the notion of nationhood was so important, nor why
its protection demanded the ultimate of sacrifices. He
assumed that his audience would realize that a war,
waged by nations against the nation, which had sought
to abolish a nation, was necessary to affirm the sacred
principle of nationhood’’ (Billig 1995, 2). As institu-
tionalized regions, states are best understood as an on-
going process of creating and maintaining territorial
practices and ideologies. Paasi describes the region-for-
mation process in four parts, the second part of which is
the attachment of symbolic meanings to territory, or the
creation of symb ...
Chapter 26 TRENDS AND CHALLENGES OF CULTURAL DIVERSITYR. DONNA.docxcravennichole326
Chapter 26 TRENDS AND CHALLENGES OF CULTURAL DIVERSITY
R. DONNA PETRIE
We are born in families, whether small or large, with one or more parenting figures. These families are embedded in a web of other families, all of which are part of a particular society or culture. In the United States families share a common culture because they all live in one country, but they also share a family culture that may or may not be like the culture of the nation. It is virtually impossible to overemphasize the influence an individual’s family culture has on the day-to-day activities of any given person’s life. In this country it is also nearly impossible to overestimate the points of difference within cultures and between cultures. Diversity itself has historically represented a core component of the democratic fabric of that which defines American life. This position and role is as viable today in 2003 as it was during the past two centuries.
The purpose of this chapter is to broadly introduce the challenges of multicultural human service work. These challenges are threefold. First, human service professionals need to have an understanding of specific value areas wherein misunderstanding between cultures is likely to occur; second, workers need to understand different cultural models of healing and caring; and finally, human service professionals, whether they think of themselves as bicultural or as “American,” need to understand how they are seen as “agents” of mainstream American culture.
FUTURE POPULATION TRENDS
A decade ago the New York Times reported that the United States Census Bureau has had to recalculate population growth (Pear, 1992). The population of the United States, it appears, will continue to grow through 2050 rather than decline after the year 2038. To summarize, for the years 1990 to 2025 there will be more babies born, particularly to new immigrants, and the proportion of men to women is likely to even out, as the life expectancy of men appears to be rising faster than that of women.
Despite this overall increase in the number of people in the United States, whites will account for a declining share in the population. The numbers of black Americans, Asian Americans, and Hispanic Americans will grow appreciably. Using the 1990 census, the Bureau predicts a 412.5 percent population growth for Asian and Pacific Islanders; a 237.5 percent growth in numbers for Hispanic Americans; a 109.1 percent increase in the number of Native American Indians, Eskimos, and Aleuts; and a 93.8 percent increase for black Americans. These figures contrast significantly with the 29.4 percent projected growth of white Americans from 1992 to 2050.
The Census Bureau makes the future trends somewhat more complex by noting that immigration by itself will account for the expected growth in the Asian American population and not the number of births. Birth rates are increasing among the black and Hispanic populations. The birth rate of whites, however, is not expecte ...
The document discusses concepts of power, race, ethnicity and racism from various sociological perspectives. It provides definitions and theories on these topics from scholars like Gramsci, Weber, Foucault, Knights & Willmott and others. It examines power in terms of its positive and negative uses, and different dimensions or types of power. It explores the social construction of race and considers biological, eliminativist and constructivist views. It also defines ethnicity and examines the historical relationship between concepts of race and ethnicity.
1
RACIAL DISCRIMINATION
Student Name
Hierarchical Racial Discrimination in America 1607-1850
Date
Introduction
For a considerable length of time, racial segregation, which is alluded to as, the act of treating somebody diversely because of the shade of their skin, has commanded news and of incredible concern. This was especially felt through police racial, underestimation and mistreatment in America. Racial segregation was especially coordinated to the African-American individuals, for instance, American youngsters were taken to various schools of elevated expectations while Afro-American sent to those that were regularly underfunded and needed assets. The Mulatto gathering and poor Americans likewise confronted racial separation being delegated substandard and unable.
The Americans conceded selective rights in matters of training, movement, voting, citizenship, arrive procurement and criminal techniques and understanding of equity. Different races endured xenophobic rejection and different types of ethnic based separation, bondage and isolation. As indicated by John Hawkins, the Negroes (in South Africa, Cape Verde and the Gold Coast) went to search for their guide against some troublesome neighboring boss, yet because of the prejudice they felt for these black individuals, they chose to help them on condition that they will catch however many of them as could be allowed , by attacking their town, which had 8000 occupants, and torched their palm covered houses ,colonized the town, caught detainees, or slaves and later left the individuals who wanted their guide helpless before their adversaries by pulling back their camp and officers around evening time . This is a reasonable sign of how the Whites hated the dark man and saw them fit for little more than servitude.
Jack Hitt affirms that in spite of the endeavors to deplete "white" of its supremacist scares by reclassifying, 'Italian, Scottish or Irish Americans', there is a still profound tension that can't be controlled about rootedness and its claim. The chain of command of prejudice is followed back to 1300 AD from the eras of Charlemagne the King of Franks and Holy Roman domain, that started from his Queen, Fastrada and proceeded upon eras after his demise, because of her aversion for outsiders whom her significant other the ruler invited and engaged because of his considerate mindset and Christian foundation
. At the point when Americans started colonizing different nations and archeologists finding up the remaining parts of the stone age apparatuses maturing to 16000 years of age, they could contend that other men separated from the old Americans were exceptionally primitive and could contend with the rage like that of a reproved youngster as cited by Jack Hitt , from Adovasio's book: The First Americans.
Linebaugh says that upon the annihilation of J.J .Mauricius in war by the Saramaka, a gathering of slaves in 1751, he composed a ballad to recall his journals in the thrashing ...
The conflict paradigm views racism, sexism, inequality as stemming from power structures that maintain the dominance of one group over others. It sees the Iraq war as extending US political and economic control over the non-Western world. The functionalist paradigm views the Iraq war as maintaining security by keeping terrorism abroad. Symbolic interactionism sees the war as sending a message to deter terrorism by supporting the image of non-Western peoples as threats.
This document summarizes a research paper about the Bureau of Non-Christian Tribes (BNCT), an institution established by the US colonial government in the Philippines in 1901 to investigate non-Christian populations. The BNCT conducted "scientific expeditions" and produced knowledge about ethnic groups to inform state policy of integrating colonial subjects. However, the bureau's research was underpinned by notions of Western civilization and racial typologies. It created artificial ethnic differences among Filipinos that were institutionalized. The document examines guidelines issued by BNCT founder David Barrows and argues his methodology was informed by racist ideologies popular at the time about cultural evolution and white male superiority.
Religion versus Ethnicity as a Source of Mobilisation: Are There Differences?African Affairs
This document provides an overview of the debate around whether religious or ethnic identities are more potent sources of mobilization for violent conflict. It discusses similarities and differences between mobilization along religious versus ethnic lines. Some key points made include:
- Both religious and ethnic identities are used instrumentally by leaders to mobilize people, but are also "essentialized" and genuinely believed in by followers.
- For mobilization to occur, leaders must cultivate in-group identity and an "other" out-group to induce violence.
- Religious organization and external support networks may be stronger than ethnic ones, but there is no evidence religious conflicts are inherently more deadly.
- In conflicts with overlapping religious and
Week 3 Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian AmericanRambau.docxcockekeshia
Week 3
Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian American
Rambaut notes that diversity is the hallmark of Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian refugees coming to the United States. How are the groups similar or different from one another? What factors shaped the patterns of settlement and secondary migration that later emerged?
The influx of thousands of immigrants from Southeast Asia during the mid to late 1970’s noticeable a new era in immigration to the United States because of multiple aspects. One of the characteristics that defined this new era was the region from which these new immigrants were coming. A second mannerism of this new era was that the arrival of these immigrants created a strong, negative reaction among Americans against them. Furthermore, the arrival of these immigrants led to new legislation regarding their status. The first major influx of Cambodian immigrants who began arriving in the United States during the late 1970’s was part of a large group of refugees from Southeast Asia fleeing political instability in their homelands.
As the Indochina War, the refugee shares a common history and experience the face in War. However, “they have different social back grounds, language, cultural, and often adversarial histories, and reflect different patterns of settlement and adaption in America” (pg.178). They range from member of the elites of former back government to Vietnamese and Chinese “boat people” survivors of the killing field of Cambodia in the late 1970s, and farmer from the highlands of northern Laos” (pg.178). Each of these ethnic group there are major different in social class. The war produced massive refugee population in United State. According to the text during the war “the first refugee arrives in U.S was Vietnamese immigration in 1952, then Cambodian immigrant arrived in 1953 Laotian in 1959”. (pg. 181). Most of the refugee are university students. The refugee was primarily placed in separate zip code in different state and half of the refugee are send to the state of their choice. Like other immigrants from Southeast Asia, Cambodian immigrants have inclined to work mostly in low-wage jobs. Many have looked for work similar to what they did in Cambodia, but some who had professional training have been unable to find corresponding employment in the United States. Cambodian Americans have generally had a difficult time economically in the United States. Unemployment among them is high. Many of them have lived in poverty and been dependent on government assistance
· In the chapter “Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian Americans” Ruben G. Rumbaut discusses the immigration and settlement of refugees and immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. Rumbaut highlights the very different experiences these groups of people went through and currently go through compared to other Asian American groups. One main driving factor that effected their settlement and adaptation was the effect that the Vietnam Wa.
Sociological perspectives examples and theories chapter 1Ray Brannon
The document discusses four sociological paradigms - conflict, functionalist, symbolic interactionist, and how they explain various social phenomena. The conflict paradigm views society as groups competing for resources which maintains power and status for one group at the expense of others. The functionalist paradigm sees the Iraq war as maintaining security by keeping terrorism abroad. The symbolic interactionist paradigm views the war as sending a message to terrorists and supporting the image of non-Westerners as dangerous. Across paradigms, society and social issues are examined through different levels and lenses.
Similar to Militarization and identity on guam alexander (17)
This document outlines the syllabus for a hybrid Intercultural Studies and Composition course focusing on Pacific Islander history and culture. The course will be taught by two instructors and meet in-person four days a week, with an additional required online hour. Students will examine topics like Pacific Islander communities in the US, oral storytelling traditions, the impacts of colonialism, and contemporary issues. Assignments include presentations, journal responses, essays, and a research paper. The course aims to develop students' understanding of Pacific Islander experiences and refine their reading, writing, and critical thinking skills.
This document provides a rubric to evaluate presentations on a scale from excellent to fair. It evaluates introductions, quality and depth of information about the interviewee, use of visual aids, and cooperation between presenters. An excellent presentation includes a clear introduction, precise and in-depth information representing major events of the interviewee's life, high-quality visual aids relevant to the topic, and equal work between cooperative presenters. A fair presentation lacks an introduction, has insufficient information about the interviewee, no visual aids, and an uncooperative effort with uneven work between presenters.
This document provides a rubric for evaluating presentations with criteria such as the introduction, quality of information presented, depth of content, use of visual aids, and cooperation between partners. The criteria are rated on a scale from excellent to fair. An excellent rating requires a clear introduction, precise and in-depth information representing major interview details, use of high-quality visual aids, and equal cooperation between partners. A fair rating is given for presentations lacking these key elements.
This document summarizes the book "Global Noise: Rap and Hip-Hop Outside the USA" which examines how rap and hip-hop have been appropriated in local contexts around the world beyond its origins in African American culture in the USA. The book argues that more innovative developments can be found in places like France, England, Germany, and Japan where strong local currents of hip-hop have emerged. It also discusses how in places like Hawaii, Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Islands, hip-hop has been used as a vehicle for political expression of issues important to those regions. While acknowledging local appropriation, the document questions what constitutes the "global" in global hip-hop culture if it is defined only by its
This document discusses the importance of decolonizing Pacific studies by incorporating indigenous perspectives from Oceania. It argues that Pacific studies has traditionally been dominated by Western frameworks that do not fully recognize indigenous ways of thinking. Decolonizing Pacific studies involves reclaiming indigenous knowledge and worldviews that have been suppressed or deemed less valuable. This will help develop a more culturally inclusive philosophy of education.
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Militarization and Identity on Guahan/Guam:
Exploring intersections of indigeneity, gender and security
Ronni Alexander
Abstract
While the Pacific island of Guahan/Guam is best known as a vacation resort, in fact much of the island has been taken to house US military bases and other facilities. Over 400 years of military colonialism has devalorized the local ‘CHamoru’ culture, making it virtually invisible not only for those outside of Guahan/Guam but also for many CHamoru people themselves. This article reflects on the implications of this history for CHamoru female and male bodies and lived lives. Using an intersectional approach, the article seeks to better understand the complexities underlying local attitudes toward the US military presence, including a proposed military build-up.
Key Words
Guam/Guahan, CHamoru, citizenship, gender, intersectionality, militarization, military colonialism, security
2. 2
Militarization and Identity on Guahan/Guam:
Exploring intersections of indigeneity, gender and security
Ronni Alexander
The Pacific island of Guam (Guahan)1is best known as a tourist destination, but in fact for over four hundred years, it has been subjected to the military and strategic desires of outside powers. In 1521, Magellan first claimed the island for Spain; control shifted to the United States in 1898 after Spain’s defeat in the Spanish-American War. Today the island remains on the list of non-self-governing territories maintained by the United Nations Special Committee on Decolonization.
Guahan/Guam is a military colony of the United States. The people have had US citizenship, but no voice in the decisions that have put a third of their island under US military control. This military neo-colonial/colonial relationship involves not only visible manifestations of military presence but also militarization, a “step-by-step process by which something becomes controlled by, dependent on, or derives its value from the military as an institution or militaristic criteria” (Enloe 2000:291).2On militarized Guahan/Guam, US strategic concerns affect virtually all aspects of life.
Colonization for strategic purposes, or ‘military colonialism,’ has two sides: the visible side such as military bases and hardware, and the less visible or ‘soft’ side comprised of food, cultural tastes, markets, and the military ideology that plays a fundamental role in the way the society is governed (Gerson 2009:50). Military colonization brings racialized and gendered beliefs of normality, citizenship, and safety, as well as militarizing social relations. The conflation of notions of citizenship as belonging to the state/national collective with military service and particular forms of masculinity, class, and heteronormativity are of particular significance here because they affect ideas, identities, and behaviors, militarizing bodies and changing the ways people understand what it means to be a woman or a man. ‘Citizenship’ both militarizes and normalizes people into colonial, neo-colonial, and national collectives and hierarchies.
American citizenship on Guahan/Guam exemplifies this militarizing of bodies and identities. In 1950, in a unilateral decision by the US Congress rather than a process of self-determination by the indigenous CHamorus, the Organic Act of Guam made the island an unincorporated organized territory of the United States. Administration was shifted from the Navy to the Department of the Interior and limited home rule established. All citizens residing there at the time of the enactment, as well as their
3. 3
children born after 11 April 1899, were granted statutory, or congressional, US citizenship,3 giving them many of the same rights and privileges as other Americans. They cannot, however, vote in presidential elections, and their observer in the House of Representatives cannot vote. People on Guahan/Guam fought hard for, and greatly value, their American citizenship, but it is “second class citizenship” (Rogers 1995:226). Citizens on Guahan/Guam enlist in the military and fight in US wars as Americans, but they have no say in the military strategy that has put a third of their island under US military control.
Today, a controversial military build-up seen as either a tremendous threat or potential golden goose is posing serious environmental, demographic and economic concerns. At first glance, resistance to the military presence in general and the build-up in particular is hard to see. Where visible, it is generally in the context of CHamoru activism. Theories of bio-politics, colonization and economic deprivation/development can to some extent explain the devalorization of CHamoru culture and why at the fringes of empire, patriotism and support for the US military presence would appear to be strong.4 They are less useful, however, for examining the contradictions lying beneath the surface of citizenship. In other words, theories of bio-politics and governmentality are insufficient to discover what it means to be CHamoru and American and the contradictions for lived lives negotiating indigeneity, nationality, class, and gender on Guahan/Guam.
Can an intersectional approach help to explain the complexities underlying local attitudes toward the US military presence? What can it tell us about the processes of marginalization that led to the devalorization of CHamoru culture and identity? Can it provide suggestions to scholars and activists about the praxis of opposing militarization? Looking along axes of gender, indigeneity, class, and distance, the paper will examine the complexities of citizenship, identity and the military on Guahan/Guam.
.
Intersectionality: looking within and between
Over the past twenty years, there has been a lively debate within and outside of IR about the meaning and focus of the intersectional approach.5 Much of this work has aspired to demonstrate the complexities of marginalization by looking at the ways in which categories can at the same time empower particular groups and make other groups and/or the diversity within them invisible. Intersectionality also demonstrates how, as Collins suggests, “our own thoughts and actions uphold someone else’s subordination” (Collins 2000:287). Using axes of inequality such as race, class, and gender, McCall has shown how social relations and processes impact and shape social
4. 4
experiences. She suggests three categories of complexity: anticategorical, intracategorical, and intercategorical, emphasizing the importance of the latter because it calls for scholars to, “provisionally adopt existing analytical categories to document relationships of inequality among social groups and changing configurations of inequality along multiple and conflicting dimensions” (McCall 2005:1773). Looking at Guahan/Guam from an intercategorical perspective along axes of gender and nationality can reveal the ways race/indigeneity is devalorized and hidden by a racialized category of citizenship, e.g. American on the one hand and notions of the noble savage and ‘‘pure’ indigeneity on the other. It also highlights the tensions between CHamoru social relations based on interdependence, family and harmony and Western notions centering on individual merit, private property, and gendered public/private spaces. In this regard, one might question whether even critical theory is able to overcome “the notion that there is a particular individual entity which is silently presupposed when we use the concept of identity” (Papadopoulos 2008:140). Can American concepts of the self as an independent individual co-exist with CHamoru understandings of the self as part of an interconnected and interdependent web of extended family? How do they play out when they are contained within one body?
An anticategorical approach might identify ways in which efforts to create/re-create CHamoru identity serve to reproduce ‘CHamoru’ within colonial, gendered and militarized conceptions of self. The following excerpt from the blog of a CHamoru activist illustrates this in the context of Guahan.
One of the weaknesses of activism on Guam is the impression that those who are involved in it all come from the same place, are all culled from the same social source. They are all people who just want land. They are all people on welfare. They are all just crazy CHamorus. As a movement which seeks to change something, you are weakened by this perception, because in terms of gaining support for whatever you are fighting for, it is easy to dismiss your movement as a mere slice of life (Bevacqua 2010.1.12).
In contrast, Yuval-Davis suggests that defining difference within a category runs the risk of reinscribing “the fragmented, additive model of oppression and essentializ(ing) specific social identities. Instead, the point is to analyse the differential ways in which different social divisions are concretely enmeshed and constructed by each other and how they relate to political and subjective constructions of identities” (Yuval-Davis 2006:205). As we will see, in Guahan/Guam, depopulation and intermarriage between the indigenous CHamoru and others created a population of
5. 5
so-called ‘mestizos’ whose legitimacy, or lack thereof, has played an important part in the construction of identity and citizenship. In particular, racialized American notions of indigenous ‘purity’ have left CHamoru people having to ‘prove’ not only their legitimacy as Americans but also as indigenous. (Monnig 2007:58, Perez, M. 2002).
A critical understanding of history is important for defining indigeneity and identity, but many CHamoru lack an understanding of their roots and ancient culture. According to Pacific writer Albert Wendt, “we are what we remember ourselves to be” (cited in Underwood 1998:9). Activists are trying to make knowledge of CHamoru culture accessible to young people through teaching language and history to help them to ‘remember’ who they are.6 Much of the ancient culture and social ranking has been lost, but the core values, particularly those concerning family, loyalty, and respect, remain strong. In brief, ancient CHamoru society was matrilineal and hierarchal, based on caste, age, and clan (extended families). Seven core values ensured that social and physical boundaries were respected. Central among these is inafa’maolek, interdependence within the extended family, a concept of mutuality and togetherness that rests on a complex system of reciprocal obligations forming a network of mutual responsibility and underlies all social relations. The caste system and the rank of one’s clan determined ownership and use of land, sea, rivers, and streams, and mamahlao (respect for others) reflects understanding of the social ranking according to caste, clan, age and status within the clan. Harmony and consensus were held to be extremely important and those with higher ranking had responsibility to protect those of lower rank. Mamahlao requires one to always put others before oneself (Cunningham 1998:29-31). Although the caste system is long gone, these values of interdependence and responsibility are still very important in CHamoru culture and identity. In that they put the extended family before the individual, on a very deep level they contradict American values and behaviors which center on the individual.
On militarized and Americanized Guahan/Guam today, CHamoru/Guamanian/Micronesian/Filipina/Pacific Islander identities and hierarchies are formed, and lives lived, around the category of citizenship (American).7 Intracategorical analysis is useful because the category of ‘CHamoru’ is highly contested. Intracategorical analysis encourages us to note the tensions created by assumptions about the unchanging boundaries of groups (Yuval-Davis 2005:531). At the same time, intercategorical analysis helps to see how some boundaries are made invisible by others. In the case of Guahan/Guam, citizenship, military service, indigeneity, and gender are important categories to think about in this respect. In the military, for example, “race is to be overcome through military service; participants are
6. 6
invited to abandon racial identification in favor of identification with the military unit” (Bartlett and Lutz 1998:132). In fact, the reality in the military often contrasts greatly with these purported homogenizing effects, disappointing the expectations of many CHamoru soldiers for finding equality.
Winker and Degele use narrative and personal experience in an intercategorical approach which treats intersectionality as a “system of interactions between inequality-creating social structures (i.e. of power relations), symbolic representations and identity constructions that are context-specific, topic-orientated and inextricably linked to social praxis” (2011:54). Similarly, Braun uses narrative and intersectional approach to look at the ways women in Lesotho describe the ways male privilege and gender inequality are reinforced by development policies and practices. She demonstrates the ways in which the global interests of the masculine development industry combine with those of the patriarchal state and society (Braun 2011:158). The military build-up on Guahan/Guam is the result of a similar combination of racialized masculine military and development interests which are being foisted on a community which, in spite of having American citizenship, has limited institutional infrastructure with which to fight back.
Using axes of time and distance to look at citizenship on Guahan/Guam can also help to highlight hidden exclusionary practices. For example, the rhetoric of ‘remoteness’ and ‘smallness’ legitimizes subordination by making Guahan/Guam and its inhabitants appear so small and unimportant as to be incapable of self-rule. Moreover, artificially created categories such as ‘Guamanian’ reinscribed and normalized relations of power/knowledge, denying CHamoru legitimacy and agency through focus on their ‘mestizo’ background. Since identity is based not only on group membership but also on feelings of belonging (Yuval-Davis 2005:521-2), an understanding of the difficulty of ‘being CHamoru’ along a variety of axes can help to further deepen our understanding of the complexities of living simultaneously on the margins and at the center of the American empire.
Colonized and militarized bodies: Spain
In discussing identity, Winker and Degele (2011:5) stress the importance of bodies and bodyisms. Souder (1992) focuses on bodies and seeks a way to remember the colonized rather than the colonizers, looking at the ways colonization affected gender relations. She suggests the following three phases which show changes in gender relations and the effects of patriarchy on the matrilineal CHamoru society. (1) Conquest and the aggressive introduction of Catholicism by Spain beginning in the 1670’s; (2) the
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US administration beginning in 1898 when marriage was institutionalized8 and a patriarchal separation of work and home which divided life into ‘public’ and ‘private’ spheres established; and (3) modernization through tourism beginning in the 1960’s, and the creation of a more heterogeneous population through the relaxing of immigration laws9 (Souder 1992:7-8). Thinking about not only gender relations but also class and citizenship during these periods underscores the ways in which CHamoru identity became subsumed first to that of the Catholic Church and then to ‘America’.
In looking at early encounters with Europeans, Souder talks about Catholicism but fails to address the implications for CHamoru bodies of disease and armed resistance. As the Manila galleon trade grew, the colony of Guam became important as a provisioning station and in 1668, with the support of the Spanish crown and the Church of Rome, the Jesuit missionary Diego Luís de San Vitores arrived on Guahan determined to establish both Catholicism and Spanish rule. His job was made somewhat easier because CHamorus had no natural resistance to European diseases such as influenza, measles, smallpox and syphilis, but in spite of that they put up strong resistance. By the end of the 17th century, the combination of war and disease had decimated the population by between eighty and ninety percent and “almost all of Guam’s most important resource, its labour resource, was destroyed. Estimates say that only 2,000 native inhabitants remained…. (T)hese were mostly women, children and the elderly” (Troutman 1998:332).
As there was no longer sufficient labor to support Spain’s agricultural and other provisioning needs, the Spanish colonial government instead brought in workers from the Philippines and Mexico (Guerrero 2002:85). The Spaniards maintained a hierarchal society, with peninsulares (people born in Spain), criollos (those born in the colonies), mestizos, Filipinos, and indios (CHamoru), in that rank order. In the 1670’s, Spanish, Filipino and mestizo soldiers began to marry CHamoru women in church ceremonies and set up permanent households. In particular, there were marriages between the highest caste women and Spanish officials (the reverse was not allowed). This gave high caste CHamoru women access to colonial power, while at the same time reinforcing the traditional power of women in the home (Souder 1992:68). It also disenfranchised men, particularly high caste men, by limiting their traditional activities such as fishing, and by changing the rules for reproduction. Souder claims that since girls follow their mothers and boys tend to follow their fathers, girls were able to access traditional knowledge, including language, more easily than boys. As a result, while many of the women’s skills remain, the men’s skills such as canoe building have been lost (Souder 1992:58).
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The Spanish created a new social hierarchy through the introduction of patriarchal ideas of private property and land ownership, consolidating their control of land through marriage. Men were forced to provide labor on this land. In the 1800s, a variety of charges, were placed on everyone except CHamorus. As a result, mestizos, Filipinos and others began to list themselves and their newborn children as indios in order to avoid paying. Rogers, for example, claims this resulted in a new valorization of the distinctive CHamoru identity (Rogers 1995:96-97). Monnig (2007) and others, however, see this as on the one hand, the consolidation of ‘otherness’ by the colonizers and on the other, the beginning of the denial of CHamoru legitimacy on the basis of ‘impurity.’
The implications of depopulation and intermarriage are also debated. For example, Troutman argues that depopulation led to a total collapse of traditional social relations and the destruction of CHamoru identity, which were then replaced by the Catholic Church. He claims, “The depopulation of Guam from disease, flight and, least of all, death in battle, acted to cause the CHamorus to give up their corporate structure and adopt, no - absorb into their very being the corporate identity and values of the conqueror” (Troutman 1998:333). An alternative view might suggest that depopulation helped the alliance of high caste women and Spanish men, leading to the separation of CHamoru clans from their land. Land was not a commodity but the essence of CHamoru identity, and the usurpation of land changed forever lifestyles, livelihoods and social relations. Many of these changes were institutionalized through the spread of Catholicism, the success of which was assisted by forced baptisms and capture of CHamoru children who were then sent to live in mission schools (Rogers 1995:60-1).
The introduction of patriarchal values, individualism, and conceptions of property ownership challenged gender perceptions and performativity, severely weakening the caste and clan systems. With the introduction of Catholicism came new conceptions of ‘equality’ based on baptism regardless of caste or clan, undermining mamahlao and inafa’maolek. The introduction of individual merit challenged ideas of competition as a group. Living spaces, language, and education including such things as systems for counting time or numbers were changed. For example, traditionally only the highest caste men could learn navigational skills or go into the ocean beyond the reef. Young men lived together in men’s houses until marriage. Under the Spanish, the men’s houses were closed, women were confined to the home, and the traditional male arts of fishing, canoe making and sailing were lost (Kasperbaur 2002:34-35).
Colonized and militarized bodies: Fortress Guahan
Souder’s second phase begins with the cession of Guahan/Guam to the United
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States in 1898. The US Navy administrators viewed themselves as ‘parents’ to the child-like, dependent and feminine CHamorus. This enabled them to justify the creation of a paternalistic and masculine system of government which would promote their moral and material development and “achieve a transformation in the bodies and minds of the people (and) transform the CHamoru populace into an ‘American’ society, a new people who would be productive, disciplined, educated, and sanitary” (Hattori 1995:1 in Viernes 2009:104). One aspect of this endeavor was the creation of new identities such as ‘Guamanian’, ‘Micronesian’, and ‘American.’
In 1941, the Japanese captured Guahan/Guam, remaining there until 1944. The Japanese occupation was brutal and when, after thirteen consecutive days of bombing, the US regained control, people celebrated their ‘liberation.’ In fact, the US return was a repetition of military colonialism; control of Guahan/Guam and the other Mariana Islands was a prerequisite for mounting attacks on Okinawa and the Japanese mainland, including the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This portrayal of the “messianic” liberation of Guahan/Guam from the Japanese encouraged in the CHamoru people a need to reciprocate. “Obligations being a sacred duty, CHamorus have since been caught in a never ending cycle of ‘paying back’” (Souder in Diaz 2009:160). Part of this ‘paying back’ involved acquiescing (albeit often reluctantly and angrily) to the establishment of US bases on Guahan/Guam which after the war were kept, along with great deal of other land taken for strategic purposes.10 Today, ‘liberation’ is the most visible and accessible trope of historical memory on Guahan/Guam, and it is conflated with patriotism and civic duty. Liberation Day is a major affair, celebrated with parades and festivities (See Diaz 2009, Viernes 2009, Perez, M. 2001, and Perez, C. 2002).
After the war, the US took the position that the people were not yet ready for self-government, and Guahan/Guam was kept under US military administration. CHamoru leaders, however, demanded both recognition of their loyalty to the US during the war and a more permanent political status.11 These culminated in a walkout by members of the Guam Congress in 1949, and the unilateral passage of the Organic Act by the US Congress the following year. Passage of this Act presumably meant that Guahan/Guam was now ready to exercise self-determination. There was talk about future political status, and in the seventies, a political status commission was established which eventually led to the holding of a plebiscite, the results of which showed support for the establishment of a commonwealth similar to Puerto Rico and the Northern Marianas. In the eighties, a Commonwealth Act was drawn up, and finally presented to Congress in 1997. Both the Bush and Clinton administrations opposed the change in status on the basis of strategic defense interests and territorial policy (Quimby
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2011:365-6), refusing to agree to three important areas of the Act: mutual consent, immigration control, and self-determination (Perez, M. 2002:462). The Commonwealth Act has faded into oblivion and Guahan/Guam’s political status has remained unchanged.12 This situation gives credence to the assertion that “the current US strategy of promoting of democracy abroad…may actually undermine the viability of (democracy) in any given (base) host (Cooley 2008:4). Guahan/Guam continues as an organized unincorporated territory, a relationship which both re-creates, and is supported by, the multiple and often contradictory identities produced by sixty years of juggling what it means to be ‘American.’
Today, the issue of political status is complicated by discourses of racial ‘purity’. As we have seen, as a result of war, disease, and colonial policy, virtually all CHamoru are of mixed blood. Monnig suggests that both cultural and political legitimacy have been made impossible for CHamoru by the construction of identity, particularly the US discursive connection between “purity” and group legitimacy on the one hand and hybridity and group invalidity on the other. CHamorus are faced with the prospect of incessantly ‘proving’ their authenticity as a Pacific indigenous group ‘worthy’ of self-determination, self-rule, and/or full US citizenship” (Monnig 2007:407). This is further compounded by a sense of responsibility to the US in reciprocation for ‘liberation’ during World War II. The need/desire to ‘be American’ coupled with the demand that CHamorus ‘prove their authenticity’ has shaped their abilities to work through issues of importance such as language, land, immigration, and political status. As a result, not only are both Guahan and Guahan/Guam invisible to many Americans, but Guahan is also invisible to many CHamorus.
Military Colonialism Today
Souder’s third phase of gendered colonization involves modernization and immigration. Her focus is on the tourism industry, but the military continues to play a huge role. Over 100 years of US military colonialism on Guahan/Guam has retarded political and economic development and caused major land alienation, immigration and environmental impacts (Quimby 2011:361). As we have seen, particularly after World War II, huge parcels of CHamoru land were taken by the Navy for military use, much of it without the consent of the landowners and without the payment of compensation. Today, nearly half of the island’s 544 square kilometers is taken up by US bases and other military facilities which are inaccessible to visitors and local residents and about 35,000 military personnel and their dependents are stationed there.13 By 2006, the U.S. military accounted for more than 40 percent of total government expenditures and about
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90 percent of U.S. federal spending on Guahan/Guam (US GAO 2006). That year, a proposal was made for a new military expansion. Planned in conjunction with the 2006 US-Japan Realignment Roadmap, the build-up was described by US Defense Secretary Robert Gates in 2008 as “one of the largest movements of military assets in decades” (Kan 2010:1). The proposal included the addition of six nuclear submarines, making a total of nine, a new Ballistic Missile Defense station, a huge Global Strike Force, a strike and intelligence surveillance reconnaissance hub, and a sixth aircraft carrier for the region (Aguon 2008:125 and Kan 2010). It also entails live-fire training, some of which is to take place on ancient CHamoru cultural sites.14 The construction and deployment is expected to add about 55,000 people to the current population of 170,000. This was to include 8000 US Marines and their families who were scheduled to be relocated from Okinawa in 2014.15 It will also include a labor force of about 20,000 construction workers, many of whom are said to be coming from the Philippines.
The residents of Guahan/Guam have been told that the build-up will be a blessing for the local economy. Proponents claim that “each additional submarine would bring roughly 150 sailors to Guahan/Guam and $9 million in salaries for them and their support personnel” (Erikson and Mikolay cited in Lutz 2009:24). However, most of the labor force, the skilled workers in particular, will be from other places because in Guahan/Guam there are not enough workers, particularly well-trained ones, to do skilled jobs (Interview, Kayoko Kushima 2011.9.10). In addition, with little or no local industry, almost all of the supplies will come from outside of Guahan/Guam. While the build-up might bring in money, proponents fail to mention the amount of land, water and other resources that it will take from the local population.16
Both the military and tourism require land and drive up the cost of living, forcing many families to leave. So many CHamoru have left that they now number less than 40% of the total population.17 This trend underlies the appeal of the Guahan Indigenous Collective to the UN Decolonization Committee to bring an end to the “great exodus” of “young CHamorus, doctors, teachers and future leaders leaving the island as US Marines, fighter aircraft bombers, unmanned aerial vehicles, fast-attack nuclear submarines and foreign construction workers take their place” (Aguon 2006). The situation is complicated by the fact that many young people, already prepared by JROTC,18 believe enlisting in the US military to be the only viable option for their future (Aguon 2008). Most families have someone affiliated with the military, many serving in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Horn of Africa, and casualty rates are extremely high (Pacific Daily News 2011.9.11:5).19
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Voices: military colonialism and ambiguity on Guahan/Guam
This section uses statements from interviews and secondary sources to underscore some of the contradictions of citizenship and identity on Guahan/Guam today. These voices powerfully convey the anguish of being made invisible both to oneself and to the world.
As Americans and as soldiers, as men and as women, CHamoru are told they are ‘equal’. In fact, it is ‘equal but unequal’ status.
What bothers me is … when we get together with … people other than our nationality, and we talk about, ‘She’s American and she’s CHamoru … it’s like ‘Wait a minute, we’re just as American as you are. We’re doing the same thing you’re doing. Defending the country.’ …The other thing that bugs me is that we don’t, we can’t vote for president. ... Here you are defending the U.S.A. and you can’t even vote for the president (Taitano in Perez, C. 2002:75).
University of Guam president and former representative to the US House of Representatives, Robert Underwood describes the situation on Guahan/Guam today as an identity crisis. He writes,
On Guam, most of us have become victims of a limited consciousness…Because of the strength of this myopia … we are pilloried as a group of people incessantly, without respite and seemingly with no hope of escape. … We view the development of the Chamorro people in a framework which denies them the right to be. We are forced to relate to each other as members of different ethnic and social groups as if we were not on Guam, but in a different world (Perez, M. 2002:463).
Aguon speaks to the effects of the lack of perceived authenticity in terms of internalized colonization, or second tier colonialism, where the struggle is not against the colonizer so much as against oneself (Aguon 2006:17). He says,
(A)s America’s perilous push to dominate the global political stage is being forced to peel back its mask by thoughtful citizens the world over, we, the indigenous people of America’s westernmost possession are not joining in the fight. We are kept under lock and key. Cleverly invisible in the international community so that no one sees as we slip quietly into the sea. Not marching, but being marched, to the drums of our own disempowerment. But alone, that information is insufficient to understand the quality of anguish today being loosed on the CHamoru people (Aguon 2006:13).
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Aguon goes on to explain that the anguish lies not in having to fight an external power, but in the struggle to attract people’s attention. “… (W)e are at home in our kitchens and living rooms engaging even our closest friends and families who have set their hearts on singing America…. The tragedy of our day, however, is that cynicism like a bad lover has come calling and many of us no longer believe this war is one we can win” (Aguon 2006:18).
Contributing to the ‘anguish’ is the realization that the CHamoru activists who are involved in consciousness raising are stigmatized and silenced. Described by Underwood as ‘maladjusted,’ these “individuals do not have to be dealt with. They are simply tolerated, occasionally recognized…and even treated well within institutions. … If they persist being maladjusted (retain critical perspectives on society), they will be tolerated as one would a fool or mentally-retarded individual. … It simply reduces them to a ‘disgruntled minority,’ a ‘vocal few,’ or ‘hot-headed nationalists’” (Underwood in Perez, M. 2002:433-4).
During a visit to Guahan/Guam in 2010, I spoke with Dr. Vivian Dames about identity, the military and the bases. She referred to Guahan/Guam’s ambiguous political status as being “neither fish nor fowl” and spoke about the frustration of having no political framework for changing things. “The tragedy is that so many Guahan/Guam people are so normalized that they don’t think anything is wrong. The US has managed to convince them that they have the best deal, and that dignity, identity and culture don’t really matter” (Interview with Vivian Dames 2010.5.8).
This view was also expressed by Rosario, a high school student who submitted a video she had made by interviewing three CHamoru women about history and identity as an American History Week project. She was at a loss to understand why the CHamoru judges did not care about CHamoru history (Interview with Rosario 2010.5.8).
Rosario had chosen women because she wanted to explore the meaning of matrilineal CHamoru culture, and her subjects were women of three different generations, so that she could explore how understandings and performativity have changed. Rosario, like some other young women I met on Guahan/Guam, was hoping to discover in her heritage a way to live as a powerful, CHamoru woman. In so doing, she is competing with idealized and Americanized versions of the past which change the way women view themselves and gender relations. For example, according to Lisa, one of the women interviewed and a CHamoru activist, in a confused conflation of matrilineality with matriarchy, young CHamoru women on Guahan/Guam justify enlisting in the US military with the argument that CHamoru women have always been
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strong.20 This confusion speaks to how racialized categories of gender that treat women as subordinate tend to ignore aspects of non-Western culture that give women power in ways not available to, or existing in, Western social relations. Nowhere perhaps are the contradictions of gender, indigeneity, and citizenship so strong as in the military.
Observations by Hope Cristobal, an expert on CHamoru culture and history who taught “History of Guam” at the University of Guam are also pertinent. She told me that the CHamoru students do not seem to care about their heritage, and ‘ancient CHamoru’ is not something that seems to be directly related to their lives (Interview with Hope Cristobal 2010.5.8). She went on to say that in fact most of the students were Filipino,21 hoping to use Guahan/Guam as a stepping stone to attaining US citizenship and going to the mainland US. Most of what she taught, she told me, was the American history necessary for the citizenship exam. Of course, enlisting in the US Army also helps their cause.
Today, the denial and/or low esteem for CHamoru culture and valorization of the military are processes that come from outside, but also from within. For most CHamoru, being as American may well reflect Preston King’s assertion that national identity is not “the identity of the state, but … that of the individual, as it intersects culture (nation) and politics (state)” (King 2007:623-4). King looks to constitutionalism as a clear indication of the meaning of identity, but concludes that “no constitution is ever quite as concrete and delimited as it may appear” (King 2007:625). As a territory of the United States, Guahan/Guam has no constitution and the CHamoru people have not engaged in a process of self-determination to create one. As we have seen, while American citizenship is seen as all-inclusive, in fact the concept itself is hierarchal and exclusionary. Moreover, the racialized American view of indigenous ‘purity’ denies legitimacy to CHamoru realities of mistizu. If we were add to this axes of difference rooted in notions of distance, size, and remoteness, the strands that comprise being “neither fish nor fowl” become even more clear. It is hardly a surprise that today ‘being CHamoru’ is much more a cultural act than a way of life (Interview with LisaLinda Natividad 2010.5).
CONCLUSION
This paper began by asking whether an intersectional approach might provide answers to why opposition to the US military presence on Guahan/Guam seems to be so difficult. On one level, this analysis has shown the difficulty to be structural. Guahan/Guam is both part of, and separate from, the United States, and its citizens are
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American, but are ‘second class Americans’ and therefore different from other Americans. Guahan/Guam is both “Where America’s Day Begins” and where America’s NIMBY (not in my backyard) ends. The mainland US (and even Hawai’i) have at least the formal structures for demanding that the actual tools for forceful discipline and sovereign repression get located someplace else, but American citizens of Guahan/Guam have no choice in those decisions and no formal mechanisms for refusal.
The contradictions of citizenship on Guahan/Guam become more visible when viewed along, or between, various axes of identity. Having American citizenship helps to disguise the fact that relations between the US and Guahan/Guam are those of military colonialism; not only is Guahan/Guam subjected to political and social control by a colonial power, but governance on the island has become militarized and racialized. As an unincorporated organized territory, Guahan/Guam is both a part of, and different from, the United States, and the military, an organization which purports to provide opportunities for equality independent of race, serves to make things even more confusing.
The voices expressed in the previous section reflect the complexities of citizenship, highlighting multi-dimensional identities and differences along lines of gender, class, and race/indigeneity. They illustrate how racialized hierarchies from the Spanish time have been reproduced in citizenship hierarchies under American rule. Moreover, the gendered and militarized notions of production/reproduction and class introduced by the Spanish and reinforced by the United States meant that for high ranking men in particular, masculinity, identity, and military service have become inextricably linked.
On Guahan/Guam, it is very difficult to ‘be CHamoru.’ Being simultaneously CHamoru and American through citizenship and “equal belonging” is close to impossible. Becoming a soldier is offered as a way to overcome, or perhaps negate, invisibility through the attainment of first-class citizenship, something that is denied to other, non-militarized bodies. Yet the high death rates of CHamoru soldiers and their devalorised CHamoru identities within the military speak to ways in which the military fails to meet these expectations. Thus, on many different levels, the military is conflated with what it means to be American. And being American is both gendered and militarized.
Opposing the proposed military build-up entails serious questioning about the meaning of citizenship on, and for, Guahan/Guam. Being CHamoru means rethinking one’s identity as a woman or as a man. Opposing militarization and the build-up thus requires people to question who they are, what their life choices have meant, and ‘how they remember themselves to be.’ It is a difficult task, but one which in the end might
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enable CHamoru to assert their authenticity and relieve their anguish.
There are perhaps three lessons from this analysis that can be applied to the praxis of opposing the military build-up on Guahan/Guam. The first is that this is not a single issue, not something that can be promoted successfully only as an anti-base/anti-military campaign. Therefore, practice needs to address the underlying issues of identity, not as identity politics but through an understanding of how certain identities serve to negate others. Gendered identities are made more complex by militarization which further de-legitimizes non-Western gender identities. Being a tough CHamoru woman should not have to be the same as being a macho American soldier.
The second is the power of distance, language, and racialized, colonial notions of identity to make some things visible, and disguise and/or deny others. Military colonialism is possible on Guahan/Guam because in the world of terrorism and globalization, military bases have become normalized and the outside world remains conveniently uncurious as to what takes place on small and distant islands. Praxis therefore needs to focus on Guahan/Guam, but also on educating the rest of the world. The third is that educating the world should not be the sole responsibility of the CHamoru. Regardless of where we were raised or currently reside, those of us on the ‘outside’ have internalized many of the beliefs about security/safety/risk/threat and growth/development that underlie the military build-up. Praxis needs to take into account and address the ways in which we, in disciplining ourselves, support the power relations that call for military build-ups in places like Guahan/Guam.
Notes
1 Guahan is the CHamoru name for Guam. Here, Guahan/Guam will be used except when referring specifically to the island as a subject of military colonialism. ‘CHamoru’ (Chamorro, Chamoru) refers to the indigenous people of Guam and their language. Although the spelling used by the government is ‘Chamorro,’ this spelling is closer to the actual pronunciation and reflects the desire for decolonization.
2 Here ‘neo-colonialism’ is used to “refer to contemporary manifestations of older colonial relations (i.e. political domination, cultural alteration and ideological justifications) under new guises. For instance, persistent U.S. neocolonial conditions involve political status and subordination, second-class citizenship, lack of control of in-migration, land acquisition, cultural erosion and Americanization.” (Perez M. 2001:100). For further discussion of militarization, see for example chapters by Alexander and Reardon in Reardon and Hans (2010).
3 The most important difference between Guahan/Guam’s status of Congressional citizenship and constitutional citizenship is that since Congressional citizenship is granted by Congress, presumably it could also be revoked by Congress. See Rogers (1995) and Perez, M. (2002:458). In 1985, the Ninth Circuit Court made the nature of the relationship with the US clear in its decision on Sakamoto v. Duty Free Shoppers, “The Government of Guam is in essence an instrumentality of the federal
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government” (Rogers 1995:226).
4 Study of bio-politics sheds light on the ways states govern life and death and enhance our understanding of why, in disciplining themselves, people conform to the unwritten rules of the particular group to which they are claiming affiliation. States engage in bio-politics through “nationalization and extension of the racialized practices internal to the state aimed at pacification and normalization” (Nadesan 2008:185). However, bio-politics fails to investigate how lives are actually lived within and among various categories of identity.
5 See for example Crenshaw (1991), Collins (2000), McCall (2005), Yuval-Davis (2005), Squires (2009), Knudsen (2003), and Valentine (2008).
6 Descent was determined through the female line and women were central in the conferring of power and prestige (Souder 1992:44).
7 Terms such as ‘Guamanian’ and ‘Micronesian’ are artificial terms that are legacies of US rule. The term ‘Guamanian’ was used to distinguish CHamorus from Guam and those from the other Mariana Islands, and frequently included long time residents of Guam, regardless of ethnicity (Perez, C. 2002:70). ‘Micronesian’ is a pejorative term used to refer to people who have come to Guam from other Micronesian islands (Interview with Helen Thompson on Guahan/Guam, 2011.9.10).
8 Marriage was introduced under the Spanish Catholics, but it was not until the US Executive Order No.308 of 1919 that women were required to take the surname and nationality of their husbands, and children that of their fathers. The Civil Code of 1953 named men as the head of the household and ensured that wives would take their husband’s names and decisions about where to live would be made by husbands (Souder 1992:45-53).
9 In 1963, the requirement that those entering Guam have a Naval Security Clearance was lifted, allowing for migrant workers to enter. These workers supported the development of a non-military, non-government population seeking economic growth through development of the tourism industry. Devastation by typhoons in 1962 and 1976 brought major redevelopment funds, further supporting the growing tourism industry. At the same time, the rebuilding disrupted traditional neighborhood patterns and ways of life (Souder 1992:35-36).
10 For example, P.L.594, the Land Acquisition Act of 1946, authorized the US Navy Department to acquire private land needed for permanent military installations. Compensation was at best inadequate, and the largest amounts of what was paid went to the biggest landowners. In addition to land for bases, 1500 acres of the best farmland was taken for food production for the military, and US objectives at the end of WWII were to acquire 55% of the total land area of the island. Even when land was no longer necessary for military use, it was not returned to the CHamoru owners (Rogers 1995:214-17).
11 The first petition to the US Congress asking for civilian government was submitted in 1901, and a series of similar petitions asking for US citizenship and self-determination were filed beginning in 1933 (Hattori 1996:57-69). Also see Diaz 2009 and Viernes 2009. The US victory was a celebrated as “’glorious event’ whose price in lives lost had purchased freedom and later American claims of exclusive rights to the region” (Diaz 2009:159).
12 Quimby (2011) claims that the defeat of the Commonwealth attempt was due in part to poor strategic planning by CHamorus in favor of self-determination. While CHamorus admit there was disunity, a much more convincing argument is that the defeat was brought on by pressure from the United States for strategic reasons, coupled with the normalization of the acceptance of the status quo.
13 According to the 2010 “Base Structure Report”, the US ‘owns’ 254 square kilometers of the 256.45 square kilometers housing military installations on Guahan/Guam (US Department of Defense 2010: 52-53). Natividad and Kirk (2010) say that the US controls about 39% of the island, an indication of the size of the build-up.
14 A lawsuit filed against the US Navy to prevent the building of a firing range at Pagat has been approved by a Hawaii district court, although the Navy is calling for a dismissal (Ridgell 2011).
15 On 12 December 2011, the US Congress voted against allocating funds for the relocation of the US Marines from Okinawa to Guahan/Guam. It is unclear when, or whether, the relocation will take place (Kurashige 2011). The number of Marines scheduled to go to Guahan/Guam has been cut in
18. 18
half, and there is discussion in progress about whether or not the remainder will stay in Japan.
16 The Environmental Impact Statement for the build-up is available at the Navy’s site: http://www.guambuildupeis.us/ Some of the more successful opposition to the build-up in Guahan/Guam and Japan has centered on environmental threats.
17 The population is about 180,000 people of whom about 37% are CHamoru, 26% Filipino and and 11% other Pacific Islander. About 85% of the population is Roman Catholic. Spoken languages include English (38%), CHamoru (22%), Filipino languages (22%) and others. (July 2010 census in CIA World Factbook).
18 There are three JROTC programs in the public high schools and also an ROTC program at the University of Guam. See Natividad and Kirk (2010:5) and Aguon (2008).
19 Guahan/Guam is said to have the highest per capita enlistment rate and casualty rate in the US army (Pacific Sunday News, 2011.9.11).
20 Observation by LisaLinda Natividad in a conversation at University of Guam, 2011.9.12.
21 The political status of Guahan/Guam, coupled with possibilities for service in the US military, makes Guahan/Guam attractive to Filipinos and Pacific Islanders who ultimately want to go to the mainland US. Citizens of Guahan/Guam generally migrate to Hawaii and the mainland US. (Quimby 2011:361).
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