Fall 2005 Newsletter

Contents:

1. ISSC Awarded Russell Sage Grant to Study Political Socialization in Mexican-Origin Families
2. ISSC Welcomes 2005-2006 Visiting Scholars
3. Center on Youth Violence Prevention Comes to ISSC
4. New Publications from ISSC Affiliated Faculty
5. H. K. Yuen Social Movement Archive Donated to UCB Library
6. ISSC and Boalt Hall's CSJ Co-sponsor Spring Conference “Citizenship Without Borders”
_________

1. ISSC Awarded Russell Sage Grant to Study Political Socialization in Mexican Origin Families

The Russell Sage Foundation has awarded ISSC a grant to conduct exploratory research on political socialization in Mexican-origin families with mixed citizenship status. The study, which will be led by Irene Bloemraad (Sociology) and Bruce Cain (Political Science), will use in-depth, semi-structured interviews to examine the ways in which mixed status families serve as sites for the political socialization of adolescents and their parents and the extent to which such families foster engagement with community, civic and political affairs. The findings of this research will contribute to filling a significant gap in the scholarly literature and lay the groundwork for more research on immigrant families as agents of political socialization.

Professor Bloemraad will be hiring two GSRs to work on the project. Applicants must be able to commit to working both the Spring and Summer 2006 terms. They must also be fluent in English and Spanish and share an interest in political and civic engagement, youth, and/or immigrant incorporation. Experience with in-depth interviewing and/or ethnographic fieldwork is preferred. Interested candidates should email their CV, a sample of a transcript if they have conducted interviews, and a statement of why they want to participate in the project to Irene Bloemraad bloemr@berkeley.edu by December 9, 2005.

__________

2. ISSC Welcomes 2005-2006 Visiting Scholars

Aaron Cicourel earned his PhD from Cornell University. He is Research Professor Emeritus of Cognitive Science at UC San Diego. A prolific scholar with many research interests, Professor Cicourel presented new research last spring on the construction of human nature and the intersections between different levels of analysis used to understand human development.

Larry Rosenthal earned his PhD in Sociology from UCB. His field of interest is political sociology with an emphasis on Italian politics as well as social movements in general.

Kay Trimberger earned her PhD in Sociology from University of Chicago. She is now Professor Emerita of Women's and Gender Studies at Sonoma State University and just completed a widely acclaimed book on The New Single Woman. The book examines how single women over 35 are creating fulfilling lives.

Jessica Weiss earned her PhD in History at UCB. She is Associate Professor at Cal State, East Bay. Professor Weiss is working on a book entitled Kitchen Debates: Women, Domesticity, and Public Life in Postwar America, 1955-1965. The book examines changes in gender roles and ideology among women in Oakland and the East Bay.

Keiko Yamanaka earned her PhD in Sociology from Cornell University. Her research focuses on international migration in Asia. She is writing a book tentatively titled From Global Warriors to Global Workers: Nepalese Labor Migration to Japan, and based on ten years spent researching a small group of Nepali undocumented migrant workers in Japan. Keiko also teaches in Ethnic Studies.

__________

3. Center on Youth Violence Prevention Comes to ISSC

The Institute for the Study of Social Change is pleased to announce that it has been awarded a $4.3 million grant to open a new center to study youth violence prevention. The five-year grant was awarded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and is one of eight approved by the CDC as part of its program to foster academic excellence in the area of youth violence prevention.

The Center on Culture, Immigration and Youth Violence Prevention will be jointly run by the Institute for the Study of Social Change (ISSC), the National Council on Crime and Delinquency (NCCD), UC Berkeley's School of Law (Boalt Hall), and UCSF. Frank Zimring, who is the William G. Simon Professor of Law at Boalt Hall and chairman of the criminal justice research program at the Institute for Legal Research, will oversee the Center’s operations.

The Center’s mission is to research the causes and prevention of youth violence, especially among Asian Pacific Islander and Latino immigrant populations in Oakland. To convert this research into a reform agenda, the Center will serve as a gathering place for community members, policy makers and researchers to identify shared priorities, develop innovative strategies for studying these pressing concerns, and translate and disseminate information and knowledge into health and community practice.

__________

4. New Publications from ISSC Affiliated Faculty

Consortium for High Academic Performance: Final Report

L. Scott Miller with Mehmet Dali Ozturk and Lisa Chavez. "Increasing African American, Latino, and Native American Representation among High Achieving Undergraduates at Selective Colleges and Universities." Institute for the Study of Social Change. University of California, Berkeley, 2005.

The report documents the extent of underrepresentation of Blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans among high academic achieving undergraduates at selective institutions and discusses the severe shortage of proven strategies for addressing the high achievement issue at the undergraduate level. The report also summarizes findings from the initial use of the Survey of High Academic Performance (SHAPER) that may help inform efforts to develop strategies that are more effective, discusses constraints on efforts to increase the number of high achieving undergraduates from underrepresented groups, and presents recommendations for action.

A copy of this report is available for downloading at <http://repositories.cdlib.org/issc/reports/> Copies of the report are also available at the Institute for the Study of Social Change.


Kay Trimberger, The New Single Woman

Drawing on stories from diverse long-term single women, including herself, Trimberger explores the idea that fulfillment comes only through coupling with a soul mate. Instead, she presents an exciting new identity possible for women in the twenty-first century: the new single woman—a woman who is content with her single life. This trailblazing woman is distinguished by six important characteristics: she has a nurturing home; satisfying work; is comfortable with her sexuality; connects with the next generation; finds emotional intimacy with friends and family; and creates a supportive community.

These gripping personal accounts of how single women’s lives evolve over time, combined with Trimberger’s incisive analysis, provide a much-needed cultural roadmap for single women who are striving to create a satisfying and meaningful life. Trimberger’s provocative argument – that married women and single women are not different or in competition but rather are at opposite ends of a continuum that comprises many women, including bisexuals and lesbians – represents a paradigm-shift, one that ultimately strengthens and enriches both single women and couples.

Read an article from The Berkeleyan for more information: http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/2005/09/14_solo.shtml

Jerome Karabel, The Chosen : The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton.

Drawing on decades of meticulous research, Dr. Karabel studies the ever-changing definition of “merit” in college admissions. "The Chosen" examines how students apply and are chosen for the most elite universities. Neither consistent nor objective, admissions standards have evolved through a series of fierce battles over power, money, and ideology.

Part of Dr. Karabel’s findings show how the top Ivy League schools created discriminative measures in the 1920s due to the number of Jewish students accepted at a time when applicants were judged solely on the basis of their grades. The author explores the "Jewish problem" at the so-called Big Three colleges, but also tackles the cultural shifts that lowered the barriers for African-American students and ultimately led to the admission of women.

For more information, please click: <http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/2005/10/12_karabel.shtml>

ISSC Fellow Roberto Hernández, “Running for Peace and Dignity: From Traditionally Radical Chicanos/as to Radically Traditional Xicanas/os”

Hernández’s article, published in the forthcoming, Latino/as in the World System: Decolonization Struggles in the 21st Century U.S. Empire, ed. by Ramón Grosfoguel, Nelson Maldonado-Torres, and José David Saldívar (Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers, 2005) explores shifting Chicana/o epistemological perspectives of/on indigeneity through a focus on the Peace and Dignity Journeys, a hemispheric-wide spiritual run that, since 1992, aims to bring together native communities throughout North and South America. Hernández uses a world-systemic approach to social movements to critically re-situate the Peace and Dignity Journeys and the “emergence” of other indigenous movements, emphasizing how such movements are not new and instead operate at different TimeSpace continuums that force us to rethink antisystemic struggle.

For more information, please click: <http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/node/135>

__________

5. H. K. Yuen Social Movement Archive Donated to UCB Library

Utilizing some of the earliest reel-to-reel recording technology publicly available, H.K. Yuen documented countless rallies, protests, debates, and meetings of the 1960s and 1970s. The collection includes materials on a wide range of social movements – both domestic and international – with a focus on Berkeley, Oakland, and the San Francisco Bay Area. The collection, which contains more than 30,000 hours of audio content, features multimedia primary documents from the Free Speech Movement, the Third World College mobilizations, the United Farm Workers, the student strike at San Francisco State University, the Black Panther Party, the American Indian Movement, the International Hotel Mobilizations, Stop the Draft Week, the Women’s Movement.

As the University Library celebrates the acquisition of its ten-millionth volume this fall, it has selected the Yuen Collection as one of “Ten Treasures of the Ten Million.” ISSC, Ethnic Studies, and the Bancroft Library have worked together to turn the Collection into a research resource through cataloging and digitization. The fruits of those labors are finally being realized. Ethnic Studies Professor Ling-Chi Wang, History Professor Waldo Martin, and Bancroft Librarian Lincoln Cushing are the key contacts on these projects.

For more information, please click: <http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/~lcushing/Yuen.html>
__________

6. ISSC and Boalt Hall's CSJ Co-sponsor Spring Conference “Citizenship Without Borders”

On March 16 and 17, 2006, ISSC and Boalt Hall's Center for Social Justice will co-sponsor a conference entitled, “Citizenship Without Borders: Belonging and Exclusion in Immigrant America.“ The conference will bring together leading scholars, immigrant rights activists, community-based service providers, members of the legal community, and immigrants, as well as UCB and Boalt Hall faculty, students, and staff to discuss the civic and political practices of immigrants (whether naturalized citizens, legal residents, or undocumented); to share stories about the daily practices of citizenship engaged in and experienced by immigrants; and to consider the role that citizenship status plays and should play in mediating the legal rights and social benefits that immigrants enjoy and are granted access to in the United States.

The conference will provide a forum in which to debate the meaning of citizenship and the logic of entitlement that flows from (legal) citizenship status, challenge assumptions about who is/can be a "citizen," and redraw the conceptual boundaries used to define membership in civic and political life. Key questions that the conference will address include: On what should the granting of rights and access to social benefits turn (e.g. personhood, citizenship, residency)? How might the meanings ascribed to "citizenship" be reconstituted to capture the transterritorial qualities of political life? What are the political implications, if any, of severing the association between citizenship and the nation-state?

The conference will be held in conjunction with the annual Robert D. and Leslie-Kay Raven Lecture on Access to Justice, scheduled for Thursday, March 16 at 4pm in the Booth Auditorium of Boalt Hall. Alexander Aleinikoff, Dean of Georgetown University's law school and former General Counsel and Executive Associate Commissioner for the INS under the Clinton Administration, will be one of the Lecture's keynote speakers.

The conference will continue on Friday, March 17, with a full day of panels and a lunch roundtable featuring a distinguished group of academics, practitioners, activists and policymakers.

More details to follow soon!