Black Femininity through the White Speculum: The Implications of Medicosocialism and the Disproportionate Regulation of Black Women’s Reproductive Autonomy

At the crux of health disparities for women of color lies a history of maltreatment based on racial difference from their white counterparts. It is their non-whiteness that limits their access to the ideologies of “woman” and “femininity” within dominant culture. As the result of this difference, the impact of the birth control movement varied among women based on race. This project explores how the ideology attributed to the black female body limited black women’s access to “womanhood” within dominant culture, and analyzes the manners in which their reproductive autonomy was compromised as the result of changes to that ideology through time. This project operates under the hypothesis that black women’s access to certain aspects of femininity such as domesticity and motherhood reflected their roles in slave society, that black women’s reproductive value was based on the value of black children within slave culture, and that both of these factors dictated the manner in which their reproductive autonomy was managed by health professionals. Black people’s worth as a free labor force within dominant culture diminished when the Reconstruction Amendments were added to the constitution and slavery was deemed unconstitutional—resulting in the paradigmatic shift from the promotion of black fertility to its recession. America’s transition to the medicosocial regulation of black fertility through Eugenics, the role of the black elite in the movement, and the negative impact of this agenda on the reproductive autonomy of black women from low socioeconomic backgrounds are enlisted as support. The paper goes on to draw connections between post-slavery ideology of black femininity and modern-day medicosocial occurrences within clinical settings in order to advocate for increased bias training for medical professionals as a means of combating current health disparities. It concludes with the possibility that this improvement in medical training could persuade people of color to seek out medical intervention at earlier stages of illness and obtain regular check-ups by actively countering physicians’ past transgressions against them.

Who Do You Say I Am?: African American Women Clergy and the Construction of Ministerial Identity

The purpose of this study was to examine how African American women in ordained ministry construct and develop ministerial identity in the context of the Black Church. This study employed a qualitative multicase study methodology and the purposive participant sample was comprised of 13 women who were ordained or pursuing ordination in the Baltimore or Washington conferences of the AME Church. Semistructured in-depth interviews were conducted with the participants, and member checks were employed as a triangulation method. This study reveals that the primary factor impacting ministerial identity development is the relationship with the senior pastor and explores the various ways in which that impact is felt. This study also connects aspects of that relationship and its resulting impact to African American cultural traditions and values, as well as offers several suggestions to women cultivating ministerial identity and the organizational systems within which that process occurs.

Jubilee and the Limits of African American Freedom after Emancipation

Scholarship generated in the post-civil rights US underpins a growing consensus that any honest confrontation with the American past requires an acknowledgment both of the nation’s foundations in racially-based slave labour and of the critical role that the enslaved played in ending that system. But scholars equally need to examine why the end of slavery did not deliver freedom, but instead – after a short-lived ‘jubilee’ during which freedpeople savoured their ‘brief moment in the sun’ – opened up a period of extreme repression and violence. This article traces the political trajectory of one prominent ex-slave and Republican party organiser, Elias Hill, to assess the constraints in which black grassroots activists operated. Though mainly concerned with the dashed hopes of African Americans, their experience of a steep reversal is in many ways the shared and profoundly significant legacy of ex-slaves across the former plantation societies of the Atlantic world.

W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Agency and the Slaves' Civil War

This article reviews the historical literature on slave self-activity during the US Civil War, taking account of recent developments in historiography. Attempting to move beyond the debate between those who argue for 'slave self-emancipation' and others who emphasize the role of high politics, this article suggests that while slaves played a central role in re-directing the war into an assault on slavery, there were severe constraints on their activity as well. Northern military advances played a critical role in opening up the Confederate South to slave self-assertion.

Between Memory and History : The Nineteenth Century in Jewelle Gomez’s Vampire Novel The Gilda Stories and the TV Series True Blood

This article examines two American vampire narratives that depict the perspective and memories of a main character who is turned into a vampire in the US in the nineteenth century: Jewelle Gomez’s novel The Gilda Stories (1991), and the first season of Alan Ball’s popular TV series True Blood (2008). In both narratives, the relationship between the past and the present, embodied by the main vampire character, is of utmost importance, but the two narratives use vampire conventions as well as representations of and references to the nineteenth century in different ways that comment on, revise, or reinscribe generic and socio-historical assumptions about race, gender, class, and sexuality.

Towards participatory political theology: democratic consolidation in Southeastern Europe and the role of Eastern Christianity in the process

This thesis defends the position that the Eastern Orthodoxy has the potential to develop, on the basis of its core concepts and doctrines, a new political theology that is participatory, personalist and universalist. This participatory political theology, as I name it, endorses modern democracy and the values of civic engagement. It enhances the process of democracy-building and consolidation in the SEE countries through cultivating the ethos of participation and concern with the common good among and the recognition of the dignity and freedom of the person. This political-theological model is developed while analyzing critically the traditional models of church-state relations (the symphonia model corresponding to the medieval empire and the Christian nation model corresponding to the nation-state) as being instrumentalized to serve the political goals of non-democratic regimes. The participatory political-theological model is seen as corresponding to the conditions of the constitutional democratic state. The research is justified by the fact the Eastern Orthodoxy has been a dominant religiouscultural force in the European South East for centuries, thus playing a significant role in the process of creation of the medieval and modern statehood of the SEE countries. The analysis employs comparative constitutional perspectives on democratic transition and consolidation in the SEE region with the theoretical approaches of political theology and Eastern Orthodox theology. The conceptual basis for the political-theological synthesis is found in the concept and doctrines of the Eastern Orthodoxy (theosis and synergy, ecclesia and Eucharist, conciliarity and catholicity, economy and eschatology) which emphasize the participatory, personalist and communal dimensions of the Orthodox faith and practice. The paradigms of revealing the political-theological potential of these concepts are the Eucharistic ecclesiology and the concept of divine-human communion as defining the body of Orthodox theology. The thesis argues that with its ethos of openness and engagement the participatory political theology presupposes political systems that are democratic, inclusive, and participatory, respecting the rights and the dignity of the person. The political theology developed here calls for a transformation and change of democratic systems towards better realization of their personalist and participatory commitments. In the context of the SEE countries the participatory political theology addresses the challenges posed by alternative authoritarian political theologies practiced in neighboring regions.

Thrips incidence in green beans and the degree of damage caused

Green bean production accounts for 2.4% of the total value of Australian vegetable production and was Australia's tenth largest vegetable crop in 2008-2009 by value. Australian green bean production is concentrated in Queensland (51%) and Tasmania (34%) where lost productivity as a direct result of insect damage is recognised as a key threat to the industry (AUSVEG, 2011). Green beans attract a wide range of insect pests, with thrips causing the most damage to the harvestable product, the pod. Thrips populations were monitored in green bean crops in the Gatton Research Facility, Lockyer Valley, South-east Queensland, Australia from 2002-2011. Field trials were conducted to identify the thrips species present, to record fluctuation in abundance during the season and assess pod damage as a direct result of thrips. Thirteen species of thrips were recorded during this time on bean plantings, with six dominant species being collected during most of the growing season: Frankliniella occidentalis, F. schultzei, Megalurothrips usitatus, Pseudanaphothrips achaetus, Thrips imaginis and T. tabaci. Thrips numbers ranged from less than one thrips per flower to as high as 5.39 thrips per flower. The highest incidence of thrips presence found in October/November 2008, resulted in 10.74% unmarketable pods due to thrips damage, while the lowest number of thrips recorded in April 2008 caused a productivity loss of 36.65% of pods as a result of thrips damage.

A full report of the proceedings of the ... annual conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

Includes a Report of the Exerciese in the Salt Lake Assembly Hall.

The Scottish Parliament in the 15th and 16th centuries

Earlier histories of the Scottish parliament have been somewhat constitutional in emphasis and have been exceedingly critical of what was understood to be parliament's subservience to the crown. Estimates by constitutional historians of the extreme weakness of parliament rested on an assessment of the constitutional system. The argument was that many of its features were not consistent with a reasonably strong parliament. Because the 'constitution' is apparently fragmented, with active roles played by bodies such as the lords of articles, the general council and the convention of estates, each apparently suggesting that parliament was inadequate, historians have sometimes failed to appreciate the positive role played by the estates in the conduct of national affairs. The thesis begins with a discussion of the reliability of the printed text of APS and proceeds to an examination of selected aspects of the work of parliament in a period from c 1424-c 1625. The belief of constitutional historians such as Rait that conditions In Scotland proved unfavourable to the interests and. effectiveness of parliament in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, is also examined. Chapter 1 concludes that APS is a less than reliable text, particularly for the reign of James I. Numerous statutes were excluded from the printed text and they are offered below for the first time. These statutes have been a useful addition to our understanding of the reign of James I. Chapter 2 analyses the motives behind the schemes for shire representation and concludes that neither constitutional theory nor political opportunism explains the support which James I and James VI gave to these measures. Both these monarchs were motivated by the realisation that their particular ambitions were dependent on winning the support of the estates whose ranks should include representatives from the shires. Chapter 3 examines the method of electing the lords of articles, the composition of this committee, and some aspects of its operation. The conclusion is that in the main the estates were the deciding force in the choice of the lords of articles. The committee's composition was more a reflection of a desire for a balance between representatives from north and south of the Forth and for the most important burghs and clergy to be selected than an attempt at electing government favourites. The articles did exercise a significant control over the items which came before parliament but this control was not absolute and applied to government as well as private legislation. Chapter 4 questions the traditional view that the general council and convention of estates were the same body. It is argued that they were two different institutions with different powers, but that they nevertheless worked within certain limits and were careful not to usurp the authority of parliament. Chapter 5 concedes that taxation was sometimes decided outside parliament; that the irregularity of taxation certainly weakened the bargaining power of the estates and that the latter did not appear to capitalise on these occasions when taxation was an issue. But the tendency was to ensure that, whether in or out of parliament, the decision to impose taxation was taken by a large number of each estate. The infrequency of taxation was a direct consequence of an unwillingness among the estates to agree to a regular taxation and their preference to ensure for the crown an alternative source of income. Moreover taxation was one issue, which more than any other, would be subject to contentious opposition by the estates, and could lead to the crown's defeat. Chapter 6 is concerned with ecclesiastical representation after the Reformation and the church's attitudes to the possibility of ministerial representation. Some ministers had doctrinal misgivings but the majority came to believe that the church's absence from parliament bad severely reduced. the influence of the church. That no agreement was forthcoming on a system of ministerial representation, particularly after 1597, is attributable to the estates' unwillingness to compromise and, not to the strength of opposition in the church. Chapter 7 examines the institutions which are sometime seen as 'rivals' of parliament and concludes that institutions such as the privy council were generally very careful in matters which needed the approval of parliament, and seemed aware of the greater authority of parliament. Chapter 8 which illustrates how parliament had the right to be consulted in all important matters of state, brings together the main points of the earlier chapters and offers further illustrations of the essential role which parliament played in the conduct of national affairs. Whether or not the system can be regarded as constitutionally sound, the estates in Scotland could observe parliament's day-to-day operation with some satisfaction. All in all, there is little convincing evidence that parliament was as weak as some historians would have us believe.

Exporting the racial republic: African colonization, national citizenship, and the transformation of U.S. expansion, 1776-1864

The effort to create a colony of African Americans on the west coast of Africa was one of the most celebrated and influential movements in the United States during the first half of the 19th century. While historians have often viewed African colonization through the lens of domestic anti-slavery politics, colonization grew from an imperial impulse which promised to transform the identities of black colonists and indigenous Africans by helping them to build a democratic nation from the foundation of a settler colony. By proposing that persons of African descent could eventually become self-governing subjects, the liberal framework behind colonization offered the possibility of black citizenship rights, but only within racially homogenous nation-states, which some proponents of colonization imagined might lead to a “United States of Africa.” This dissertation examines how the notion of expanding democratic ideals through the export of racial nationhood was crucial to the appeal of colonization. It reveals how colonization surfaced in several crucial debates about race, citizenship, and empire in the antebellum United States by examining discussions about African Americans’ revolutionary claims to political rights, the bounds of US territorial expansion, the removal of native populations in North America, and the racialization of national citizenship, both at home and abroad. By examining African colonization from these perspectives, this dissertation argues that the United States’ efforts to construct a liberal democracy defined by white racial identity were directly connected to the nation’s emerging identity as a defender and exporter of political liberty throughout the world.

Integrating Environmental Justice and Social-Ecological Resilience for Successful Adaptation to Climate Change: Lessons from African American Communities on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay

This research concerns the conceptual and empirical relationship between environmental justice and social-ecological resilience as it relates to climate change vulnerability and adaptation. Two primary questions guided this work. First, what is the level of resilience and adaptive capacity for social-ecological systems that are characterized by environmental injustice in the face of climate change? And second, what is the role of an environmental justice approach in developing adaptation policies that will promote social-ecological resilience? These questions were investigated in three African American communities that are particularly vulnerable to flooding from sea-level rise on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay. Using qualitative and quantitative methods, I found that in all three communities, religious faith and the church, rootedness in the landscape, and race relations were highly salient to community experience. The degree to which these common aspects of the communities have imparted adaptive capacity has changed over time. Importantly, a given social-ecological factor does not have the same effect on vulnerability in all communities; however, in all communities political isolation decreases adaptive capacity and increases vulnerability. This political isolation is at least partly due to procedural injustice, which occurs for a number of interrelated reasons. This research further revealed that while all stakeholders (policymakers, environmentalists, and African American community members) generally agree that justice needs to be increased on the Eastern Shore, stakeholder groups disagree about what a justice approach to adaptation would look like. When brought together at a workshop, however, these stakeholders were able to identify numerous challenges and opportunities for increasing justice. Resilience was assessed by the presence of four resilience factors: living with uncertainty, nurturing diversity, combining different types of knowledge, and creating opportunities for self-organization. Overall, these communities seem to have low resilience; however, there is potential for resilience to increase. Finally, I argue that the use of resilience theory for environmental justice communities is limited by the great breadth and depth of knowledge required to evaluate the state of the social-ecological system, the complexities of simultaneously promoting resilience at both the regional and local scale, and the lack of attention to issues of justice.

Expanding the Australian empire?: the Australian Council for the World Council of Churches, the Menzies Government and the New Hebrides in the late 1950s

In the late 1950s the Australian Council for the World Council of Churches (AC-WCC) inspired primarily by the Presbyterian Church, undertook a concerted campaign to pressure the Australian government to assume a greater role in the affairs of the New Hebrides. The AC-WCC wanted the Australian government to take over the United Kingdom's role in the administration of the Anglo-French Condominium. It was motivated to undertake this campaign by the dismal social and economic conditions in the islands, the neglect of the British and French colonial authorities, and their failure to offer the indigenous people a way forward to self-government. The high point of the campaign was a meeting between Robert Menzies, the Australian prime minister and a delegation from the AC-WCC in early 1958. As a result of this meeting Australian ministers and officials, for the final time, gave extended consideration to expanding Australia's empire in the South Pacific to include the New Hebrides. This article examines the AC-WCC's campaign, explores the Australian government's response, and analyses the outcome of this important episode in Australia's involvement in the colonial territories of the South Pacific.

Saint-Domingue Refugees and their Enslaved Property : Abolition Societies and the Enforcement of Gradual Emancipation in Pennsylvania and New York

Ce mémoire porte sur le rôle des cercles abolitionnistes dans l’application des lois sur l’émancipation graduelle de l’esclavage dans le nord des États-Unis vers la fin du dix-huitième siècle, principalement à New York et en Pennsylvanie. Plus particulièrement, il met en lumière la façon dont ces cercles, dont les deux plus importants étaient la Pennsylvania Abolition So-ciety (PAS) et le New­York Manumission Society (NYMS), ont fait face aux centaines de réfugiés de Saint-Domingue qui sont arrivés avec leurs esclaves sur la côte est américaine pour fuir la révolution haïtienne dans les années 1790. Dans un premier temps, ce mémoire étudie l’abolition graduelle de l’esclavage dans le nord des États-Unis, débutant avec la Pennsylvanie en 1780, et la formation des cercles abolitionnistes dans les anciennes colonies anglaises. Il sera en outre question des stratégies des antiesclavagistes américains afin de promouvoir l’abolition graduelle de l’esclavage et d’empêcher le mouvement des esclaves et des noirs libres en dehors des frontières de leurs États respectifs. Il sera aussi question de leurs efforts pour resserrer davantage les clauses des lois existantes à ce sujet. Dans un second temps, dans le but de mettre en relief la contribution des cercles abolitionnistes, ce mémoire procède à une étude de cas sur la manière dont les réfugiés de Saint-Domingue ont interagi avec l’esclavage résiduel à New York et en Pennsylvanie et cherche à comprendre pourquoi leurs tentatives d’échapper aux lois sur l’émancipation graduelle se sont heurtées, à plusieurs reprises, aux stratégies des sociétés antiesclavagistes.

Historiographic Metafiction and the Neo-slave Narrative: Pastiche and Polyphony in Caryl Phillips, Toni Morrison and Sherley Anne Williams

The classic slave narrative recounted a fugitive slave’s personal story condemning slavery and hence working towards abolition. The neo-slave narrative underlines the slave’s historical legacy by unveiling the past through foregrounding African Atlantic experiences in an attempt to create a critical historiography of the Black Atlantic. The neo-slave narrative is a genre that emerged following World War II and presents us with a dialogue combining the history of 1970 - 2000. In this thesis I seek to explore how the contemporary counter-part of the classic slave narrative draws, reflects or diverges from the general conventions of its predecessor. I argue that by scrutinizing our notion of truth, the neo-slave narrative remains a relevant, important witness to the history of slavery as well as to today’s still racialized society. The historiographic metafiction of the neo-slave narrative rewrites history with the goal of digesting the past and ultimately leading to future reconciliation.