ASU News - Social Science

Professor documents anti-globalization movement

mattcrum — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 17:40:33 -0600

An anthropologist’s first-hand experience in an international social movement forms the basis of Networking Futures: The Movements Against Corporate Globalization (Duke University Press). The new book by Arizona State University professor Jeffrey S. Juris chronicles his experiences organizing and participating in protests from Seattle to Prague to Barcelona.

Juris’ book provides an ethnographic study of anti-corporate globalization movements. From his base in Barcelona, he followed their connections and movements around the world. A critical component of the workings of these movements, Juris found, is their use of technology.

“Because they use tools such as email lists, Web pages and free software to organize actions, share information, and coordinate at a distance, anti-corporate globalization networks have become models for emerging forms of directly democratic politics,” Juris says.

“These groups don’t need complex hierarchical structures to spread their messages or organize actions.”

The effects of this new type of political activism are evident in such examples as the influence of MoveOn.org and the success of the Barack Obama campaign at online fundraising, Juris says. “Through the same types of technologically driven mechanisms, protests are now being planned for the Democratic and Republican conventions, so it will be interesting to see what the scope of these protests turns out to be,” he says.

Juris participated in the November 1999 protest against the World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle. “I had never seen anything like it – thousands of protestors in the streets, confronting police and tear gas,” he says. “I knew immediately that I wanted to study this phenomenon.”

In 2001 and 2002, Juris took part in the Barcelona-based Movement for Global Resistance, an influential European anti-corporate globalization network. His experiences participating in hundreds of meetings, gatherings, protests, and online discussions form the basis for Networking Futures. In the book, Juris documents how activists are responding to growing poverty, inequality, and environmental degradation while also building social laboratories for the production of alternative values, discourses, and practices.

George E. Marcus, co-author of Designs for an Anthropology of the Contemporary, describes Networking Futures as “a terrific, deeply informed ethnographic account of the origins and activities of the anti-corporate globalization movement. Juris’ identity is as much that of an activist who happens to be doing first-rate anthropology as vice versa, and there is much for anthropologists to reflect on in the way this work is set up and narrated through these dual identities.”

Juris is an assistant professor of social and behavioral sciences in the New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences, located on ASU’s West campus. He received his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley in 2004. Juris’ research and teaching interests include globalization, social movements, new media, violence, Spain, and Mexico.

Juris also is a co-author of Global Democracy and the World Social Forums. Most recently he has conducted field work at the United States Social Forum, and he is carrying out new ethnographic research on grassroots media activism and autonomy in Mexico City.

ASU research team working to decode TB

rhowe — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 09:20:00 -0600

Tuberculosis may call to mind Old West consumptives and early 20th-century sanatoriums, yet according to the World Health Organization, the disease took the lives of more than 1.5 million people worldwide in 2006. In the United States alone, thousands of new cases are reported annually making TB an enduring menace. The need to better understand this disease is becoming critical, note researchers at Arizona State University, especially with the emergence of antibiotic-resistant strains and increasing globalization spurring pathogen migration.

Of humans and beasts

Among those trying to decipher the origins and trajectory of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria responsible for TB, are three researchers in ASU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Graduate student Luz-Andrea “Lucha” Pfister and associate professor Anne Stone in ASU’s School of Human Evolution and Social Change, and Michael Rosenberg, an assistant professor in the School of Life Sciences, are trying to establish a credible evolutionary timeline for TB.

Their research suggests that the disease migrated from humans to cattle – not the reverse, as has long been assumed. The research estimates that the evolutionary leap took place prior to the domestication of cows – more than 113,000 years ago – indicating M. tuberculosis is a much older pathogen than previously believed.

This outcome supports that of the French Pasteur Institute’s Cristina Gutierrez, an evolutionary mycobacteriologist whose work first cast doubt on the cattle-to-human TB link and its date range. Gutierrez calls the findings of Pfister’s team confirmation of TB’s ancient origins and human-cattle transmission.

This summer, Pfister presented the results of the group’s research at the annual meeting of the Society of Molecular Biology and Evolution, in Barcelona. She also presented during the April assembly of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists and subsequently saw the group’s research reported on in the journal Science.

Tracking a killer

With no fossil evidence to consult, studying the deep history of bacteria has only recently become possible. Genomics holds the key. Using DNA, Pfister, Stone and Rosenberg are making inroads into calibrating the watershed moments in TB’s development, such as when it expanded in the human population. Through their work, they also plan to address the biogeography of the disease and what types of TB ancient people had relative to modern strains.

Why are scientists interested in TB’s status thousands of years ago? Pfister puts the research into perspective: “An accurate timeframe can help us learn about the development between host and pathogen. It can aid in understanding the disease and the way it evolves, how it creates new strains to stay alive.”

As Stone is quick to point out, “The data we generate can be used by clinicians to study this disease and formulate appropriate treatments. Our work is historical, but the implications are far-reaching.”

One of the primary goals is to calculate a meaningful mutation rate. The established model for bacteria was developed in the 1980s in regard to E. coli. Pfister notes, “This mutation rate has been used as the universal standard, but that is not feasible. TB and E. coli are very different. Bacteria may evolve at different rates. We cannot say that one model applies to all.”

Pfister, Stone and Rosenberg worked with 108 genes, compared to just over 20 genes used in the E. coli formula. As a result, they were able to delve deeper than Gutierrez at the time she conducted her ground-breaking research. “The Pasteur Institute looked at a small piece of the genome; the full genome gives a much better idea,” says Stone, alluding to the team’s comprehensive approach and its possibilities.

Looking at the big picture

“The work we have done so far is only one aspect of a bigger project,” explains Rosenberg. “There are different directions we want to go with it. Of course, the main target is to get a better estimate of the rate of mycobacterium evolution, but a lot of things branch off from that.”

Rosenberg, a computational evolutionary biologist who designed the program to analyze many of the sequences, says the project shows that “as we get more data and complete sequencing of full genomes, we find new ways of looking at issues, which can do away with assumptions. An example is the belief of cow-to-human transmission of TB. That was a long-held notion, but it was just an assumption.”

“It is the evolutionary way of thinking that has caused us to explore this issue from new and varied angles,” states Pfister. “An evolutionary perspective is also important in a contemporary sense because our species’ population is growing dramatically. Soon we will reach carrying capacity. We will start producing pathogens and opportunities for problems at escalating rates.”

Hope for the future

Pfister was born and raised in Chile where TB ran rampant before being subdued by aggressive government health programs. However, as in other parts of the world, Chile is presently facing a resurgence of tuberculosis. Still, Pfister is hopeful that someday the deadly pathogen will be rendered obsolete. She enthuses, “We now have lots of gene data. We can count mutations. There is so much evidence out there; we just need to link it all. If we start looking at the history and essence of TB in a holistic, transdisciplinary way, we can see the big picture and find solutions.”

Rebecca Howe, rebecca.howe@asu.edu
480-727-6577
School of Human Evolution and Social Change

Researchers find Latinos willing to pay for public services

lambraki — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:49:00 -0600

As immigration from Latin countries continues to swell, so has speculation about the implications of increasing Latino populations in communities where they settle. Such speculation ranges from potential changes in local community life and culture to public policy.

Researchers at Arizona State University believe that, at least for the city of Phoenix which experienced a phenomenal triple-digit growth rate of 226 percent in its Latino population between 1980 and 2007, they have helped answer a pivotal question regarding impact on local public services.

According to the researchers, they found that Latinos in Phoenix are generally willing to pay for quality public services. Their findings, based upon analysis conducted on data collected by Phoenix-based Behavior Research Center as part of the City of Phoenix’s 2002/2004 Community Attitude Surveys, appear in the June issue of Social Science Quarterly.

“The research taps into the broader and compelling question of what difference an increasing Latino population makes, focusing specifically on public service delivery in local government,” said Nicholas Alozie, principal author of the article and professor and head of the social and behavioral sciences unit in the School of Applied Arts and Sciences at the Polytechnic campus.

Alozie’s body of research centers on women and minority issues in public policy. He has published a number of articles on Latinos, but he said there is something unique about this one.

The new research challenges beliefs that the Latino population is merely interested in handouts from government. And it helps address what effect increasing Latino populations can have on their local communities.

Alozie said that many local governments continue to shy away from considering Latino and other lower socioeconomic parts of town for serious public services, especially privatized services, for fear that these populations cannot afford, or will not be willing to pay, for such services. Alozie added that the USAID, in its global crusade to improve social justice, has attributed this grounding assumption not only to many of the differentials in service quality often observed across parts of the same local communities worldwide, but even to the non-availability of services in poorer parts of town altogether.

“This research suggests that assumption is misplaced,” he said. “Latinos want superior local public services, and they are willing to pay for them.

“The Latino population is generally poorer than the white, black, and Asian populations,” said Alozie. “This research proposes that Latinos are willing to pay for local services, ranging from crime fighting, ambulance, library and youth programs to countering gang activities, their income notwithstanding. Moreover, our findings suggest that Latinos are more prepared than whites to pay for these services.”

While the research indicates a willingness to pay for services, the researchers suggest that it also is important to consider the broader role Latinos will have in creating and shaping public policy in the future.

“The continuing growth and persistent residential segregation of the Latino population will call for changes in the way local services are delivered to Latino parts of town, as Latinos will demand more and superior services in the communities in which they live,” he said.

For a copy of the article, visit http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1540-6237.2008.00539.x.

Spielberg receives ASU award for communication excellence

chughes3 — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 12:28:02 -0600

Steven Spielberg, a three-time Academy Award winner, is the 2008 recipient of Arizona State University’s Hugh Downs Award for Communication Excellence. His latest film, “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” starring Harrison Ford, opened in theaters worldwide late last month.

“This year’s award honors a master storyteller,” noted H.L. “Bud” Goodall Jr., director of ASU’s Hugh Downs School of Human Communication. The award winner was announced June 19.

Spielberg, a founding partner of DreamWorks Studios, has written, directed or produced some of the top-grossing films of all time, including “Jurassic Park” and “E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial.”

Among his film honors are two Oscars for best director and best picture for “Schindler’s List” and a third Oscar for best director for “Saving Private Ryan.” Those movies also earned Spielberg Golden Globe Awards.

The Directors Guild of America (DGA) presented Spielberg with its Lifetime Achievement Award, as did the American Film Institute. Spielberg has earned three DGA Awards and 10 DGA nominations – more than any other director in history.

In crafting the award narrative for the ASU honor, respected broadcast journalist Hugh Downs noted that Spielberg is “a man who has demonstrated the power of narratives to inform, persuade and entertain, all the while reminding us of how important it is to be able to respect the past in order to imagine a better future.

“In an age defined by new global communication and shaped by our use of new communication technologies, it is only right and fitting to honor an individual who has used film – and the innovations we associate with his films – to change how we think about our worlds, both real and imagined,” Downs wrote.

“The stories that are the soul of Steven’s films, and the technological advancements that have been created to touch the heart and appeal to our capacity for wonder, deserve to be recognized not only as achievements in the filmic arts, but moreover as superlative achievements of human storytelling and inspiration,” said Downs.

In accepting the award, Spielberg said: “It is a great honor for me to receive this award, for many reasons. First, it comes from Hugh Downs whose work as a communicator I have long admired and respected.

“Second, because the award recognized the significance of human communication, which is something we need more than ever in today’s world. And third, because the root of this award springs from Arizona, which has meant so much in my own early life. So thanks Hugh, and thanks Arizona State University,” Spielberg said.

As a teenager, Spielberg lived in Scottsdale, Arizona. He attended Arcadia High School in Phoenix for several years, before moving to California. While at Arcadia, Spielberg wrote and directed a science fiction movie, “Firelight.”

In addition to filmmaking, Spielberg has devoted his time and resources to several philanthropic causes. According to biographical notes on the DreamWorks Web site, “the impact of his experience making ‘Schindler’s List,’ led him to establish the Righteous Persons Foundation using all his profits from the film. He also founded Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, which has recorded more than 52,000 Holocaust survivor testimonies. In 2005, the Foundation’s repository of testimonies were transferred to the University of Southern California. The new USC Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education will be dedicated to research and scholarship in the humanities and social sciences.

Spielberg is the second recipient of the Hugh Downs Award for Communication Excellence. Last year, the honor went to Larry King, host of CNN’s “Larry King Live.”

The idea behind the award came from school alumna Jeanne Lind Herberger who wanted to honor the school’s namesake by establishing an annual award to commemorate Downs’ legacy.

Downs has experience as a television host, producer and author. He is a living legend among American communicators, according to Goodall.

Downs served as anchor of “20/20,” host of “The Today Show,” announcer for “The Tonight Show with Jack Paar” and co-host of the PBS talk show “Not for Women Only.”

The Hugh Downs School of Human Communication in ASU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences exists to advance the understanding of message-related human behavior for the purpose of improving communicative interactions.

“Through the study and critique of human communication, we generate knowledge, creativity and understanding to facilitate healthy relationships and workplaces, civil and secure communities; and constructive intercultural interactions,” Goodall said. “We teach more than 16,000 students per year and we’re proud of our top-tier doctoral program.”

More information at www.asu.edu/clas/communication.

Undergraduates bring passion to research projects

lccampb — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 16:02:12 -0600

Valencia Johnson points to symbols on a research poster and makes her message very clear: these are not just numbers on a page.

“These are women who have suffered childhood emotional, physical and sexual abuse, and they need help,” says Johnson, a sophomore at the School of Community Resources and Development.

She’s working closely with Dominique Roe-Sepowitz of the School of Social Work on a faculty research project focusing on women from a Phoenix-area residential exiting program for prostitutes.

The empathy and passion in Johnson’s voice is contagious. It spread among the faculty and staff at the College of Public Programs when she won a presentation contest during the college’s first symposium highlighting undergraduate research.

The college in downtown Phoenix is among numerous ASU schools and colleges that offer undergrads the chance to work with faculty members on a faculty research project each semester. The Office of the Provost, in collaboration with the Office of the Vice President for Research, plans to develop a funding mechanism that will expand undergraduate research opportunities across the university within the next year, says Delia Saenz, ASU’s vice provost for undergraduate education.

“We think it’s very important to incorporate research into the undergraduate experience because it reaps benefits – not only for the students, but also for the departments and the colleges that are involved,” Saenz says. “Involvement in research with faculty is a key to undergraduate student engagement and success; it is linked to both persistence and graduation.”

Other academic units that offer formal undergraduate research programs include the College of Nursing and Healthcare Innovation, W. P. Carey School of Business, Morrison School of Management and Agribusiness, the College of Teacher Education and Leadership, the School of Life Sciences, the Ira A. Fulton School of Engineering, and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

At the College of Public Programs, upon recommendation of a faculty member, students can work for at least 10 hours a week with an instructor during their undergraduate education. For the first semester, they get a $500 scholarship from the dean’s office. They receive a $1,000 scholarship for the second semester and a $1,500 scholarship for the following semesters.

Fourteen students have been involved in undergrad research projects with faculty at the college so far.

For winning the contest, Johnson will receive a small travel grant to a conference, where she’ll present her research to colleagues in the field.

The symposium took place in tandem with a scholars’ reception that brought together about 50 students who were among those on the dean’s list this semester. Guest speaker Gordon Shockley, an assistant professor at the School of Community Resources and Development, spoke about his own educational journey.

Other student research projects presented at the event included an analysis of state tourism brochures to determine the ways gender is marketed in tourism, an examination of bias and self-determination among social workers, and an assessment of the ways religious communities can help elderly victims of abuse.

For information about undergraduate research projects at the college, contact Dana Newell at (602) 496-0416.

Corey Schubert, corey.schubert@asu.edu
(602) 496-0406
College of Public Programs

Study looks at Arizona’s 'megapolitan' future

nhaas — Thu, 08 May 2008 16:07:38 -0600

Two out of three Americans are expected to live in just 20 “megapolitan” areas in about 30 years, and one of these megapolitans – the Sun Corridor – is in Arizona.

Arizona already is one of the most urban and fastest-growing states, and much of its projected growth is expected to be in the Sun Corridor, which stretches from Santa Cruz and Cochise counties to the center of Yavapai County.

“Megapolitan: Arizona’s Sun Corridor,” a report just released by Morrison Institute for Public Policy at ASU, is the first comprehensive analysis of this new geography. The Morrison Institute’s Grady Gammage Jr., Rob Melnick and Nancy Welch wrote the report along with ASU’s John Stuart Hall and Robert E. Lang of Virginia Tech.

People have been predicting for 50 years that Phoenix and Tucson would grow together into one giant desert conglomerate. A diverse pattern of land ownership in central and southern Arizona most likely will prevent that. But what is happening now, according to the report, is that the economies of metropolitan Phoenix and metropolitan Tucson are merging. With about 5 million people now and nearly 8 million projected for 2030, the Sun Corridor will be at the heart of Arizona’s expansion – and the state’s opportunities and challenges, too.

Predictions of growth are not new. But because growth and development are happening nationwide at an unprecedented pace, the “mega” concept is moving into the mainstream of public policy and planning.

“The megapolitan concept is powerful in part because it reinforces the strength of fundamental forces shaping Arizona and the world,” Melnick says, adding that its strength lies in the recognition that an economic merger brought on by overlapping community patterns and shared interests is more important than a physical one.

How the Sun Corridor will change in the short term depends largely on choices in five “megaton” areas:

• Global connections.

• Governance.

• The “trillion-dollar questions” related to residential and commercial development plus infrastructure.

• Water.

• Quality of life.

The report concludes with a critical question: “Do you want to live in the Sun Corridor?”

Adds Gammage: “The future of the Sun Corridor isn’t inevitably either rosy or bleak. It is what we make it. What can we do collectively to make the Sun Corridor somewhere we want to stay?”

“Megapolitan: Arizona’s Sun Corridor” is one of the first reports in the nation to analyze one megapolitan area. Robert Lang, co-director of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech and a visiting ASU scholar in 2006, helped develop the megapolitan concept in 2005 as part of projecting where the next 100 million Americans would live. Lang’s definition is based on economic interdependence, population and the U.S. Census Bureau’s “combined statistical area” designation.

To download “Megapolitan: Arizona’s Sun Corridor,” visit the Web site www.morrisoninstitute.org.

Funding for the report was provided by the Stardust Foundation, Arizona Public Service Corp., Salt River Project, and the UniSource Energy Corp. family of companies: Tucson Electric Power and UniSource Energy Services.

The Morrison Institute for Public Policy conducts research that informs, advises, and assists Arizonans. It is a part of the ASU School of Public Affairs and College of Public Programs.

ASU takes ‘Kids Voting’ to Kosovo

chughes3 — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:27:55 -0600

ASU's Melikian Center for Russian, Eurasian and East European Studies will implement a “Kids Voting” program in the world's newest state, Kosovo.

Funded by a three-year, $750,000 grant from the U.S. State Department’s Division of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, ASU’s Melikian Center, in collaboration with the Kosovar Institute for Policy Research and Development (KIPRED), will pilot the Kids Voting program in southeastern Europe.

Kids Voting, an American voter education program for school-age children, was established in Arizona in 1988 and has expanded to more than 40 states and the District of Columbia. Marilyn Evans, the first president and CEO of Kids Voting Arizona and Kids Voting USA, and now an academic associate at ASU, will serve as the on-site leader in Prishtina, Kosovo. In addition to her experience with Kids Voting, Evans has developed and implemented democracy and governance projects in five other countries: Armenia, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Yemen.

The goal of the Kids Voting in Kosovo project “will be to engage young people in reasoned debate and simulated election voting,” says ASU Professor Stephen Batalden, a Balkan specialist and director of the Melikian Center in ASU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Batalden is the principal investigator on the grant.

The Kids Voting model addresses the international issue of building civil society through meaningful citizen participation in the electoral process, Batalden says. “By design, the program motivates current and future generations to become dedicated citizens by engagement in the voting process. Consistently, across Kids Voting projects, adult voting participation increases, stimulated by their children's participation in the Kids Voting experience,” he says.

ASU’s Melikian Center will develop the curriculum, train teachers, and oversee the development of Kids Voting in Kosovo, working with their local partner – KIPRED – a Kosovar NGO with a broad range of democratic project experience.

“Educators and elections officials are central for project success, utilizing interactive curriculum lessons to prepare students as competent decision-makers about issues and candidates,” Batalden notes.

The curriculum will include homework assignments, purposely stimulating discussion among students and their parents about key community and national challenges. On election days, students will accompany their parents to voting centers and cast their own unofficial ballots. The student ballot, which includes all the official candidate races and issues, is tabulated after the polls close and results are given immediately to the news media.

In the past, comparisons of student ballot results with official voter results are intriguing; "next generation voters" often voice divergent perspectives from current citizen voters, Batalden says.

The Kosovo project's objectives include increasing voter turnout, which fell to only 46 percent of eligible voters in last year’s parliamentary elections, and assuring that minority populations are well represented as voters. The pilot project will support upcoming local elections in school programs to be launched in Gjilan and areas of Prishtina, Kosovo's capital. Gjilan, with 130,000 inhabitants, specifically was chosen due to its large concentration of minority Serbian population, Batalden says.

“Given the importance of the democratization process under way in southeastern Europe and, especially, in Kosovo, this pilot project will provide unique opportunities for middle school and high school students to be drawn into the important election process. It is a very exciting and timely project indeed,” Batalden says.

The Melikian Center for Russian, Eurasian and East European Studies is a comprehensive international research and training center that has both instructional and research missions. The Kids Voting in Kosovo project builds off a series of significant the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) projects undertaken by the Melikian Center in Kosovo since 2001.

Most recently, the center received grant support from the Citizens’ Exchange Bureau of the State Department to facilitate a dialogue between Muslin and Christian leaders from southeastern Europe and Arizona. This past January, Bosnian Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders participated in a three-week seminar in Arizona as part of the exchange.

Another project was an educational partnership for the development of business management and public administration curricula within the University of Pristina. Funded by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs in the State Department, that project brought young faculty members from the University of Pristina to ASU.

One of the outcomes of the work with business administration at the University of Pristina led to another partnership project that involves the transformation of accountancy training at the Kosovo university.

Lecture studies cities’ environments, health impacts

lambraki — Fri, 02 May 2008 17:41:28 -0600

A city’s built environment includes man-made structures large and small, from city sidewalks, skyscrapers and public transportation systems to neighborhood streets, parks and individual homes. But how does this type of environment affect our physical health?

Billie Giles-Corti, a professor in the School of Population Health at the University of Western Australia, and director of the Centre for the Built Environment and Health, will present “Studying the Impact of the Built Environment on Walking: Work in Progress From Perth, Western Australia” at the second William J. Stone lecture from 11 a.m. to noon, May 5, at ASU’s Polytechnic campus. She will address the benefits and perils of an urban lifestyle on day-to-day life.

Giles-Corti’s research focuses on the impact of urban design on health and physical activity, as well as on social ecological research. She recently won a Fulbright Senior Scholar Award, which enabled her to travel to the United States to collaborate with researchers at Stanford.

On the Fulbright Commission’s Web site, she is quoted as saying, “There is a growing recognition of the link between the built environment and health, and the nexus between health and sustainability agendas. There also is an urgent need to consider the housing and urban design needs of older adults, given the aging population and the importance of active living, to protect and enhance health.”

The built environment lecture is free to the public and will be presented in room 113 in the Exercise & Wellness Building at ASU’s Polytechnic campus in southeast Mesa.

The Stone Lecture was initiated in 2007 to honor Stone’s retirement from a 40-year career at ASU. It is an annual lecture featuring an expert in health and physical activity promotion sponsored by the Department of Exercise and Wellness.

ASU professors’ scale sets definitions of ‘macho’ men

lccampb — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 14:13:17 -0600

Professor Miguel Arciniega clearly remembers the dichotomy of being a Mexican-American youth trying to learn what it means to be a man.

Now he and his colleagues have developed an academic scale to define what it means to be either a gentleman or a “macho” man in the Mexican-American culture.

“This has been a lifelong thing for me, in terms of growing up in El Paso, Texas, and finding out the messages about being a man from my father and grandfather,” says Arciniega, an associate professor of counseling and counseling psychology in the Division of Psychology in Education with ASU’s Mary Lou Fulton College of Education. “On the streets, from my friends, it was a very different message.”

Arciniega says he was raised to believe that men took care of their families and respected their wives. His family raised him to be un caballero – “a gentleman” – but his peers embodied machismo, which is the stereotypical, hypermasculine image of Mexican-American men as chauvinists who drink too much and fight too much.

This contradiction in the meaning of “manhood” resulted in Arciniega pursuing an extensive study of machismo in the Mexican-American community. The resulting research article, “Toward a Fuller Conception of Machismo: Development of a Traditional Machismo and Caballerismo Scale,” was published earlier this year by the Journal of Counseling Psychology, the top-tier journal in its field.

The journal gives particular attention to empirical studies on the evaluation and application of counseling interventions, and the applications of counseling with diverse and under-represented populations.

The machismo article also received special recognition as the featured article on the journal’s Web site, apa.org/journals/cou.

The journal’s associate editor, Stephen Quintana, worked with Arciniega and his team through many drafts to produce the final manuscript.

The journal features just one article in each of its four issues per year based on its appeal to a wide range of readers and researchers, and the quality of the research itself. Journal editors have received many positive comments about the article since its publication.

The project evolved from research Arciniega worked on in 2005 with Tom Anderson, who was a doctoral student in counseling psychology at ASU. They realized then that very little research had been done on machismo. The few studies that had been done focused on a restricted view of aggression and dominance among Mexican-American men. Therefore, Anderson developed a “Measure of Machismo” to investigate clinical correlates.

“Both the academic literature and the popular literature tended to talk about machismo as very negative,” Arciniega says. “Other measurement scales only perpetuated this negative stereotype.”

He sought to redefine machismo into a more positive trait of Mexican-American men by developing a new scale that included negative and positive aspects.

The research team for the second study included Terence Tracey, a professor of counseling and counseling psychology in the Division of Psychology in Education with the Fulton College of Education. Tracey is an expert in statistical analysis and development of scale construction measurement. The research team also included doctoral candidate Zoila Tovar-Blank, who then was a graduate research assistant.

The researchers used Anderson’s instrument in a sampling of 403 Mexican-American men of various ages and education levels. Anderson gathered 71 positive and negative statements about manhood from traditional Latino stories, folklore and interviews with Mexican-American males about their gender roles and values.

“We pride ourselves on Tom Anderson gathering statements from so many different areas, with a range of positive and negative statements of what it means to be a Mexican-American man,” Arciniega says.

The statements ranged from “real men should never let down their guard” to “men should be affectionate with their children.”

Tracey culled through the research items to determine if the responses validated the statements.

“His intricate, statistical analysis was phenomenal,” Arciniega says.

The responses helped the team discover two distinct constructs:

• Traditional machismo is the stereotypical masculine personification of a Mexican-American man as controlling, sexist and violent, correlated with antisocial behavior, aggressive masculinity and wishful thinking as a coping style. These men tend to have more difficulty expressing emotion. However, traditional machismo did not correlate with dominance as hypothesized.

• Caballerismo is a positive image of a man as the family provider who respects and cares for his family. It depicts Mexican-American men as chivalrous, nurturing and noble. These men rated higher on the social connectedness scale, saying they felt value in their family relationships and were in touch with their feelings, and the feelings of others. They also displayed more practical ways of solving their problems.

As expected, younger, less-educated men identified more with traditional machismo than caballerismo. However, the hypothesis that older, more educated Mexican-American men would correlate more with caballerismo did not hold true, Tovar-Blank says.

The study also revealed that overall satisfaction of life among these men contradicted expectations of lower satisfaction of life. Caballerismo was associated with a higher satisfaction of life, but the men who displayed traits of traditional machismo didn’t see their manly characteristics as negative. They viewed themselves as assertive men who stood up for themselves and were the heads of their household.

“Individuals who endorsed a more positive aspect of machismo, such as caballerismo, reported more satisfaction with life,” Tovar-Blank says.

But those men who endorsed traditional machismo also were more likely to be less in touch with their feelings or denied their emotions, which could have clinical implications for counseling Mexican-American men.

“We felt there must be a difference in coping skills,” Arciniega says. “People who use wishful thinking, not practical problem-solving, were highly connected to traditional machismo.”

Arciniega aays the team’s hypothesis correlating traditional machismo to fighting and arrests was confirmed. Not surprisingly, the men who didn’t fight identified with the more gentlemanly traits of caballerismo.

The article revealed that men who strongly identified themselves as Mexican endorsed more traditional machismo, while men who valued people from other cultural groups endorsed more caballerismo aspects. Although the study focused on Mexican-American men, there were responses from other Hispanics, including Cubans, Puerto Ricans, Guatemalans, Caribbeans and South Americans.

“It seemed to hold just as well for these groups,” says Tracey, who also expressed caution in the statement because of the small sample.

“We really want to do a further study with samples from these other groups to see how these constructs apply. Do they apply to men in general?”

The team hopes to test and retest for reliability, as well as to study larger sample groups, including non-Mexicans, and include questions about sexual orientation, marriage and acculturation data.

Verina Palmer Martin, verina.martin@asu.edu
(480) 965-4911
Mary Lou Fulton College of Education

Museum of Anthropology features 2 new exhibits

chughes3 — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 19:50:41 -0600

The Arizona State University Museum of Anthropology is featuring two new concurrent exhibits – Mosaic: Cultural Identity in America, and, Fuse: Portraits of Refugee Households in Metropolitan Phoenix.

Through the artwork of local artist Eliza Gregory and selected student artists, these exhibits explore questions of identity and cultural experience in the largest urban center in the Southwest. Although the exhibits focus on two distinct topics, their approaches and themes complement each, both exploring contemporary regional, social and political relationships.

In Mosaic: Cultural Identity in America, jury selected student artists explore questions of national identity. Sarah Elsasser, the guest curator and a student in Barrett, The Honors College at ASU, has asked students to express, through a variety of artistic media, how they understand and identify with being American. Mosaic contextualizes U.S. American identity as a diverse and changing ascription, based on ethnicity, religion, gender and sexual orientation. This exhibit presents both positive and negative takes on American culture and invites the visitor to engage emotionally with the artwork.

Fuse is a portrait exhibit of the complex worlds of resettled refugees in the Phoenix metro area. It fosters critical thinking on who refugees are and how, through sharing experiences, the Phoenix metro community can seek common ground. The photographs validate the struggles and triumphs of these families, portraying them in a way that fosters a deeper sense of belonging in the community. The exhibition is being developed in collaboration with Community Outreach & Advocacy for Refugees (COAR), a youth-led nonprofit organization based in Tempe that works with refugees and local artist Eliza Gregory, a member of the eye lounge artist cooperative on Roosevelt Row.

The exhibits are on display through Oct. 3. The Museum of Anthropology is open 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. when school is in session. For more information about the exhibits and upcoming events contact the museum at 480-965-6224 or online: shesc.asu.edu/asuma.

The ASU Museum of Anthropology is located in the School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Anthropology Building, Room 240 on ASU's Tempe Campus. A map of ASU’s museum locations is online at: asu.edu/museums/map.htm.

Rebecca Howe, Rebecca.Howe@asu.edu
480-727-6577
School of Human Evolution & Social Change