Perceptions (Vol. 5, No. 2) by Temple Undergraduate History & Social Sciences Association

PERCEPTIONS

Volume 5, Number 2 Spring 2019

FREEDOM THROUGH TRUTH

Letter from the Editor Dear reader: For over two years, I have been proud to serve as a member of Templeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Undergraduate History and Social Sciences Association (TUHSSA) and as part of the Perceptions team. As my duties for this journal come to a close, I can honestly say it has been an incredible experience to read through so many fine examples of scholarship from fellow undergraduates at Temple University. We hope that this journal continues to spread knowledge and foster curiosity for many years to come. This semester, we decided to center this edition of Perceptions on freedom, in dedication to the numerous marginalized groups throughout history still yearning for their stories to be told. By bringing truth, we are able to understand their struggles to better society and learn from them to create a fairer and just world. From gender discrimination in our culture to post-colonial hardships in the Congo, it shows that truth is the key that will set the world free. So long as we seek and acknowledge truth, there is no challenge too great that we cannot overcome. We would like to thank all the individuals that made this edition of Perceptions possible. A huge thank you specifically goes out to Dr. Jay Lockenour of the History Department and Ms. Annie Johnson for always believing in TUHSSA and its ability to bring students and faculty alike in the pursuit of knowledge. This semester, we also had a record number of volunteer editors on the editorial team to help revise and edit submissions. Without the support and dedication of our team of volunteers, Perceptions would have never made it as big as it is now. As Temple University Libraries bids its final farewell in its transition from Paley Library to Charles Library, Perceptions is also experiencing a dramatic change in leadership. It is my earnest hope that the new e-board is able to carry the journal to greater heights and to continue serving the Temple community. While this farewell is bittersweet, history shows that we must always continue to look forward to ensure progress. We hope that you will enjoy this edition as much as those involved had in creating it. Sincerely,

Christopher Chau President of TUHSSA Editor-in-Chief of Perceptions

Inside Vol. 5 No. 2 On Divinity and Marginalization: Western Christianity and African Spirituality as Impetuses of Gender In/Equality Selena C. Baugh, Junior, Sociology “It’s a Battle for Information”: Mau Mau as the Boogeyman of Decolonization Dylan Biggs, Senior, History SES, Math Achievement, and Head Start Attendance Reese Cogswell, Senior, Sociology Trade in Conflict Minerals -- Congolese Warlords, MNC’s, and Dodd-Frank 1502 Ankit Deshmukh, Junior, Global Studies Foreign Born Populations and Unemployment in the United States: Myth or Reality? Steven Doncaster, Senior, Political Science & Economics Gender and Memory: Depictions of Femininity in Irish Revolutionary Art Pearl Joslyn, Senior, History & Global Studies Gridlock in Global Ocean Governance: Diverging National Interests in the South China Sea Wesley Nappen, Senior, Political Science The Gender Correctional Machine: Institutional Mechanisms that Reinforce a Patriarchal Gender Order in Correctional Facilities Micaela Robalino, Recent Graduate, Gender, Sexuality, Women's Studies & Political Science Love is Historically, Institutionally, and Societally Constructed: Using Intersectionality to Examine Racial Issues of Power and Privilege in Queer Relationships Sarah Tahir, Senior, History The Greek Voyage Panagiotis Tzumakaris, Recent Graduate, History & Secondary Education Loss of Balance: Destructive Legal Mechanisms Within USA Gymnastics Policy and their Contributions to a Toxic and Abusive Environment Katherine Weaver, Junior, Political Science & Global Studies

Editorial Team Editor-in-Chief

Assistant Editors

Christopher Chau Senior, History & Political Science Major, French Minor

Lindsay Hargrave Senior, Journalism Major

Executive Editors John Fabian Junior, History Major Ellen Taraskiewicz Senior, History Major, Jewish Studies Minor

Associate Editors Kyle Baskin Junior, English Major, History Minor Alexandria Kazandjian Junior, History Major Italia Messina Sophomore, Global Studies & Political Science Major Anna Moher Sophomore, History Major, Anthropology Minor Amanda Morrison Junior, Global Studies & Strategic Communications Major

Patrick J. Kelly Senior, Public Health Major Lauren Nolan Freshman, Spanish & Anthropology Major Maryam Siddiqui Sophomore, Public Relations Major Victoria Schrag Junior, Global Studies and Communications Major Nicholas Taraschi Sophomore, Environmental Studies & Geography/Urban Studies Major Helen Zeidman Sophomore, English Major

On Divinity and Marginalization: Western Christianity and African Spirituality as Impetuses of Gender In/Equality Selena C. Baugh Junior, Sociology & Africology/African American Studies In societies with dominant religions, it is not uncommon to find aspects of religion woven into their politics and social structures. Many African civilizations feature references to divinity and spirituality prominently throughout their politics and sciences, even assigning divine significance to various aspects of life such as war, 1 motherhood, and death. Likewise, many Western societies demonstrate similar religiosity to the extent that renown political theorist and economist, Karl Marx, referred 2 to religion as the “opium of the people.” Since religion plays such an important role in these societies on a personal and political level, it follows that these belief systems would also impact social ordering. Though many forms of African spirituality and Western religion are similarly influential within their respective civilizations, the ways both societies were shaped by their religions reflect the dramatic differences between the belief systems. One of the most striking of these differences is their treatment of gender, as demonstrated in their Molefi Kete Asante, The History of Africa: The Quest for Eternal Harmony (New York: Routledge, 2015). 2 Karl Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1970), 1. 1

treatment of women. While Western Christianity calls for the subordination of women to their husbands and lacks female divinity, women appear prominently in many African spiritual systems. Similarly, while Western women have spent centuries being oppressed, pre-colonial African women were generally respected members of society. The correlation between the positioning of women in national belief systems and the way women exist in those regions suggests that religion is a crucial factor in social ordering in more strongly religious societies. Therefore the presence of powerful women in African spirituality aided in upholding similar respect for women in their societies while the subordination of women in Western Christianity contributed to oppression of women in the West. In many regions of Africa, spirituality and divinity were foundational to the people’s epistemologies from explaining everyday occurrences such as the movement of celestial bodies and the ebb and flow of 3 the Nile through Ancient Egypt or “Kemet” to grander realities such as the origins of 4 man among the Igbo. In Kemet, for example, arguably one of the most important roles religion played was the legitimation of 5 their political scheme. Believed to be Molefi Kete Asante, The History of Africa: The Quest for Eternal Harmony (New York: Routledge, 2015), 26. 4 Toyin Falola, Africa: African Cultures and Societies Before 1885 (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2000), 75. 5 Molefi Kete Asante, The History of Africa: The Quest for Eternal Harmony (New York: Routledge, 2015), 23, 27. 3

endowed with divinity, each pharaoh or “per-aa” was able to exercise immense influence over the nation with often unquestioned authority. In fact, even the rulers’ names were often changed to reflect their new status as gods upon their coronation. Meanwhile, the African peoples of Jamaica demonstrate their deep connection with spirituality through their grammatical structure. The language commonly known as Jamaican patois lacks a copula verb, which means that subjects and modifiers immediately follow each other. This demonstrates the societal belief in the spiritual connectedness of subjects and the ability of beings to be spoken into existence. To Jamaicans, this means that “being” verbs 6 become redundant. This is evidence of the significance of divinity and spirituality in even the most fundamental aspects of African life. Across the continent Africans attributed various phenomena and ideas to different divine figures, many believing the universe was split into a masculine and 7 feminine realm. The upper realm was associated with masculinity and included “virility, lightning, fire, heat, fierce animals, 8 birds of prey, sickness, and the color red.” The lower realm was considered feminine and included “fertility, earth, water, cold, domestic animals, healing, and the color

white.” An example of a goddess from the lower realm is the Yoruba goddess, Osun, who controlled the flow of the Osun River and represented fertility and female 10 sexuality. Similarly, Aset, the Kemetic goddess of motherhood, healing, protector 11 of the throne, and guardian of ma’at, was believed to control the flooding of the Nile, filling it with her tears for her slain husband, 12 Asar. Even though the upper and lower realms were associated with gendered characteristics, male gods were known to operate below and vice versa. Likewise, men often worshipped goddesses while women worshipped gods. Furthermore, the public understood these realms as complementary and represented the complementarity of the interconnected parts of the universe. As a result, this binary conception of the universe contributed to the perception of the interdependence of men and women in society. According to renowned historian, Dr. John Henrik Clarke, while modern Western societies are burdened with issues of gender equality, African societies never questioned the natural equality of the sexes: “Things that white women are debating about now, Africans never debated about… Nobody was fool 9

Ibid., 81. Ibid., 80-81. 11 Jennifer Williams, “From Aset to Jesus: The History of the Goddess Aset in Ancient Kemet From Circa 3000 BCE Until the Removal of Feminine Salvation Circa 400 CE,” Journal of Black Studies 45, 2 (2014): 102-124. 12 Molefi Kete Asante, The History of Africa: The Quest for Eternal Harmony (New York: Routledge, 2015), 26. 10

Tristan Samuels, “A Invokative Pronoun Dis,” YouTube video, 15:59, October 17, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD5OsUOQ61w . 7 Toyin Falola, Africa: African Cultures and Societies Before 1885 (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2000), 80-81. 8 Ibid., 80.

enough to debate whether a mother was equal… This is why the Africans had female gods earlier. You make a woman a god then 13 debate whether she’s equal?” The argument here is that not only does the presence of prominent goddesses in African spirituality aid in perpetuating the idea of gender equality, it also suggests that this fact was never in question from the start. For a people to create a spiritual system which features complementary gods and goddesses, the implication is that the people themselves already understood gender as such. Therefore gender and sex complementarity was taken for granted throughout Africa. Other researchers of African civilization echo Dr. Clarke’s assertion of naturally understood complementarity amongst African peoples. For example, Oyèrónké Oyewùmí, a prominent researcher of African civilization, says in her seminal work pertaining to the Igbo people, The Invention of Women, that “the woman question is a Western-derived issue… It is an imported problem not indigenous to the 14 Yorúbà.” Not only was there an inherent recognition of sex equality in African societies, but sex was irrelevant to the social hierarchy. As a result sex was never given 13

Dr. John Henrik Clarke, “Dr. John Henrik Clarke | Africa: Empires of Ghana & Mali,” YouTube video, 1:41:08, February 16, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJ411sgwkvU. 14 Oyèrónké Oyewùmí, The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), ix.

the formal social category of “man” or “woman,” meaning until the arrival of the West, the Yoruba were without gender. Instead, males and females existed and related simply as humans. Some Igbo peoples also recognized gender as separate from sex, meaning people were able to socially operate as men or women 15 irrespective of their sex. In many regions, women were also able to exercise economic independence, possessing jobs and fulfilling 16 a variety of roles such as warriors, farmers, 17 and property-owners. Furthermore, even though the majority of African women operated in the home while the men worked and provided for the family, women were 18 still respected as vital members of society. Therefore African women’s abilities to fulfill a wide range of social roles without sacrificing their social standing reflects the ability of African goddesses to command respect both in realms designated as feminine and masculine. There are also numerous instances of African women operating in positions of political power across the continent. The land of Meroe, for example, was led by Ifi Amadiume, Male Daughters, Female Husbands: Gender and Sex in an African Society (London: Zed Books Ltd., 1987), 4. 16 Toyin Falola, Africa: African Cultures and Societies Before 1885 (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2000), 53-54. 17 Jennifer Williams, “From Aset to Jesus: The History of the Goddess Aset in Ancient Kemet From Circa 3000 BCE Until the Removal of Feminine Salvation Circa 400 CE,” Journal of Black Studies 45, 2 (2014): 102-124. 18 Toyin Falola, Africa: African Cultures and Societies Before 1885 (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2000), 52. 15

female rulers known as Candaces, or 19 “Kandakes,” for over five hundred years. These women led the nation independent of male assistance. Even when they had husbands, their spouses were either equal in power or subordinate, but the Kandakes never deferred to them. Some were even known internationally as fiercely intimidating warriors which, according to Kemetic understandings of gender, women were also recognized as potentially 20 “ferocious.” Another immensely powerful female position was that of the “queen mother” which existed in numerous African societies and often included the power to select the next king or take the throne for 21 herself. The per-aa, Hatshepsut, is an example of one such queen mother who ultimately crowned herself not as a queen, 22 but a female king. However, while the powerful and dynamic presence of goddesses in African spirituality was reflected in their societies where women were respected and held positions of influence, Western Christian civilizations imposed a much more rigid and marginalizing system of sex and gender upon its women. Just as spirituality undergirded African societies, Christianity was the

bedrock of Western civilization for many years. As a result, Christian concepts can be found in many Western ideas, guiding everything from science where many regarded the entire universe as God’s handiwork, to politics where explicit references to “God-given rights” are commonplace.23 Furthermore, before the West largely abandoned its monarchical governmental structure, the “divine right of kings” legitimized most thrones and freed kings of accountability to man-made laws. This positioned many kings as second only 24 to God. Even after switching to a democratic republic, presidents in the United States still swear to uphold the office on a Christian Bible during their inauguration, thus continuing to insert God into the executive office albeit ritualistically. Western education systems, too, have historically included heavy religious overtones. Only recently did the United States, for example, prohibit public schools from engaging in organized religious 25 practices. Religious influence can even be found in Western justifications for war and colonization which frequently occurred under the banner of the cross and included references to divine providence and 23

Ibid. Lana Troy, “The Ancient Egyptian Queenship as an Icon of the State,” Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity 3, 1 (2001): 1-24. 21 Toyin Falola, Africa: African Cultures and Societies Before 1885 (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 2000), 52. 22 Molefi Kete Asante, The History of Africa: The Quest for Eternal Harmony (New York: Routledge, 2015), 44. 20

Thomas Jefferson, “The Declaration of Independence,” National Archives and Records, accessed May 7, 2019. https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declarationtranscript 24 Adam Augustyn et. al., eds. “Divine right of kings: Political Doctrine,” Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed December 13, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/divine-right-of-kin gs. 25 “Engel v. Vitale,” Oyez, accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1961/468.

proselytization up to the late nineteenth 26 century. All of these are examples of the incredible influence religion has had on Western epistemology. As previously stated, a people’s religion not only impacts their beliefs but lends insight into the ideas they possessed before the creation of their religious systems. Even allowing for the divine inspiration or “God-breathed” origins of Christianity, the resulting interpretations and edits of the Word have been filtered through Western cultural understandings and motives, which provides invaluable cultural context. This process becomes especially telling when considering the possibility that the foundation of Christianity itself stems from the Kemetic legend of Asar, Aset, and Heru, whom many believed were the original inspiration for what later became the Christian Trinity. However, while the Kemetic trio features the divine mother, Aset, in a position of prominence, the Western Trinity has no such figure. This suggests that recognition of feminine significance was purposely written out of Christianity, presumably in order to better align the religion with the morals of the people. The Westernization of Christianity began in 325 CE during the reign of the Roman emperor, Constantine I, who is credited for beginning the process of

creating the modern biblical canon. Leading up to this time, Christianity was practiced widely across Africa and Europe with people referring to countless religious texts in their worship. Among these texts were some attributed to women such as Mary, the virgin mother of Jesus. However, in 325 CE the Nicene Council led by Constantine I decided to exclude this along with many other passages in his effort to 28 establish a universal Bible. Nearly sixty years later the Council of Constantinople canonized the concept of the Trinity wherein the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit exist as equal parts of the one true God, officially removing Mary, the Western equivalent of Aset, from the status of prominence or 29 divinity. With each formalization of Christianity by the West, the role of women in the narrative was further reduced to that of nameless wives and mothers, often with little to no importance beyond their utility to their husbands and sons. It would be unfair to argue that women solely appear in the Bible as nameless or male-centered. For example, Queen Esther, the only woman with a book attributed to her in the Bible, is heralded for her strength and faith. Likewise, Mary, Mother of Jesus; Ruth; and Anna are also recognized as champions of faith, patience, and obedience to God. There are countless 27

W. E. B. Du Bois, The World and Africa: Color and Democracy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007), 318. 26

Adam Augustyn et. al., eds. “Council of Nicaea: Christianity [325],” Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/event/Council-of-Nicaea -Christianity-325. 28 Ibid. 29 Ibid.

more examples of biblical women who deserve recognition for their feats of miraculous courage and perseverance in the Bible. However, despite these appearances of powerful women, the Bible explicitly situates them beneath men in the social hierarchy. To start, the Bible follows a patrilineal system which erases all but five 30 women from the ancestral line of Jesus. Furthermore, the book of Genesis condemns women not only to the pain of childbirth but also to subservience to their husbands as punishment for their original sin in the Garden of Eden, meaning that biblically, no matter the context, any married women must 31 submit to the will of her husband. Just as Dr. Clarke argues that a society which makes women gods cannot simultaneously marginalize its women, it follows that a society based on a religion which features a Trinity of divine men and requires the submission of women to men would proceed to marginalize its female members. Women’s autonomy is still a relatively new concept in many parts of the West, including the United States and Britain. In both the US and UK, for example, women were not allowed to own property, earn a salary, or enter into contracts without their husbands’ or fathers’ permission until the late nineteenth century.

Until the 1960s, women were still largely relegated to the domestic sphere. However, contrary to African women who worked in the homes while enjoying the respect of the men in their lives, Western women continued to be regarded as the weaker, intellectually inferior gender. It was for these reasons that for many years women were either legally or socially barred from obtaining positions of power in government, working in math and science, or possessing physically demanding jobs. This is also why the history of great women in the West is marked not by women excelling in socially endorsed positions of power or influence, but instead succeeding despite t heir gender. Lists of women defying social expectations dominate the Western conception of what constitutes a “strong woman.” Furthermore, when Western women do venture into roles traditionally held by men, the English language reflects this breach in expectation by taking special note of their womanhood in respect to the position; terms such as “woman pilot,” “woman president,” and “professor emerita” are examples of this phenomenon. 33 In Western societies, womanhood has historically functioned as a social handicap in many regards. It has taken consistent 32

“Matthew 1,” Bible Gateway, accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mat thew+1&version=NLT. 31 “Genesis 3,” bible Gateway, accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=gen esis+3&version=NLT.

“A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 1875,” Law Library of Congress, accessed December 12, 2018. https://memory.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awlaw3/pro perty_law.html. 33 Oyèrónké Oyewùmí, The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses ( Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), xiii.

social pressure over the course of several decades for women to gain the rights they currently enjoy. This constant struggle is what gave birth to Western waves of feminism. Because the context of Western gender is one of opposition rather than complementarity, feminism presupposes conflict between men and women as well as 34 the global subordination of women. Though inapplicable to most African societies, this assumed gender conflict is natural in the context of Western Christianity. In Genesis chapter three during the immediate aftermath of Adam and Eve’s disobedience of God in the Garden of Eden, God says to Eve, “…you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over 35 you,” thus setting the stage for a natural, inevitable tension between men and women as a result of the Fall. Therefore, a society founded on these teachings will regard this contention not as an aberration, but rather the predictable unfolding of a divine ordinance. Furthermore, in the context of the overall absence of female authority figures in Scripture, as well as later verses which call for the subordination of women to their husbands, the necessitation of Western feminism is unsurprising.

powerful presentation of women in African spiritual systems is not only indicative of African attitudes towards females in the society, but also aided in their perpetuation via the omnipresence of spirituality in daily African life and thought. As Clarke argues, it is impossible for a society which worships goddesses to simultaneously disrespect its own women. Meanwhile, the West built its political and social foundation upon a belief system which both lacked divine women and framed gender conflict and female subordination as inevitable results of The Fall. Therefore, as Christianity was used to guide the creation of new governments and societies, women continued to mirror the positions of their biblical counterparts, forced into the margins of the national narratives. In both of these instances, religion serves not only as evidence of pre-existing attitudes towards the social significance of sex, but also predictors of future social structures. Contrasting African religion and societies with those of the West strongly suggests that depictions of gender roles in dominant religions can not only serve as evidence of pre-existing ideas towards sex in a society, but a predictor of future social attitudes towards sex and gender as well.

In theistic societies religion is a crucial factor in social ordering. The Valethia Watkins, Beyond Feminism: Some Theoretical Guideposts Toward Examining Women in African Contexts, 64. 35 “Genesis 3,” Bible Gateway, accessed December 13, 2018. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=gen esis+3&version=NLT. 34

REFERENCES "A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates, 1774 1875." Law Library of Congress. Accessed December 12, 2018. https://memory.loc.gov/ammem/awh html/awlaw3/property_law.html.

"Bible Gateway." Bible Gateway. Accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.biblegateway.com/passa ge/?search=genesis 3&version=NLT.

Amadiume, Ifi. Male Daughters, Female Husbands: Gender and Sex in an African Society. London: Zed Books, 1987.

Clarke, John Henrik. YouTube. February 16, 2017. Accessed December 5, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j J411sgwkvU.

Augustyn, Adam, Patricia Bauer, Brian Duignan, Alison Eldridge, Erik Gregersen, J. E. Luebering, Amy McKenna, Melissa Petruzzello, John P. Rafferty, Michael Ray, Karen Rogers, Amy Tikkanen, Jeff Wallenfeldt, Adam Zeidan, and Alicja Zelazko. "Council of Nicaea." Encyclopædia Britannica. December 05, 2018. Accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/event/C ouncil-of-Nicaea-Christianity-325.

Du Bois, W. E. B. The World and Africa: Color and Democracy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

Augustyn, Adam, Patricia Bauer, Brian Duignan, Alison Eldridge, Erik Gregersen, J. E. Luebering, Amy McKenna, Melissa Petruzzello, John P. Rafferty, Michael Ray, Karen Rogers, Amy Tikkanen, Jeff Wallenfeldt, Adam Zeidan, and Alicja Zelazko. "Divine Right of Kings." Encyclopædia Britannica. March 22, 2017. Accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/div ine-right-of-kings. "Bible Gateway." Bible Gateway. Accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.biblegateway.com/passa

ge/?search=Matthew 1&version=NLT.

""Engel v. Vitale"." Oyez. Accessed December 12, 2018. https://www.oyez.org/cases/1961/46 8. Falola, Toyin. Africa: African Cultures and Societies Before 1885. 2nd ed. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press, 2000. Jefferson, Thomas. "Declaration of Independence: A Transcription." National Archives and Records Administration. Accessed May 07, 2019. https://www.archives.gov/founding-d ocs/declaration-transcript. Marx, Karl. A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of the Right. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1970. Molefi, Kete Asante. The History of Africa the Quest for Eternal Harmony. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2015.

Oyewumi, Oyeronke. The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. Samuels, Tristan. "A Invokative Pronoun Dis." YouTube. October 17, 2018. Accessed December 11, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= HD5OsUOQ61w. Troy, Lana. "The Ancient Egyptian Queenship as an Icon of the State." Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity3, no. 1 (2001): 1-24. Accessed December 11, 2018. doi:10.1163/157077602100416878. Watkins, Valethia. "Beyond Feminism: Some Theoretical Guideposts Toward Examining Women in African Contexts." The Compass: 62-83. Williams, Jennifer. "From Aset to Jesus: The History of the Goddess Aset in Ancient Kemet From Circa 3000 BCE Until the Removal of Feminine Salvation Circa 400 CE." Journal of Black Studies45, no. 2 (2014): 102-24. doi:10.1177/0021934713520420.

“It’s a Battle for Information”: Mau Mau as the Boogeyman of 1 Decolonization Dylan Biggs Senior, History The decades after the Second World War saw the slow dissolution of European colonial empires. This era of decolonization was palpable throughout the world, but the African continent more acutely experienced significant struggles for freedom from foreign rule. Britain was the largest empire after the war, but it began to burst at its seams as its colonies fought for their independence through a variety of means. Throughout the Cold War, the British essentially lost all dominance on the African continent to freedom movements, as did most of the European colonialists. Countries like India managed to break free using non-violent and constitutional means, but for most parts of Africa this was not viable due to the tight colonial grip of the British. Often European countries resisted these separation struggles with violent and inhumane methods, and due to their position in the world, could forge the narrative as they wished to influence other Europeans and Americans to remain passive about colonialism. The Kenya Colony was one British territorial possession in Africa that began a long fight for self-rule. Kenya’s struggle for independence included an Selected Originals - Shadow Over Kenya, video, (1954; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/selected-original s-shadow-over-kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 1

element of informational warfare, and the country finally prevailed in 1963. A part of this journey to freedom was a rebellion that came to be known as “Mau Mau,” a guerilla resistance to British rule that began in the early 1950s and lasted until independence.2 The documentary company Pathé News produced many newsreels during the conflict that help to construct a British narrative that places Mau Mau in the role of the “boogeyman” of the Kenya Colony. The reels in question purposefully created anxiety surrounding the future of the colonies without British rule through a fear-mongering discourse of primitivism and barbarity on the part of Mau Mau against the civilization of the British. This, in effect, demonized Mau Mau in the historical narrative and helped further ideas about race and civilization that propped up colonialism and racial superiority that permeate even until today. This narrative has placed Mau Mau in the “uncivilized” camp, and as such sidelined a legitimate discussion of their movement and its effect on Kenyan history and colonial history more broadly. The Mau Mau rebellion was most active in the highlands of Kenya in the areas of the Kikuyu people.3 Native populations slowly lost their land and the British put them into worsening economic positions during the decades of British rule as white settlers increasingly occupied the highlands David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire, (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2005), 4. 3 Caroline Elkins, Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain’s Gulag in Kenya, (New York: Henry and Holt Company, 2005). 2

and utilized native Africans as cheap labor. The colonists did this by forcing the Kikuyu to vacate land and then taxing them heavily, resulting in their being relegated to a continuous source of cheap labor. Mau Mau was a mass movement on the part of native Kenyans from many different groups who all began to resist British colonial rule through raids, attacks, assassinations, and sabotage. The Kenyan colonial government declared a state of emergency in October of 1952, and it was then that the “Kenya 4 Emergency” began. The British effectively instituted a gulag system, essentially imprisoning native Kenyans and forcing them to work, in accordance with their philosophy of divide and rule, which had placed captured Mau Mau and their sympathizers in forced labor camps throughout the colony. By the end of 1954, “the detainee population had risen to over fifty-two thousand – an increase of 2,500 5 percent from the beginning of the year.” This British repression of and hostility towards the Mau Mau, as well as Mau Mau’s resistance and attacks, continued until shortly after the Kenyans attained autonomy in 1963. Throughout the conflict, the British could release news from the colony to the metropole and abroad through traditional means such as newsreels and newspaper articles. The Mau Mau had no such ability to influence public opinion, and little if any

way to change the narrative shipped abroad by the British. This means that much of the reporting during this time was biased against the Mau Mau, and highlights the atrocities they committed such as the murder of settlers and chiefs. However, historians such as Caroline Elkins and David Anderson have worked in recent years to bring to light the system of oppression and the atrocities the British committed as they combatted Mau Mau. Thus, it is integral to the history of Mau Mau to discuss the news and propaganda surrounding them at the time of their activities. It is clear from such discussion that race and its relationship to being civilized shaped much of public and international opinion on Mau Mau. The international reception of Mau Mau can best be understood in the context of African-Americans during this period and the way they discussed, embraced, and shied away from this violent struggle for independence. In his work Mau Mau in Harlem?, historian Gerald Horne lays out how America’s burgeoning civil rights movement was inexorably related to the movement for Kenyan liberation. He writes about the ways in which black Americans looked to Mau Mau and Kenya favorably fora method of combating racial inequality. The title of the book was drawn from a Malcom X speech in which he called for a 6 Mau Mau-like uprising in the U.S. Horne’s work discusses the broad connection between the situation in Kenya and the Gerald Horne, Mau Mau in Harlem? The U.S. and the Liberation of Kenya, (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2009), 3. 6

Ibid, 35-6. 5 Ibid, 131.

African-American reaction to it, and mainly shows the ways in which black America felt comfortable embracing Mau Mau for what they represented. However, the other side of this discussion reveals the ways in which African-American organizations and leaders condemned or refuted Mau Mau ideology based on their methods and the other side of the decolonization struggle they represented. The historical work Proudly We Can Be Africans: Black Americans and Africa, 1935-1961 discusses the ways in which black America reacted to Mau Mau and highlights the backlash the movement created. The author, James H. Meriwether, recounts the narrative in the African-American press and highlights the negative press Mau Mau received due to 7 their use of violence. He also points out an important reason this may have been. He writes about a response by the press to a massacre, stating, “The Kenyan government invited reporters to the gruesome scene to witness the carnage, and their press reports and photographs helped to paint a portrait of 8 Mau Mau savagery.” Here it is evident that the African-American press, while generally sympathetic, did not have the same outright support of the Mau Mau uprising as individuals like Malcom X. This was due to the white government and press forging the Mau Mau’s narrative through informational exclusion or inclusion based on their desired James H. Meriwether, Proudly We Can Be Africans: Black Americans and Africa, 1935-1961, (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2002), 135-138. 8 Ibid, 136.

effect. This is reflected as well in the fact that in 1953, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) condemned the Mau Mau for their “terrorist methods.”9 This position was partly influenced by the news surrounding Mau Mau but also by the United States government who dictated that support of Mau Mau meant support of communism, a 10 connection that was not based in reality. Knowledge of those who decide the predominant narrative is key to understanding the relationship between the average African-American and the Mau Mau. There were many mediators between information and the public, who all helped to create a narrative that even affected the black American perception of this movement. The government, entertainment media, and news were all affected by the informational warfare committed against Mau Mau. That is not to say there was no truth in what these groups were reporting, but their methods of reporting and intentional exclusion of information illustrates the narrative they created around the Kenya Emergency. The reach of this narrative was evident in the reaction of the African-American community, as more militant groups would accept that narrative even with the aggrandizement of violence. Moderates and conservatives were much more apprehensive to fully embrace Mau Mau and their representation abroad.

Ibid, 141. Horne, Mau Mau in Harlem?, 115.

There were many moving parts in the information campaign against Mau Mau, not least of which was the emerging field of video news in the form of newsreels. The company Pathé News produced many newsreels during this period and has uploaded most of their collection of English news videos to the site www.Britishpathe.com. This collection contains Pathé newsreels about the Mau Mau and the Kenya Emergency, including a segment with a speech by Sir Evelyn Baring, 11 the Governor of Kenya during this period. These segments are invaluable to a discussion of the informational efforts made to combat the Mau Mau by the British and the discourse surrounding the struggle. The newsreels likely would have been played before movies and served as a form of video news for the British audience. While the newsreels presented were only a small proportion of the total news about Mau Mau, they still contain the general language of primitivism and civilization that can be seen throughout the discussion of Mau Mau at that time. The seminal film in the collection is a speech by the Governor of Kenya, Sir Evelyn Baring titled Selected Originals Shadow Over Kenya 1954. Baring’s speech is laden with the rhetoric of the period about Mau Mau. Baring opens with the following statement, I should say that everybody in Kenya, that is to say whether European, or whether they 11

Selected Originals - Shadow Over Kenya, video.

are Asian, or whether they are African, who are reasonable and have a decent outlook on life, are faced with a threat. A threat in the limited area of the country, and a threat from one of the many African peoples in Kenya only. But all the same it is a serious threat. I think that threat has come about by the result of a conspiracy. A conspiracy that has been laid very deeply and has spread very wide and has been organized by a comparatively small number of very clever and very ruthless men, whose aim without any doubt whatever, was to obtain part of 12 themselves. Baring’s call for people “who are reasonable and have a decent outlook on life,” regardless of race, allows him to shift the discussion from a worldview that posits white settlers are the cause of violence to one that posits fellow Africans are the cause of Africa’s struggles. It also makes the point, then, that colonialism and all its trappings are “reasonable” as opposed to the “indecent” outlook of the native Kenyans. This thread of focusing on the Mau Mau as the instigators of violence against Africans is woven throughout the collection and highlights a key way that British officials and press managed to essentially project white abuse of native Kenyans onto African-on-African violence. This narrative is one that framed the violence committed by Mau Mau against 12

Ibid.

African loyalists as exceptional. It was also an attempt to garner support from the international community against Mau Mau due to their attacking their own people. This rhetoric went hand-in-hand with casting the war in Kenya as one that would cause the downfall of the empire. David Anderson in his 2005 work Histories of the Hanged addresses the perception of the war as one against whites, saying that: “Contrary to public perception, only thirty-two European settlers died in the rebellion, and there were fewer than two hundred casualties among the British regiments and police who served 13 in Kenya over these years.” He then goes on the state that there were 1,800 African loyalist citizens killed and over 12,000 Mau Mau killed over the rebellion, which far outweighs European losses in both civilian and military capacity.14 Pitting Africans against Africans using the divide and rule method and then using the outcome of that mode of operation to justify why their enemies are barbaric is simply devious. This tactic can be seen in the newsreels that are dedicated to the horrific Lari Massacre of March 1953. This incident was a Mau Mau attack on the loyalist citizens of the community of Lari, where 120 Kikuyu loyalists, mostly women and children, were killed in a surprise attack that targeted the families of prominent leaders 15 and chiefs who opposed Mau Mau. This event itself has consistently been seen as an important turning point in the revolt by

historians such as Anderson and Elkins, but the coverage of this event by Pathé News is not the kind of balanced assessment seen in Anderson’s work, which gives a full history of the tension leading up to the massacre as well as details that allow a serious 16 inspection of such an event. There are two reels in question: one titled The Mark Of The Mau Mau – Exclusive, the other titled Mau Mau – Lari Massacre Trial. The second piece is a twenty-five second segment that simply states that a trial is about to take place for twenty-six individuals accused of having “brutally done to death” the victims 17 of the Lari massacre. The first, however, is a full display of the carnage of Lari as well as the justice being doled out by British government officials in the trial. The exclusive segment titled The Mark of Mau Mau goes into brutal detail about the victims, how they are suffering, and gives first hand reporting from the cameraman. This is extremely insightful, as the cameraman, William McConville, gives his reaction as a British citizen seeing this kind of news. As images of the accused prisoners roll across the screen, the announcer reads off McConville’s account which describes the prisoners as they “sat in their wire compounds, sullen and quiet.” The reel continues with pictures of women waiting to testify and the men being led into the court. McConville then expresses the intended anti-Mau Mau sentiment when he 16

David Anderson, Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire, 4. 14 Ibid, 4. 15 Ibid, 126-131. 13

Ibid, section titled “A Deeper History,” 139. Mau Mau – Lari Massacre Trial, video, (1953; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/mau-mau-lari-m assacre-trial (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 17

says, “Then the prisoners were marched to the courthouse, and for the first time I felt some pity for them, even if they were guilty, as they shuffled handcuffed together towards the dock. Later, when I had seen the victims of the Lari massacre for myself, 18 there was not pity in my heart.” This set up for the exclusive and first-hand reporting for Pathé shows the way the reporter and the government wanted the Lari massacre to be portrayed, as the lead in builds false sympathy for Mau Mau rebels before solidifying the opinion on their barbarity and savagery. The second half of the reel has McConville visiting the hospital treating the victims. This is a gruesome and horrendous video, showing small children in body casts, injured women, and even one small child with deformed face from the fires the Mau Mau had lit in the huts when they attacked. The reel, as expected, portrays the horror of the attack and the victims being treated by the white hospital staff, as well as the loyal Kikuyu who came to donate blood even with the Mau Mau death threats against collaborators. This all culminates in our narrator McConville changing his stance after the music crescendos and shots of the same prisoners in the dock are shown. He says, “No, there was no pity in my heart. If these were the murderers, then I like all in Kenya would expect swift justice. Too long has this proud and faithful land suffered from the Mau Mau’s crusade of evil. Justice The Mark Of The Mau Mau – Exclusive, video, (1953; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/the-mark-of-themau-mau-exclusive (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

must, and will, be done.”19 The rhetoric changes completely by the end of the reel. What starts as potentially unbiased reporting is shaken to the core, and it is now palpably anti-Mau Mau. That is not surprising under the circumstances, but the feelings conjured up by the Lari Massacre were subsequently channeled into strong support of the anti-Mau Mau movement. Anderson summarizes the propaganda use of the Lari Massacre quite aptly and the Pathé News reporting fits right into his model. He writes that “At Lari, Mau Mau became something evil, to be despised and detested. This was how Mau Mau would 20 forever be remembered.” This was a passive process that eventually entered the discourse more seriously. If Lari marks the time when Mau Mau tale became one of “primitive barbarism,” as Anderson argues, then this sort of discourse should also be more prevalent in newsreels in the Pathé collection that were produced after March 1953, when the massacre occurred. Most of the reels in the collection, including the two above about the trial and the hospital, were produced after the Lari Massacre. That timeline of the sources possibly shows a growing interest in the conflict as that is when Pathé News sent McConville to report. These newsreels, however, show the opposite of what Anderson suggests, as it just proves that discourse on primitivism was present before the Lari Massacre, and simply continued with possibly more fervor

19 20

The Mark Of The Mau Mau – Exclusive. Anderson, Histories of the Hanged, 177.

after. When watched in chronological order, the reels show a trend not of an increase in primitivist rhetoric, but rather of an uptick in the use of the moniker “terrorists” to describe Mau Mau, as well as more usage of 21 the term “evil.” Anderson is therefore correct in saying that this is when Mau Mau became synonymous with “evil” in the news. Also of interest is that other terms to identify Mau Mau in the news were often “murderers” or occasionally “gang,” both of which carry a less organized or ideological 22 motivation than “terrorist.” While the moniker “terrorist” may point to a sort of respect of the Mau Mau or a deeper understanding of their operations, it is more likely that it was simply used to drum up more fear from viewers. The primitivist and paternalistic tones come through strongest in the earliest two reels, Mau Mau Disorders in Kenya and the first Lyttleton in Kenya, both made and released in 1952 at the beginning of the conflict.23

In the 12 videos with sound, the term terrorist is used more consistently after the Lari Massacre, and the term evil appears in three videos after the Massacre and not once before. 22 Kenya Report, video, (1953); Mau Mau Victims Funeral, video, (1953); Mau Mau - Lari Massacre Trial, video, (1953); and The Mark Of The Mau Mau – Exclusive, video, (1953); (Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 23 Mau Mau Disorders In Kenya, video, (1952; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/mau-mau-disord ers-in-kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018), & Lyttleton in Kenya, video, (1952; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/lyttleton-in-keny a-1 (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

The Pathé News newsreels contain language and rhetoric surrounding the Lari Massacre that continued the focus on African-on-African violence as a part of the strategy of divide and rule. Thus, it is next important to examine the most overtly racist language of the reels. The earliest reel in the collection, titled Mau Mau Disorders in Kenya, is a rundown of the beginning of the conflict, when important loyalist chieftains were killed. If the use of the easy-going term “disorders” is not enough to show that at this point the British government was not too concerned about this conflict, the reel also labels Kenya as simply a “troubled colony.” 24 This segment also calls Mau Mau a “band 25 of fanatics” and a “secret society.” This all points to a lack of gravity on the British side about Mau Mau at this point and shows they still hoped that Kenya would come under control again after some minor policing action. The second reel, however, takes on a more patronizing and paternalistic tone and has overt racist language. Lyttleton in Kenya is the story of the Colonial Secretary for the British government, Oliver Lyttleton, visiting Kenya to assess the problem of the 26 “fanatical natives.” He tours the capital of Kenya, Nairobi, and visits African workers and elders. The narration for the video, however, shows the mindset of the colonial government and white British colonists about the situation of colonialism and the

Ibid. Mau Mau Disorders In Kenya. 26 Lyttleton in Kenya. 25

increasing resistance to white minority rule. The narrative is that, “Britain has brought much good to Kenya; her standards of living are growing still higher as more of her people learn the lessons that the white man has to teach. But if the Mau Mau were to succeed in their mission, then the natives fear their colony may return to its former 27 primitive state.” This language is classic imperialist paternalism. It has a tone akin to a father speaking about an unruly child, saying that at the end of the day the Kenyans will recognize the benefit of their subjugation and be willing to submit to authority. This is willfully ignorant of the history of land appropriation and the continual abuse of native Kenyans. This narrative does change over time, as the reels for Pathé News after the first two released usually lack any explicitly racist rhetoric, or literally attempt to counter the argument. In the official reel Shadow Over Kenya, which has a snippet of Sir Evelyn Baring’s speech, the announcer attempts to counter claims of developmental negligence on the part of the British. After Baring speaks only a few lines of his longer speech, the announcer says that “Vicious plans have been made to aid the African and to build a new future for him. The criticism that Europeans ignore the welfare of Africans is being countered by a higher standard of

Ibid.

living.” This language is like the segment above, which places the weight of the civilization-dole onto the shoulders of Europeans for the “betterment” of Africans. The reel states that its goal is to counter any criticism of the regime by showing their improvements in the next few shots, including that “new homes replace the shacks,” with those new homes looking quite redolent of a tenement apartment building. The language of paternalistic responsibility, development, and civilization are all laden with racist undertones that are all too prevalent during this period, and these reels are just a few of the ways that British citizens and others abroad got their information about Kenya and Mau Mau. However, the reels do reveal the extent to which Mau Mau was viewed as more and more evil over time by both the creators of the news and, by extension, those viewing the segments. In the later reel, Amnesty Offered to Mau Mau, Governor Baring goes to a meeting of tribal Kikuyu leaders in “traditional costumes” to offer Mau Mau members amnesty and let the Kikuyu loyalists know he is doing this (to note: Baring, usually seen in a suit, it is wearing a bright white military governor uniform). This is apparently not well received by the Kikuyu leaders, who are supposed to have compared this amnesty to 29 “offering Hitler an amnesty in 1943.” This Shadow Over Kenya, video, (1954; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/the-shadow-over -kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 29 Amnesty Offered To Mau Mau, v ideo, (1955; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, 28

stance from the loyalists likely echoed many people’s sentiments at this point in the conflict, as all the news that has been coming out of Kenya has been about atrocities like the Lari Massacre. This language actually “advances” the Mau Mau 30 away from simple “bandits” to a well-organized European group akin to the Nazis. When viewing the Pathé collection, the actual rhetoric is extremely useful as it is exactly what the reel wanted the audience to hear, but the visual side of video news is just as important for their message. There are many videos that have not yet entered this exploration because they lack sound. These videos are extra film that did not make it into the official reel and are basically a collection of excess footage of the Emergency. It is easy to see that in most videos that made it into the theaters, the imagery is often of grateful Africans, native Kenyans in their villages, and colonial officials watching them do a traditional dance while standing uncomfortably on the 31 side in their suits. These images were meant to invoke ideas of African “backwardness,” and when Africans in modern clothes were were shown, it was during the trials and the segments about how Europeans were improving their lives. The imagery was not shown, however, would tell

an entirely different story of the Kenya colony. There are two reels that did not make the cut into the theaters, likely due to the level of militancy it showed on the part of the British in Kenya. The films, one labeled “Operation Anvil” in Nairobi and the other Operations Against Mau Mau, both contain footage of troops in the field. “Operation Anvil” refers to the military and policing operation carried out in which thousands of Mau Mau supporters or suspected sympathizers were rounded up in Nairobi and arrested, then moved to the early stages 32 of what became the gulag system. The reel itself shows this mass arrest being carried out as thousands of troops move through the city. The camera captures the clearing of buildings, Africans being rounded up, and 33 prisoners being processed. It makes sense that none of this footage would find its way into the news going out of Kenya, as that was not the kind of optic that the Kenya Colonial Government wanted of the situation. The other film shows British troops going through villages and rounding up suspects, as well as patrolling the forests. 34 Both reels are not seen in any other report in the collection, indicating that there may be more official releases out there, or

Elkins, Imperial Reckoning, 121-125. “Operation Anvil” in Nairobi, video, (1954; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/operation-anvil-i n-nairobi (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 34 Operations Against Mau Mau, video, (1954; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/operations-again st-mau-mau (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 32 33

https://www.britishpathe.com/video/amnesty-offeredto-mau-mau (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 30 Mau Mau Disorders In Kenya, video. 31 Lyttleton in Kenya, video, (1954; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/lyttelton-in-keny a (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

perhaps this footage was not made into any actual reporting on this side of the conflict. The most obvious set of footage that highlights the informational campaign’s one-sided nature is an appalling reel titled British M.P's In Kenya. This reel coincides with the visit of a party of M.Ps led by Walter Elliot mentioned in Shadow Over Kenya, so this footage did not make it into that segment nor did it warrant a segment of its own. It shows the group visiting the countryside, but more impressively it has footage of the prisons in which the Mau Mau fighters and sympathizers had been placed. There are shots of an M.P. talking to prisoners through a fence, prisoners doing hard labor, and aerial shots of the prison 35 complex. This is a side of the Kenya emergency that never made it into the public perception of the conflict. Elkins calls this system of prisons the “untold story” of the Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya, and the fact that this footage was produced but intentionally hidden backs up that claim. So, for all the rhetoric, imagery, and defense the Pathé News collection included for the British side, what the agency excluded at the time is almost more telling of their complicity with the creation of the British narrative of Mau Mau. As Sir Evelyn Baring says in his speech for Pathé News, “It’s a battle for 36 information.” Sir Baring was referencing British M.P’s in Kenya, video, (1954; Nairobi: Pathé News), online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/british-m-ps-in-k enya (Accessed April 14th, 2018). 36 Selected Originals - Shadow Over Kenya 1954, video. 35

the idea that Kikuyu needed to come forward and report on their fellow tribesmen so the British could root out Mau Mau, but as always, his words bear more weight in the face of their history. The narrative created by the British and continued by news organizations around the world was not untruthful. The press laid out facts and reported information they had. What the news did that made the narrative questionable was omit, exaggerate, and utilize language that would create anxiety and fear in both Africans and Europeans. The reach this discourse and reporting had abroad was evident in the reaction of the African-American community, as even their press grappled with the reports coming out of Kenya. The employment of words like evil, terrorist, development, and primitive all have shaped public perception of the Mau Mau movement more than any firsthand accounts from members or Kenyans since. The collection is one of propaganda, which based its appeal to fear using racial ideas and the looming threat of loss of power in Africa. The British citizens who consumed these reels participated in a system of oppression that still permeates society. This system labeled anyone fighting for freedom in Africa as extremist and inhuman. The power of news, especially video news, is something that the world is grappling with today, and the example of the Mau Mau narrative can still serve as a guide in the 21st century as we confront issues affecting post-colonial populations and other race-based schisms in modern societies.

REFERENCES Amnesty Offered To Mau Mau. Video. 1955. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ amnesty-offered-to-mau-mau (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

Lyttleton in Kenya. Video. 1952. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/l yttleton-in-kenya-1 (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

Anderson, David. Histories of the Hanged: The Dirty War in Kenya and the End of Empire. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2005.

Lyttleton in Kenya. Video. 1954. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/l yttelton-in-kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

“Assignment Mau Mau” – Exclusive. Video. 1953. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ assignment-mau-mau-exclusive (Accessed April 14th, 2018). British M.P’s in Kenya. Video. 1954. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ british-m-ps-in-kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Elkins, Caroline. Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain’s Gulag in Kenya. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2005. Horne, Gerald. Mau Mau in Harlem? The U.S. and the Liberation of Kenya. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2009. Kenya Ready C – Day – Exclusive. Video. 1953. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ kenya-ready-c-day-exclusive (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Kenya Report. Video. 1953. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ kenya-report (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

Mau Mau Chief Captured. Video. 1956. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ mau-mau-chief-captured (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Mau Mau Disorders In Kenya. Video. 1952. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ mau-mau-disorders-in-kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Mau Mau - Lari Massacre Trial. Video. 1953. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ mau-mau-lari-massacre-tria (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Mau Mau Victims Funeral. Video. 1953. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ mau-mau-victims-funeral (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Meriwether, James H. Proudly We Can Be Africans: Black Americans and Africa, 1935-1961. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2002.

Operations Against Mau Mau. Video. 1954. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ operations-against-mau-mau (Accessed April 14th, 2018). “Operation Anvil” in Nairobi. Video. 1954. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/ operation-anvil-in-nairobi (Accessed April 14th, 2018). Shadow Over Kenya. Video. 1954. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/t he-shadow-over-kenya (Accessed April 14th, 2018). The Mark Of The Mau Mau – Exclusive. Video. 1953. Nairobi: Pathé News. Online, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/t he-mark-of-the-mau-mau-exclusive (Accessed April 14th, 2018).

Socioeconomic Status, Math Achievement, and Head Start Attendance Reese Cogswell Senior, Sociology Introduction This study looks at the persistent effect of socioeconomic status on student learning and achievement from kindergarten through eighth grade. Students from lower status groups may be more likely to perform poorly in comparison to their higher status peers, and the type of childcare a young student attends may affect this. Specifically, this study focuses on students who attended publicly funded Head Start programs when they were three and four years old, right before they began kindergarten. Head Start began as part of the War on Poverty in 1965 under President Lyndon B. Johnson, and continues today with the goal of improving low-income students’ school readiness. Students from lower socioeconomic statuses perform at lower levels throughout the entirety of their academic careers (Lam, 2014). The goal of Head Start is to close this gap before students ever enter school, thus improving the overall school performance of low-income students. The effectiveness of such programs is important in evaluating existing policies as well as suggesting future policies focused on low-income families. Head Start is implemented differently between states, with some states serving significantly more low-income and impoverished youth than others do. The

results of this study will emphasize the importance of implementing such programs uniformly to equalize opportunity between location, and minimizing the effect that a student’s location has on their academic performance. This study focuses on math achievement over time, as there is a stronger, more consistent association between socioeconomic status and math performance from kindergarten and through eighth grade. Math and science skills are often identified as those that American students are lacking to perform well and succeed in the global economy (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009). A recent book titled Rising above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future promoted the broad acceptance of the idea that not enough American students are mathematically prepared for the demands of the global market, and the way students are taught math and science needs to change. Literature Review Considering education research at large, socioeconomic status (SES) is one of the most widely considered contextual variables. A meta-analytic study of data between 1990 and 2000 found a moderate association between SES and achievement at the student level, and a high association between SES and achievement at the school level (Sirin, 2005). However, SES is not a sole indicator of academic achievement but is linked to achievement through multiple interacting systems. For example, there is a

pattern of minority students being more likely to live in low-income households which in turn places them in lower-income neighborhoods, and their parents often have lower levels of education, they are more likely to attend under-resourced schools (Sirin, 2005). The concept of educational inequality is cyclical; students who live in poorer neighborhoods attend more under-resourced schools, thus receiving lower quality education, minimizing their opportunity for upward mobility, and placing them back in the same kinds of neighborhoods they started in. These disparities in education begin before children even enter the public education system and these early disparities are the basis for later inequality. Thus, the early childhood years are critical for intervening in children’s long-term educational careers (Ansari, 2018). There is extensive literature supporting preschool programs as effective in preparing both low-income and middle-class students academically for school, with the effects for low-income students being higher than those of their middle-class peers by ten to thirty percentage points (Ansari, 2018). Both low-income students who attended preschool and those didn’t are more susceptible to academic tracking that places them in classes with less favorable outcomes than their more privileged peers (Lam, 2014). Low-income students still lack the prerequisites to make their way into tracks with better outcomes, both academically and in terms of social and cultural capital. Lam (2014) says that the lack of cultural capital

that low-income students’ parents can provide them, combined with the lack of learning opportunities in and outside the home puts low-income students at a significant disadvantage. Not only is there a lack of stimulating resources in low-income homes, but there are often many more stressors that parents and their children must face. These can include financial hardships, strained relationships, and food insecurity. Lam (2014) continues to say that parent stress and psychological well-being affects parenting strategies; moreover, low-income parents are susceptible to maladaptive coping strategies which make them more likely to adopt harsh or neglectful parenting strategies. In turn, this can lead students to internalize the stress that their parents are feeling and display similar maladaptive responses (Lam, 2014). Parents’ position in the socioeconomic structure directly impacts student achievement by affecting access to resources at home, and indirectly by determining the amount of social capital that students take with them to school (Sirin, 2005). Social capital is directly tied to family SES in that capital is provided by the neighborhood a student lives in, the school they attend, and the resources available in these places (Sirin, 2005). Further, students’ social capital can be interfered with even more if their parent isn’t involved in school activities for any number of reasons (Lam, 2014). Expectations for students are a concept outside of social capital entirely, but both are strongly associated with family

SES. Low-SES parents tend to have lower expectations for their students, partially due to the fact that they typically have low levels of education and lack knowledge about opportunities for their children. Students internalize these low perceptions and expectations for themselves, similarly to how they are affected by parent stress (Lam, 2014). These expectations are often adopted by teachers and this cycle is referred to as the “nexus of triad expectation” (Lam, 2014, p. 329). SES and parent expectations affect students’ level of opportunity before they even enter the classroom, and just becomes exacerbated by the above concept when they do (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009; Lam, 2014). This tends to explain why students are tracked into lower-performing classes and organized into ability groups beginning in primary school (Lam, 2014; Byrnes and Wasik, 2009). In such circumstances, teachers pay less attention to student achievement, and specifically, focus less attention on positive performance in the classroom (Lam, 2014). Byrnes and Wasik (2009) notes that there were differences in math content exposure for low-SES and high-SES students, with low-SES students more likely to be placed in ability groups as early as kindergarten and first grade. The combination of the above-mentioned factors leads to the discussion of “school-readiness,” which is measured by combining assessments of early math and reading skills with overall health status and behavioral measures from kindergarten teachers (Isaacs, 2012). In spite of the proven positive results of preschool,

the probability that a low-income student would attend a formal childcare program outside the home decreased between 1998 and 2010, with in home resources – like technology and literacy resources – increasing for students from all backgrounds (Bassok et al., 2016). Isaacs (2012) cites preschool attendance, parenting behaviors, parents’ education, maternal depression, parental exposure to tobacco, and low birth weight as factors contributing to school readiness. Continually, he notes a significant gap between the school readiness of low-income students and their middle- and high-income peers, with a 27 percentage point difference between the groups. Children from the upper-quartiles of SES were overall more prepared for each grade, presenting more skills and motivation to benefit from instruction than their lower-SES peers (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009). Less than half of low-income children are considered “school ready” at age five (Isaacs, 2012). Long term, a lack of economic success in adulthood can be traced to failure to complete high school or college, and further linked to academic strife and behavioral struggles in grade school (Isaacs, 2012). One key mediating factor in school readiness is preschool attendance, which is successful in minimizing the effects of SES on achievement for a number of reasons. School readiness is increased by nine points overall in a simulation conducted by Isaacs (2012) for children who attended preschool, and Isaacs continues to assert that “preschool programs offer the most promise

for increasing children’s school readiness” (p. 1). Studies have found positive associations between preschool participation and children’s literacy and math performance at school entry, especially for lower-SES students but preschool programs can be leveraged to increase early learning for children from all income backgrounds (Ansari, 2018; Bassok et al., 2018; Isaacs, 2012). Long-term studies have shown positive effects from early childcare programs on health, educational attainment and earnings (Bassok et al., 2018). Conversely, much of the research finds that the positive effects of preschool fade out in early elementary, as early as the spring of kindergarten in some studies (Bassok et al., 2018; Gormley et al., 2017; Isaacs, 2012). Yoshikawa and colleagues (2016) noted four major reasons that the positive effects of preschool; 1) kindergarten and first grade teachers may be more focused on catching students who didn’t attend preschool up that they allow the positive effects of preschool to dwindle in those who did attend; 2) the kind of content students receive in kindergarten may need to be closely tied to the content and delivery methods they are used to from preschool; 3) skills taught in preschool (e.g. language decoding) may just be skills that students were going to pick up by third grade anyways; and, 4) the comparison groups in studies over time may affect the perceived effectiveness of preschool programs by having more structured early childcare than staying home with their parents, as was true for studies in the past.

The impacts of Head Start, specifically, have been reported to fade out. Isaacs (2012) notes that the impacts of Head Start have been smaller and prone to fade out, while Gormley et al. (2017) cites contradicting studies, some of which say Head Start is responsible for long-term, positive effects. In a study of Oklahoma’s statewide, universal pre-K program, researchers found a significant relationship between pre-K enrollment and math test scores eight years later, despite the fact that some other results in this cohort fade over time (Gormley et al., 2017). At the time of the study in the 2005-06 school year, Oklahoma’s pre-K program, administered directly through schools or partner programs like Head Start, served nearly 70% of four year olds in the state, regardless of their socioeconomic status (Gormley et al., 2017). In a similar study of Tennessee’s Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten program during the same time period, however, benefits from pre-K participation diminished in the first years of elementary school (Bassok et al., 2018). Claessens et al. (2014) found that the benefits of preschool attendance have been more pronounced for students from more economically disadvantaged backgrounds. In contrast, Bassok (2018) found that among low-income students in the ECLS-K cohorts, the advantages provided by preschool attendance were no longer significant as early as the end of kindergarten. The caveat for lower-income students is that preschool programs aren’t a remedy for the various disadvantages faced by children over the course of their lives (Ansari, 2018).

Additionally, the quality of elementary schools that lower-income students attend after preschool may affect the fade out of short-term preschool effects, regardless of the quality of preschool attended (Claessens et al., 2014; Yoshikawa et al., 2016). For students from all backgrounds, those who had attended preschool programs retained positive effects in math through the beginning of third grade (Bassok et al., 2018). A recent book titled Rising above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Future promotes two major ideas: 1) too few American students are adequately prepared in the fields of math and science to compete in the global economy; and 2) the systems responsible for educating youth in math and science need reform (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009). Significant changes to math curriculum occurred in the 1960s and 1980s due to similar calls from researchers (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009). Math achievement is largely discussed because studies have shown that middle school math score are a predictor of later success (Gormley et al., 2017). Additionally, the current literature on math achievement is largely fragmented due to the fact that there is disagreement about how exactly to measure achievement (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009). One study mentions nine factors divided into three subsets: student aptitude-attribute factors, instructional factors, and psychological environment (Byrnes and Wasik, 2009), while others mention five subset categories.

The effectiveness of preschool programs is affected by several factors, including funding. Between 2000 and 2009, state spending on public preschool programs increased every year, with Head Start expanding to serve younger students during this time, despite still receiving much less funding than public education overall (Isaacs, 2012). Additionally, the quality of preschool varies greatly across the types of programs, as well as within various settings, making it difficult to truly measure the impact of any one kind of early childcare (Isaacs 2012). Research Questions and Hypotheses This study seeks to answer the following questions: (1) Does familial socioeconomic status have a positive effect on children’s academic performance in mathematics? (2) Does Head Start attendance reduce the effect SES has on children’s academic performance in mathematics? According the literature cited above, I expect students from lower economic backgrounds to achieve at lower levels than their middle- and high- income counterparts. Additionally, I expect to see that the positive effect of SES on math achievement from kindergarten through eighth grade is reduced by Head Start attendance. Several studies identify SES as a key predictor in academic achievement for numerous reasons, including the neighborhoods low-SES families live in, family dynamics, parent education, parenting style, access to enrichment resources, and so on. Head Start is a publicly funded preschool program with an emphasis

on serving low-SES students and families, thus its primary goal should be to minimize the effect SES has on academic achievement over time. Data and Measurement This study uses data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study: Kindergarten Cohort 1998-9 (ECLS-K 1998-9) from the National Center for Education Statistics. At baseline measurement, there were 16,015 valid cases drawn from a representative sample of schools and students nationwide. Only the kindergarten and first grade samples are truly representative because students were recruited for a second time in first grade, due to state-specific requirements about when students must begin school. The study faced student attrition over the duration of the study, making the sample size (n=12,830) in the third grade measurement, (n=10,050) in the fifth grade measurement, and (n=8,503) in the final, eighth grade sample. The weighted response rate in the base year was 74% for schools (940 of 1,280 sampled schools) and 92% for child participation within those schools. Socioeconomic status (WSESQ1) was measured by combining both parent’s education level, both parent’s occupational prestige, and the overall family income. This was organized into quintiles in the original study, recoded into three categories (Low SES, Middle SES, and High SES) for this study. The first and second quintiles were combined to form the “Low SES” category (n=5,285), the third quintile remained as the

“Middle SES” category (n=2,974), and the fourth and fifth quintiles were combined to create the “High SES” category (n=6,739). The recoded variable was named “SESCAT1.” ECLS-K collected data at the child, parent, teacher, and school levels. For this study, I used child-level data measuring math achievement. In the kindergarten through fifth grade measurement years, computer-assisted assessments were administered by trained assessors. The eighth grade assessment was a self-administered paper/pencil test. To be considered proficient in a content area for all grade-level assessments, students must have answered two of the three questions correct in that particular category. In the data, levels of achievement were divided into ten categories: (1) non-mastery of the lowest proficiency level, (2) number and shape, (3) relative size, (4) ordinality and sequence, (5) addition/subtraction, (6) multiplication/division, (7) place value, (8) rate and measurement, (9) fractions, and (10) area and volume. “Not applicable” responses were coded as missing. Variable names in the data are C2R4MPF (kindergarten), C4R4MPF (first grade), C5R4MPF (third grade), C6R4MPF (fifth grade) and C7R4MPF (eighth grade). The data provided early childcare attendance in two variables with the following indicators: (1) the child has attended Head Start (P1HSEVER), and (2) the child has attended other formal childcare outside the home (P1CEVER). These dichotomous variables were combined to

form a new variable (ECATTEND_R) with four categories: (1) both types of early childcare at some point, (2) Head Start only, (3) other early childcare only, and (4) neither type of early childcare. This was necessary to separate students who had attended â&#x20AC;&#x2039;only â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Head Start from all other students in the study. For kindergarten and first grade measurement years, data was collected both in the fall and the spring. This study uses spring collection points because this is largely when data was collected in following years was collected. Results Initial crosstabs from spring kindergarten data show that the largest percentage of low-SES students achieved Level 2 (Relative Size) proficiency (35.42%), while the largest percentage of middle- and high-SES students achieved Level 3 (Ordinality and Sequence) proficiency (41.93% and 44.96%, respectively). Chart 1 shows the trend that low-SES students performed lower overall than their middle- and high-SES peers. The association between SES and math achievement in kindergarten (Gamma=0.451) is strong and highly significant (p<.001). *INSERT TABLE 4. *INSERT CHART 1. The SES effect on math achievement for students who attended Head Start was minimized, the largest percentage of

students from all statuses achieving Level 2 (Relative Size) proficiency (37.25% for low-SES; 42.52% for middle-SES; and 40.18% for high-SES students). Chart 2 shows the peak for all SES levels at Level 2. The association between SES and math achievement in kindergarten for students who attended Head Start (Gamma=0.176) is relatively weak in comparison to that observed above, and still significant (p<.001). *INSERT TABLE 5. *INSERT CHART 2. Analysis of data from the second measurement year display a similar, however less pronounced, trend between SES and math achievement, with the largest percentage of all SES groups achieving Level 4 (Addition/Subtraction) proficiency (46.74% for low-SES; 52.38% for middle-SES; and 46.92% for high-SES students). High-SES students were still the most likely to reach the highest levels of proficiency with 29.87% achieving Level 5 (Multiplication/Division) and 6.48% achieving Level 6 (Place Value) compared to 10.18% of low-SES students at Level 5 (a marginal difference of 19.69 percentage points), and 1.66% of low-SES students at Level 6 (a marginal difference of 4.82 percentage points). The association between SES and math achievement (Gamma=0.419) remains strong and highly significant (p<.001) in first grade. *INSERT TABLE 6.

*INSERT CHART 3. In the first grade analysis, the effect of SES on math achievement for students who attended Head Start is minimized similarly to the trend in the kindergarten analysis. The largest percentage of students from all statuses achieved Level 4 (Addition/Subtraction) proficiency (43.7% for low-SES; 50.75% for middle-SES; and 53.21% for high-SES students). High SES students remained more likely to achieve higher levels of proficiency, but with smaller margins than for students who had not attended Head Start; 11.01% achieved Level 5 (Multiplication/Division) while 7.69% of low-SES students achieved Level 5, a marginal difference of 3.32 percentage points. The association between SES and math achievement in first grade for students who attended Head Start (Gamma=0.173; p<.001) is much lower than the overall observed effect of SES on math achievement. *INSERT TABLE 7. *INSERT CHART 4. Again, a positive correlation between SES and math achievement is observed in the third grade data, with the largest percentage of students from low- and middle-SES achieving Level 5 (Multiplication/Division) proficiency (36.22% and 33.05%, respectively) and the largest percentage of students from high-SES achieving Level 6 (Place Value) proficiency (34.88%). Middle-SES students were much more likely than low-SES

students to achieve Level 6 proficiency (30.78% versus 21.99%, an 8.79 percentage point difference). High-SES students were much more likely to achieve Level 7 (Rate and Measurement) proficiency than lowand middle-SES students by margins of 16.66 percentage points and 10.21 percentage points, respectively. Still in third grade, the positive association (Gamma=0.406; p<.001) between SES and math achievement remains strong and highly significant. *INSERT TABLE 8. *INSERT CHART 5. Continuing trends from previous study years, the SES effect on third grade math achievement is significantly decreased by Head Start attendance, with the largest percentage of students from all status levels achieving Level 5 (Multiplication/Division) proficiency; 36.19% of low-SES, 40.91% of middle-SES, and 45.74% of high-SES students. Additionally, students from all status groups share the same likelihood of performing above the mode, with 17.43% of low-SES, 17.61% of middle-SES, and 14.89% of high-SES students achieving Level 6 (Place Value) proficiency and high-SES students being only slightly more likely to achieve Level 7 (Rate and Measurement) at a difference of 7.14 percentage points between high/low-SES. The association between SES and math achievement (Gamma=0.155; p<.001) continues to drop in third grade for those who attended Head Start.

*INSERT TABLE 9. *INSERT CHART 6 Not surprisingly, fifth grade data shows the same trend: SES has a positive impact on math achievement, with higher-SES students performing notably better than their middle- and low-SES peers. Low- and mid-SES students were most likely to achieve Level 6 (Place Value) proficiency (37.22% and 36.09%, respectively), while high-SES students were the most likely to achieve Level 7 (Rate and Measurement) (35.61%). High-SES students were much more likely to achieve at even higher levels, with 20.9% achieving Level 8 (Fractions) with only 5.64% of low-SES students, a difference of 15.26 percentage points. The positive association between SES and math achievement (Gamma=0.426; p<.001) remains strong through the fifth grade. *INSERT TABLE 10. *INSERT CHART 7. The story remains interesting in the fourth year of the study, with the positive effect of SES on fifth grade math achievement being lessened by Head Start attendance. Students from all status groups were almost equally as likely to achieve Level 6 (Place Value) proficiency, with 37.16% of low-SES, 33.33% of middle-SES, and 38.57% of high-SES students. Chart 8 displays a nearly even distribution of math achievement for students from all backgrounds, with the largest variance occurring at Level 7 (Rate and

Measurement) proficiency where there is an 8.56 percentage point difference between low- and middle-SES students. Head Start attendance dramatically reduces the positive impact of SES on fifth grade math achievement (Gamma=0.123; p<.05), with the statistical significance for this portion of the study falling. *INSERT TABLE 11. *INSERT CHART 8. In the final year of analysis – eighth grade – the positive effect of SES on math achievement is still largely visible low-SES students being the most likely to achieve Level 6 (Place Value) proficiency (31.22%) or Level 7 (Rate and Measurement) proficiency (31.63%), middle-SES students most likely to achieve Level 7 proficiency (36.66%), and high-SES students most likely to achieve between Level 7 and Level 9 (Area and Volume) proficiency: 27.56% at Level 7, 28.62% at Level 8 (Fractions), and 26.6% at Level 9. Chart 9 shows the trend the low-SES students are performing much lower than their middle- and high-SES peers, with nearly 80% of low-SES students performing at Level 7 or below and more than 80% of high-SES students achieving Level 7 or above. The positive association between SES and math achievement (Gamma=0.438; p<.001) remains strong and highly significant through middle school. *INSERT TABLE 12. *INSERT CHART 9.

For students who attended Head Start, the SES gap in eighth grade math achievement is greatly reduced, and students from all status groups are likely to achieve Level 6 (Place Value) or Level 7 (Rate and Measurement) proficiency. For low-SES students, 35.58% achieved Level 6 and 26.79% achieved Level 7, middle-SES students achieved the same levels at rates of 27.43% and 34.51%, respectively, and high-SES students achieved the same levels at rates of 32.79% and 39.34%, respectively. Low- and middle-SES students were actually slightly more likely to achieve Level 8 (Fractions) or Level 9 (Area and Volume) proficiency, with 16.36% of low-SES students performing at Level 8/9 and 20.35% of middle-SES students performing at Level 8/9, while only 14.76% of high-SES students performed above Level 7. The association between SES and eighth grade math achievement (Gamma=0.138; p<.05) continues to show a great impact from Head Start attendance which minimizes the effect of SES and equalizes student performance across status levels. *INSERT TABLE 13. *INSERT CHART 10. Overall, the positive association between SES and math achievement longitudinally remains strong and highly significant, being mediated by Head Start attendance. In each grade level measured, students who attended Head Start show much lower SES effect on their math achievement, with the association dropping

below Gamma=0.15 in the final two years of measurement. *INSERT CHART 11. Discussion Socioeconomic status has a consistently strong and positive effect on math proficiency over time, meaning higher SES students perform better. Head Start considerably narrowed the achievement gap between low-SES and middle/high-SES students on measures of math performance. According to existing literature, it is likely that an association between Head Start attendance and math performance would be witnessed in the kindergarten, first grade, and maybe even third grade measurements. It is surprising to find that Head Start consistently reduced the effect of SES on math performance from kindergarten all the way through eighth grade. In the kindergarten year data, the expectation is that students achieve Level 3 (Ordinality and Sequence proficiency), which is true for middle- and high-SES students in the initial analyses between SES and achievement. When Head Start effects are observed, all students, regardless of status level are equalized to Level 2 (Relative Size) proficiency level. We would expect any early childcare program to equalize student achievement by raising the proficiency level of underperforming students, but in this case, student achievement is equalized by pulling higher-status and potentially higher achievers back. This could be for a number

of reasons, but Yoshikawa and colleaguesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; (2016) research suggests that in this case, teachers might be paying more attention to the underperforming students and not building as much on the foundation that middle- and high-SES students in Head Start already have. By first grade, this phenomenon wasnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t visible anymore and Head Start seemed to equalize students by placing them at the same, expected proficiency level: Level 4 (Addition/Subtraction). Initial analysis showed a continued strong, positive effect of SES on math achievement, with high-SES students much more likely to achieve above the expected Level 4, and low-SES students below. The expected result was witnessed in this year of the study; the positive effect of SES on math achievement was mediated by Head Start attendance in the year before school, and high-SES students were likely to achieve above Level 4 at lower margins than in the initial analysis, and percentages for achieved proficiency level were more comparable across the board for students from different status groups. The same trends continue into the third grade analysis, with initial crosstabs showing a sustained, positive, strong effect of SES on student math achievement. The expected math proficiency level for third grade was Level 3 (Multiplication/Division). Low-SES students were the most likely to achieve the expected level or below, middle-SES students performed about right in the middle, and high-SES students were significantly more likely to achieve a Level

6 (Place Value) or above. Looking at the chart for this data shows pretty clear trends, and disparities in the performance levels of different status groups. It is clear that low-SES students are performing far behind their peers on measures of math achievement. For students who attended Head Start, however, we see the same trend as in the first grade analysis, that student performance is equalized by allowing students from all status groups to achieve at the expected level at more comparable rates. High-SES students are still slightly more likely to achieve above the expected Level 5, but by much smaller margins than was seen in the initial analysis, meaning in third grade, the positive effects of Head Start on math achievement are still visible, contradicting some previous research about the impacts of early childcare attendance. The same magnitude of effect exists for SES on math achievement in fifth grade, but this is where we should expect to see some fadeout of the positive effects of Head Start if they didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t occur sooner. Initial analyses show very similar trends to those laid out above: low-SES students are more likely to perform at the expected level or below while high-SES students are likely to perform at the expected level or above. In fifth grade, the overall expected level of achievement is Level 6 (Place Value) proficiency. For students attending Head Start, this trend again nearly disappears; students from all status levels are likely to perform at each proficiency level at similar rates. Although results from this analysis are less statistically significant (p<.05) than

previously mentioned results, we can still make assumptions about the population with this data, and it’s pleasantly surprising to see that Head Start continues to mediate the positive effect of SES on student math achievement through fifth grade. At this level, students were almost equally as likely to perform at the expected level, regardless of their socioeconomic status. In the final year of analysis, the positive effect of SES on student math achievement remains, and just as strong as the effect evident in kindergarten. The expected level of achievement for eighth grade math was Level 7 (Rate and Measurement). Most low-SES students achieved Level 6 or 7, while middle-SES peers were on target at Level 7, and high-SES peers were very likely to have achieved a Level 7 or higher. For students who attended Head Start, it was much more likely than in the initial analysis that a low-SES student would perform above a Level 6 or 7, and made it more consistent that middle- and high-SES students were performing on target at a Level 7. Again we see that Head Start equalized the achievement levels for students from all status groups, despite whatever external stressors students from low-SES backgrounds may be facing. It is important to note that students from lower-SES families face many stressors outside of school that affect their achievement, and Head Start – or any early childcare for that matter – is not a remedy for the thing that happen outside of school. In light of this, the persisting effects of Head Start in mediating

SES’s positive effect on math achievement are even more notable. Implications This study has several implications for policy and future research, beginning with further study regarding the efficacy of Head Start. Nationwide, Head Start serves less than 40% of 3- to 4-year-old students in poverty, and less than 20% of students this age considered low-income (130% of the poverty line). This number drops significantly more for children under age 3. This study showed that Head Start mediates the effect of SES on math outcomes through eighth grade for students who had attended, so it becomes incredibly important to continue studying the impact of Head Start, expanding it to serve more impoverished and low-income students, and implementing in a way that is more standardized or uniform across states. Largely, states have the control over how Head Start is implemented, and funding varies by state making the program look very different from one state to another, even though the overall goals remain the same. Where a student lives shouldn’t be a determinant of their opportunity educational success, which in turn leads to career success. Additionally, public preschool doesn’t necessarily need to take the form of a nationwide program, but could be state specific as long as it’s universal and serves youth despite their socioeconomic status. The consistent, strong effect of SES on math achievement proves that attention needs to be paid to minimizing this effect on

performance, equalizing the opportunities children have to succeed. Access to effective early childcare seems to be one way that policymakers and educators can work to close the achievement gap between students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and their middle- and high-SES peers. Disclaimers and Limitations The focus of Head Start is on serving low-SES students and families, and thus has thresholds for the numbers of middle- and high-SES students they can accept. Due to this, the sample size of middle- and high-SES students who attended Head Start is much smaller than low-SES students. At baseline middle-SES students represented about 17% of Head Start attendees, and high-SES students represented about 9% with the rest of the students coming from low-SES backgrounds. The percentage distribution remained consisted, but the total sample size fell from 1,229 students who had attended Head Start in the year before school to 663. Future analysis of this data should control for more factors, including race, gender, ELL (English Language Learner) status, and state/geographic region. Race is often cited in education research as a factor in determining achievement because minorities are more likely to live in low-income neighborhoods and face systemic pressures than whites. Additionally, since education is largely controlled at the state-level, it would be interesting to either see state-level studies regarding the effectiveness of early

childcare in mediating the effects of SES on math achievement, or to control for state/region to determine differences across the country. Another common discussion about early childcare is that of socioemotional outcomes and psychosocial skills. Future research should consider this and consider if the academic benefits of preschool are counteracted by poorer socioemotional outcomes that are often cited for preschool attendees. This also may vary across type of childcare, rather than simply categorizing childcare as Head Start and Other. There are numerous settings included in the â&#x20AC;&#x153;other early childcareâ&#x20AC;? that I mention above, and it would be worth examining these more closely in terms of both math achievement, and considering the socioemotional outcomes of preschool. Finally, an ideal study would use a continuous measure of SES rather than the categorical one, and I would like to redo the analysis with this to see if the results are consistent. The continuous measure is more comprehensive and allows for examination of individual cases rather than generalized groups.

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Longitudinal Study (ECLS). United States Department of Education. Institute of Education Sciences. National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER). (2016). State(s) of Head Start: Executive Summary. Retrieved from http://nieer.org/wp-content/uploads/2 016/12/HS_Executive_Summary_ States_of_Head_Start.pdf

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Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE). (2012). “Examining the Predictive Power of Children’s School Readiness Skills” an ASPE Research Brief. Office of Human Services Policy. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Phillips, D., Gormley, W. and Anderson, S. (2016). “The Effects of Tulsa’s CAP Head Start Program on Middle-School Academic Outcomes and Progress” in Developmental Psychology, Vol. 52, No. 8, pp. 1247-1261. American Psychological Association. Puma, M., Bell, S., Cook, R., and Heid, C. (2010). Head Start Impact Study: Final Report Executive Summary. Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation. Administration for Children and Families. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Washington, DC. Sirin, S. R. (2005). “Socioeconomic Status and Academic Achievement: A Meta-Analytic Review of Research” in Review of Educational Research, Vol. 75, No. 3, pp. 417-453.

APPENDIX

Foreign Born Populations and Unemployment in the United States: Myth or Reality? Steven Doncaster Senior, Political Science and Economics Introduction: Immigration has played a vital role in the United States, as it has allowed the country to grow a diverse labor force and citizenry. While immigration has been a backbone to economic prosperity throughout the history of the United States, it has also been a key source of political division. As new labor enters the workforce, the increase in competition for jobs has been speculated to have a downward pressure on wages which proponents of stricter immigration policies say have a negative effect on the income of United States citizens. In addition, immigrants are often scapegoats of angry sentiments about job loss in the constantly changing economy. These two key trends came to the forefront as recently as the 2016 presidential election, where US President Donald Trump made a successful bid for the presidency playing to these notions. As these claims have come up time and time again, it’s important to look beyond the perceptions that we may come to from incomplete experience and look at the data. Do areas with higher foreign born populations actually have more unemployment? In order to answer this question, I will be looking at US Congressional district data from all 435

districts to see if there is a link between districts with higher foreign born populations and unemployment. This issue is important to study, as the prevalence of immigrant populations and their discrimination in the political sphere has been a consistently repeating phenomena in US politics. By conducting this research, the data will be able to eliminate biases that our individual perceptions have and bring us to a clear answer of whether foreign born populations impact employment rates in the United States. Literature Review: To see where the current literature has focused on this issue, I have looked at articles published in the last decade that touch on the unemployment rate and immigrants, as I assume that immigrants and the foreign born population have a high level of crossover. The first two articles bring insight and results from Europe. First, an econometric study conducted in Europe on the relationship between the unemployment rate and anti-immigrant sentiments found that the presence of far right parties coupled with a higher unemployment rate sparked anti-immigrant sentiments, while the absence of a far right party did not spark these sentiments (Cochrane and Nevitte 2014, 18-19). While this does not include measurements directly relating unemployment of foreign born populations, it does confirm that this is a relation that is seen as connected by the public, and justifies a variable in my study I will discuss later. Next, an econometric

study that explores wage setting data from Germany shows that “a one percent increase in the German labor force through immigration increases the unemployment rate by less than 0.1 percentage points”(Brucker and Jahn 2009, 26). This study shows that in Germany, an increase in the immigrant work force produces a small increase in the unemployment rate. While these two papers provide insight and data for us to work with, it is important to also review literature that deals with this topic in the United States. Starting with a study that provides an overview challenging the claim that immigrants steal jobs, Niyimbanira finds that immigrants overall tend to bring more consumers to a given location, which increases demand for more workers to meet their needs (Niyimbanira and Madzivhandila 2012 , 171-172). This directly challenges the question at hand, as it provides evidence and economic rationale for the unemployment rate to drop when immigrants come to a community. Next, in an econometric study conducted by Orozco-Aleman and Gonzalez-Lozano, they seek to see if immigration and border policies have an effect on the amount of illegal workers in the US. While their main study is not directly linked to mine, one of their key findings is that when illegal workers are on payroll and paying taxes, they reduce the rise in the unemployment rate brought on by illegal workers (Orozco-Aleman and Gonzalez-Lozano 2018, 175). This links illegal workers to a rise in the unemployment rate for natural

and legal citizens, which adds an interesting element for my project. Although the illegal immigrant population is often targeted in political discourse around the subject, measuring how many illegal immigrants are in the country is hard to quantify. In order to address this problem, data will be used in this study which tries to best capture the undocumented immigrant population in the United States. Finally, the well-known labor economist George Borjas and his literature review titled Immigration and the American Worker will help piece together the importance of my research project. In the extensive literature review which covers immigrant’s impact on labor, only one focuses on the relationship between the unemployment rate and immigration. This is a study conducted to see how the Mariel boatlift, which was Fidel Castro’s announcement that Cuban refugees could freely leave the island in Mariel, Cuba, shows that the unemployment rate for Miami’s black population increased during the years of mass Cuban refugee increases. However, the unemployment rate increase for black Americans in Miami increased lower than the national average, as the study focuses on the years 1980-1982 when an economic recession was occurring nationwide (Borjas 2006, 18). These statistics show that one could interpret an increase due to immigrants or that immigrants lowered the increase in the unemployment rate. However, the rest of the paper focuses on the impact that immigrants have on wages of US workers,

showing the focus the academic field has given this relationship instead. Overall, the literature on this subject is diverse in its scope and largely unsettled in coming to a final conclusion. What my research looks to add to this topic is a more direct examination of the relationship between the unemployment rate and the foreign born population, as political discourse focuses on this relationship while the academic field tends to focus on the foreign born population and wages. To ground my project in this political discourse, I will be examining the relationship between the unemployment rate and foreign born populations across congressional districts. Outside of a few cases I will discuss below, this level of analysis makes the population sizes of each case relatively similar. I will also be adding in a partisanship measure to account for if this adds to the unemployment rate. The rationale behind this is that if high foreign born population districts and partisan districts are both connected to a high unemployment rate, this partisanship could be caused by the local suspicion of the foreign born population. By incorporating all of these elements, my project seeks to add to the literature of unemployment and foreign born populations. Hypothesis and model: Through this study, I will seek to see if there is a relationship between the foreign born population and the unemployment rate in the United States. This project will help further analyze the effect of Say’s law in the United States. Say’s law says that supply

will create its own demand, and therefore will even out in the long run. In this model, Say’s law is relevant to the entrant of a new immigrant (someone who is foreign born), as they are both a worker (supply of labor) and a consumer (demand of goods and services). This project will therefore be able to test whether or not the foreign born population is creating too much demand and lowering the unemployment rate, creating too much labor supply and increasing the unemployment rate, or following Say’s law and having an evening out effect. In addition, this is a relationship that has been questioned throughout the United States history, as the nation has consistently had a stream of immigrants coming to the country and a domestic workforce that has had varying levels of hostility towards them. Therefore, this project is significant, as it works towards finding an answer to not only an economically important question but a politically important question as well. The level of analysis of this project will take place at the US Congressional District level, as they are generally formed to have a relatively equal population size. The only cases in which this does not occur are the seven states that have 1 US House of Representatives seat, as their whole population will be in one district. However, the average population of the Congressional districts in this study is 746,000, and four of these districts fall within 150,000 of this average. Given that only 3 of the 435 districts lay far outside of the average district size, I do not believe this will significantly impact the results of the study.

In addition to this relatively similar population size across congressional districts, the populations within the districts are also likely exposed to similar local laws affecting employment and the labor force, which could be influential. In addition, congressional districts are exposed to political ads of the same congressional candidates, so I believe people would partially form their opinions on immigration based on these, which adds another common characteristic across this level of analysis. To set up a model which will more precisely measure the impact that a foreign born population has on the unemployment rate in the United States, I will incorporate into the model multiple variables that can have an effect on someone being unemployed in addition to the foreign born population. These will include the labor force, income, distance, education, industrial representation, and political partisanship. The labor force size, industrial representation, and education will be included in the model as I believe they play a significant role in labor market relations that could potentially be cast to foreign born populations if the relationship one has to them are negative. The labor force size essentially determines the amount of people that one has to compete with to find a job. For this reason alone, it is an important part of our model. In addition to this, the labor force is also relatively constrained to a working aged population, which hinders those who are too young or in retirement from participating. Not only will a labor force size tell us something about job

competition, but it could inform us on the relationship between age of a population and the unemployment rate. Industrial representation is also an important feature to take into consideration, as the amount of firms and the diversity of firms will create a varying level of demand for a diversely skilled labor force, which will have an impact on the unemployment rate. Finally, I will take into account educational attainment, as many positions require a certain degree of education to apply for said position. A more educated population could have an effect on the amount of people being able to work, and therefore it must be included in this model. This summarizes the labor market qualities that could have an effect on our model to precisely measure the foreign born populationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s effect, and which each represent a variable in the model. In addition to these variables, I will also be controlling for income, distance, and political partisanship for each case. Income is a crucial variable to control for unemployment, as the amount of money in a given area affects the amount of capital invested in an area and in turn the ability to create jobs. People who are paid more will spend more money, creating a cycle which effects the job creation in the area. The distance one has to travel to work in the area of each case also needs to be controlled for. This is because the geographic size is not taken into consideration when congressional districts are formed, but only the size of the population. This means most districts are similar in the amount of people in them, but

not the closeness of these people. The larger geographic districts or the more densely populated districts could be affecting the amount of traveling someone has to do, which could dissuade people from finding employment if the distance is far. Finally, partisanship will be controlled for, as these localities will be more likely to have local economic and labor policies which reflect the public officials they elect to office. If these districts overwhelmingly skew liberal or conservative, they could be facing benefits from this or hurting from these partisan political tendencies. Districts could be harmed by the motives of political ideology over other considerations, or benefit from these policies or the stability of the policies so that private firms can know what to expect in their respective districts. By including this measure, we will be able to see if partisan biases in areas do have a relationship to unemployment rates. Taking all of these variables into consideration, I have created the following model for this research project:

Y = β0 + β1X1 + β2X2 + β3X3 + β4X4 + β5X5 + β6X6 + β X + u 7 7

Where:

Data: Since this project is using congressional districts as the level of analysis, the United States Census Bureau and their data tool My Congressional District is where data for all the variables, except for the partisanship measure will come from. This data uses results from the 2017 American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates and 2016 County Business Patterns, which are used to represent the beginning of the 115th congress on January 20th, 2017 (US Census Bureau, 2017). Using this data, it is important to clarify the definitions that the Census Bureau uses for each of the categories, as they affect the scope of the data. Two crucial definitions for this project will be the way in which the Census Bureau defines and measures the foreign born population and unemployment rate. For them, the foreign born population is anyone who is not a U.S. citizen at birth, including those who become U.S. citizens through naturalization (US Census Bureau, 2017). This will help us accurately capture individuals who may face discrimination in being employed due to how they gained their legal status and also those who are stereotypically perceived as immigrants by United States citizens by birth. In addition, the census bureau includes illegal immigrants in this definition, allowing us to account for them in this study. For the unemployment rate, the Census Bureau defines this as the number of unemployed people as a percentage of the civilian labor force, giving a clear cut definition which

connects to our measure of the labor force (US Census Bureau, 2017). In order to measure the labor force, I will be using the data that the Census Bureau calls the civilian labor force. They include in this measure “All non-institutionalized civilians who are either employed or unemployed,” which will help the study accurately measure all of those who are searching for work (US Census Bureau, 2017). Other variables for this project do not have as specific of definitions, but the measurements selected have a purpose. For income, I will be using median household income, as this takes away possible skews in data from extremely wealthy or poor families and situates the data at the median family. For educational attainment, I have decided to use the percentage of the population 25 and over that has a bachelor’s degree, as this level of education has been commonly referred to as being a more well off benchmark compared to a high school diploma. There is a large disparity between these two attainments in most districts (US Census Bureau, 2017), so this will make for a compelling measurement. For distance, I will be using the average travel time it takes to get to work, as I believe this will accurately measure what individuals account for when considering employment instead of the actual distance. This will lead to results that include a measure more transparent to the average worker. Finally, for the industrial representation, I will be using the total establishments for all sectors in the economy of a given district, as more firms will allow for more options for workers.

Conceding that this does not take diversity of industries directly into consideration, I operate under the assumption that more total firms will more likely have a diversity of economic sectors than less total firms in a district. For partisanship, I will be using The Cook Report’s rating system which takes how strongly each congressional district leans towards one party and compares this to the national average (The Cook Report, 2018). The results in the dataset therefore show how much the district skews towards one party relative to the United States as a whole. I find that this will be an accurate measure to gage how partisan a district will be, as liberals tend to align to the Democratic party and conservatives to the Republican party. The highest a district can score is difficult to exactly tell, as the national average for each party in elections usually falls in the Summary Statistics Table Category

Mean

Min.

Max.

5.4

2.7

13.4

% population foreign born

13.6

56.3

civilian labor force (in 000’s)

375

215

714

Avg. travel time to work (min)

% population over 25 w BA

Unemployment rate (%)

# of establishments (in 000’s)

Partisan skew

Median household income ($ in 000’s)

134

n = 435, US Congressional Districts, January 2017

45%-55% range. The higher the score the more partisan, and based off the relatively closeness of the popular vote in most elections, a score around 50+ would say the district goes 50+ in one parties favor, signaling around 95% -100% of the vote for one party. I will use the report from November 7th, 2016, as the data from My Congressional District is meant to represent January 20th, 2017 from the census and this is the closest date available. Above in my data table, the mean, minimum, and maximum for each data set are presented. The sample size for this study is 435, as there are 435 congressional districts. This excludes the D.C. area, as they do not have congressional representation. For the dependent variable, the unemployment rate, the spread for the unemployment rate coalesces around the 5% mark, with a minimum of 2.7% in the 2nd district in Wisconsin and a maximum of 13.4% in the 15th district of New York, located in the Bronx. The foreign born population averages 13.6% across the nation, with the maximum percentage of 56.3% in the 25th district of Florida, which

makes sense as the district heavily lies in Miami, which is a population destination for Cuban immigrants. In contrast, the lowest percentage of foreign born population, at .1%, is in the 6th district of Ohio. I found this to be interesting as the district is in the area which is heavily perceived as old coal and industrial country, where anti-immigrant and anti-free trade sentiments are perceived to be salient amongst citizens. Concerning the issues with populations and congressional districts discussed earlier, the West Virginia’s 3rd congressional district has the lowest civilian labor force population at 215,000, dispelling some worries about that measurement issue. However, the maximum civilian labor force population is 538,000, is in Montana’s at large district. Another interesting statistics result would be that New York’s 12th district holds the highest total establishments, New York’s 15th holds the highest partisan skew at +44, and New York’s 5th congressional district has the longest travel time to work. All of these districts are within what is considered New York City, emphasizing the potential influence large urban areas may have on these variables. Empirical Results and Discussion:

Intercept: % Population Foreign Born Civilian Labor Force (in 000’s)

Coefficient

P-value

9.532

0.00

0.021

0.003** *

-0.011

0.000** *

Avg. Travel time to work (min)

0.10

0.000** *

% Population over 25 w BA

-0.051

0.323

Total Establishments (in 000â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s)

-0.033

0.045**

Partisanship

0.012

0.086*

-0.051

0.000** *

Family Income ($ in 000â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s)

*** Significant at 1%, ** Significant at 5%, * Significant at 10%

R Square

.4665

Observations

435

Dependent Variable

Unemployment Rate

In order to study the relationship between the unemployment rate and the foreign born population in the United States, a regression with all of the previously discussed variables was ran. The results of the study show an R Square value of about .47, which while relatively low, is still an appropriate number to dissect the conclusions of the regression. The results for the core independent variable, the foreign born population, are positive and statistically significant. Taking the coefficient value into consideration, the

results show that a 1% increase in the makeup of the foreign born population would lead to an increase in the unemployment rate by .02%. Using the mean variables from the data summary table, this would show if the % foreign born population went from 13.6% to 14.6%, the average unemployment rate would go from 5.4% to 5.42%. This would show that although a relationship exists between the unemployment rate and the foreign born population exists, the overall effect it has is relatively small. However, the results from the regression are statistically significant at the 1% level, showing that the small but strong relationship does appear to exist. Therefore, the positive relationship between the unemployment rate and the percent foreign born population can be supported by this study. The hypothesis that a higher foreign born population leads to higher unemployment is therefore accepted. Before exploring the possible reasons why the foreign born population is found to be statistically significant, the results from the other independent variables bring interesting conclusions. The size of the civilian labor force, the number of establishments, and the median family income were all found to have a positive relationship with the unemployment rate. When the totals of these variables went up, the unemployment rate went down. There are theoretical rationales for why these all make sense. When the civilian labor force is larger, this signals a larger population in the age range of those working, which could increase economic activity on the demand

side as well. As there are more establishments in an area, there is a more diverse economy with different job options. Finally, it would make sense that the higher median family income there is, the lower unemployment is as there is more demands for goods and services which creates jobs. It is important to note, however, that the results of the median family income were found to be as statistically significant as the results for the foreign born population and has a stronger change in the unemployment rate. When the median income from a family increases by $1,000, the unemployment rate drops .05%. From the example above, a $1,000 increase would drop the average unemployment rate from 5.4% to 5.35%, showing a more noticeable change in the employment rate. The independent variable found to be statistically significant that has a negative relationship with the unemployment rate is the average travel to work time of the sampled districts. This would mean that as the average commute time to work of the districts went up, the unemployment rate also went up. This distance measurement makes economic sense, as one could derive from this that the economic benefit of working at a job decreases the longer you have to travel to it. At some point, the commute to work would not be worth it and one would decide to be unemployed and pursue some other need. The results from this variable also produces the largest difference as it increases, as a 1 minute increase in travel time increased the unemployment rate by close to .10%. Using

the average unemployment rate, this would mean that one minute added to the average commute would bring the unemployment rate from 5.4% to 5.5%. Therefore, traveling to work time represents the most notable change in the unemployment rate in this regression. The two variables I will discuss before returning to the foreign born population is the educational attainment variable, which is the only statistically insignificant variable in the regression, and the partisan skew variable. I would derive from the statistically insignificant result that while education may heavily influence wages, it may not influence actual employment. There are varying economic sectors with different educational requirements, and a lot of fields that require vocational or trade school are speculated to be undersupplied. When it comes to the partisan skew variable, the results were only significant at the 10% level and the change was the second smallest with a coefficient of .012. Given the widespread partisanship of the average district (+14), such a small change at a low significant level leaves these variable with questionable results. The reason why the foreign born population is a significant factor to the unemployment rate in these results could come from a few different sources. One reason why the results would be statistically significant is that in the United States the influx of the foreign born population is not following Sayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s law. This would mean that the supply of labor that the foreign born population is giving is not being balanced

out by the demand for goods and services that these same people bring. If this is true, then it would make sense that the results are statistically significant because they would be supplying more labor into the market than demand. One key relationship I would examine is that the median income per family and foreign born population contributes to the unemployment rate. If foreign born populations are struggling financially relative to the average family, they may not be able to demand as many goods. Taken from another perspective, they may also be sending money to family in other countries, which could explain the unbalanced supply and demand given.

and the foreign born population is explored. By analyzing the current academic literature on the subject, it is shown that results in Europe found a small positive relationship between the two, and in the United States there has generally been a focus on the relationship between wages and the foreign born/immigrant population. Therefore, this research is important as it helps answer whether the focus on wages has been justified or not. In addition, the model of this study grounded the sample in US Congressional Districts, bringing a new level of analysis to the relationship which could help capture the political nature of the issue.

As shown by the statistically significant results of most of the independent variables, the unemployment rate can be attributed to a lot of different factors that make or donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t make people employable. Trying to explain unemployment through one key factor is likely to fail. While the hypothesis that a higher foreign born population leads to a higher unemployment rate is proven true, there are other variable results which produce stronger effects on the unemployment rate, exemplifying the complexity of explaining the unemployment rate.

The hypothesis that a higher percentage of a foreign born population would lead to an increase in the unemployment rate is accepted through the econometric results, as the foreign born population is found to be a statistically significant variable included in the model. For a 1% increase in the % population foreign born, the unemployment rate increased by .02%. Other independent variables considered in the congressional districts like the civilian labor force size, the average travel to work time, the partisan skew, the total amount of establishments, and the median family income were all found to be statistically significant in their effects on the unemployment rate. The percentage of the population over 25 years of age and holding a bachelorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s degree is the only statistically insignificant independent variable. The independent variable that produces the largest change in the

Conclusion: Through this study, an important issue throughout the history of the United States that has gained renewed prominence in recent political discourse is tackled, as the relationship between the unemployment rate

unemployment rate, the commute time to work, produces about a .1% increase in the unemployment rate per every minute increase in commuting time. This shows that while the foreign born population was a statistically significant variable that leads to an increase in the unemployment rate, it was not the one that produces the greatest change in the unemployment rate. The results from this study suggest that multiple different policy changes should be considered to improve the unemployment rate. The two variables that produced the highest change in the unemployment rate were the travel time to work and the median family income. Based on the regression results, policy initiatives should be considered which would improve the transportation of employees to work. This could range in investing in more efficient public transportation options for civilians or increasing infrastructure spending. During the 2016 presidential election, a bipartisan concern was funding for a trillion dollar infrastructure bill, and the results of this study suggest that a benefit of such a bill would be lower unemployment. Making commuting to work more economically feasible for workers will increase their willingness to work, which would decrease unemployment. Another policy initiative could be to focus on allowing legal immigrants in who are skilled in job areas with high demand, regardless of the educational attainment of immigrants. This will lead to a better chance of immigrants following Sayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s law and balancing out their supply of labor and demand of goods as it

will be easier for them to find employment in the job market. A final possible policy initiative could be to work towards combating income inequality in the United States. As the median family income in an area had the second biggest change in the unemployment rate, perhaps working towards distributing income towards areas with not a lot of income will help regenerate financially struggling areas and reduce the unemployment rate. From a research perspective, I would recommend that those who want to study the relationship between the foreign born population and the unemployment rate research characteristics within the foreign born population that would cause them to increase the unemployment rate. As earlier suggested, perhaps foreign born populations have an overall lower median income compared to the median family in the United States. Researching the ways in which foreign born populations are disadvantaged in the job market and other aspects of life and working towards improving these conditions could help bring the foreign born population in the United States to follow Sayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s law.

REFERENCES Borjas, George. 2006. “Immigration and the American Worker.” Center for Immigration Studies 1-26. Brucker, Herbert and Elke J. Jahn. 2009. “Migration and Wage-Setting: Reassessing the Labor Market Effects of Migration.” IAB Nurnberg and IZA Bonn 1-41. Cochrane, Christopher and Neil Nevitte. 2014. “Scapegoating: Unemployment, far-right parties and anti-immigrant sentiment.” Comparative European Politics 1 2: 1-32. Niyimbanira, F. and T.F. Madzivhandila. 2012. “Myth That Immigrants “Steal Jobs”: An Economic Blame Game?” International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanity Studies 8: 165-179. Orozco-Aleman, Sandra and Heriberto Gonzalez-Lozano. 2018. “Labor Market Effects of Immigration Policies Border Enforcement and Amnesty.” Journal of Labor Research 3 9: 150-177. The Cook Report. 2016. “2016 House Race Ratings.” Date accessed 10/14/18 https://www.cookpolitical.com/rating s/house-race-ratings/139361 US Census Bureau. 2017. “My Congressional District”. Date accessed 10/14/18. https://www.census.gov/mycd/

Trade in Conflict Minerals -- Congolese Warlords, MNC’s, and Dodd-Frank 1502 Ankit Deshmukh Junior, Global Studies Since the start of the First Congo War in 1996, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has remained in a state of perpetual political and economic instability. Caused by a spillover of conflict from the Rwandan genocide into the DRC (then named Zaire), the Congolese Wars took place over a span of seven years (1996 2003) and are the primary factor contributing to the instability within the region (Schneider, 2011). Conflict remains rampant — even after the official conclusion of the Congolese Wars in 2003 — as several warlord-led militias seek to gain control of the DRC’s massive mineral reservoirs (Schneider, 2011). These minerals are dubbed “conflict minerals,” due to their part in funding conflicts within the DRC; at their peak in 2008, intrastate wars over conflict minerals in the DRC “killed 45,000 people a month” (Polgreen, 2008). Conflict minerals are undoubtedly the DRC’s “resource curse”, as the elevated level of demand for these minerals fuels conflict between rebel groups seeking to control mineral rich land and plunges the country further into instability. The international trade in conflict minerals is profitable for both sellers — rebel militia groups — and buyers — multinational corporations (MNCs) — thanks to favorable prices and the difficulty involved in tracing legitimate buyers to

illegal sellers. Although Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act attempts to suffocate the trade, it is unable to impact illegal sellers of conflict minerals; instead, it harms legitimate miners and mining corporations. Tin ore (cassiterite), tungsten, tantalum (extracted from columbite-tantalite), and gold — collectively referred to as 3TG minerals — are the raw materials classified as conflict minerals due to their extraction from militia-controlled mines. (Deloitte, 2018). The DRC houses the world’s largest deposits of these minerals as its mines contain several billion pounds worth “around $24 trillion” (Paulas, 2017). The astronomical value assigned to 3TG minerals is a result of their necessity in the supply chains of electronic devices. 3TG minerals are essential in the process of constructing batteries, circuit wires, and processor chips due to their high conductivity and resistance to corrosive substances (Reuters, 2017). Without these minerals, devices such as computers, phones, televisions, and tablets could not properly function. As such, 3TG minerals are the DRC’s most valuable factor endowments and have the potential to generate copious amounts of revenue if properly exported. As it currently stands, warlord-led militia groups control around a third of the DRC’s mines and other natural repositories (Wolfe, 2015). Much of the DRC’s export revenue concerning minerals and ores is not accrued by legitimate state-approved actors — and therefore not reflected in economic data — but by militia

groups instead (CIA, 2018). Consequently, the DRC cannot utilize the entirety of its vast amount of natural resources and put funding towards developing infrastructure, establishing affordable healthcare, or providing quality education. The international conflict mineral trade market contains several actors, including smelting/refining corporations, intermediary traders, mineral transporters, and component producers (which are companies that make basic mechanisms and devices and sell them to end product producers) (Deloitte, 2018). However, the major economic players in international conflict mineral trade are the Congolese warlord-led militia groups and tech-centric multinational corporations operating outside of the DRC. Both actors wield the most power out of all other groups involved, engage in the conflict mineral trade market to sustain their respective operations, and mutually benefit from trade. While they “only control [around] 33 percent of the mines within the DRC,” warlord-led militia groups still control land which contains billions of dollars in untapped mineral reserves (Paulas, 2017; Wolfe, 2015). The militia groups have no need for 3TG minerals as resources to utilize in building or repairing electronic devices. Instead, they extract and sell conflict minerals on the black market, using them to obtain munitions, food, and medical supplies (Paulas, 2017). Conflict minerals aid militia groups in solidifying their regional dominance and are simply the most profitable and accessible resources for them.

During the price spike of columbite-tantalite in 2000, about “$20 million a month went to rebel groups” to finance their war efforts (Schneider, 2011). The main reason why militias can conduct such an operation while turning a massive profit is due to their low operating and opportunity costs. Essentially, militias have a comparative advantage in the extraction of 3TG minerals. Labor costs are non-existent and any physical capital needed is forcibly taken. Militias regularly take over existing mines and utilize their labor force, which usually consists of children and teenagers forcefully conscripted from the surrounding villages (Blanco, 2016). This allows militias to specialize in mineral extraction and trade minerals in exchange for products they need. Sometimes, militia groups choose not to dig for minerals themselves, instead selling individual diggers access to mining pits they control and taking a sizable percentage of the minerals these diggers discover (Raghavan, 2014). After extracting the minerals, militia members sell them to legitimate traders by bribing underpaid public officials to certify their minerals via the “tag and bag” system, which involves “tying a small plastic tag around a bag of minerals to [mark] it as ‘clean’” (Wolfe, 2015). Although they never directly interact with the militia groups supplying 3TG minerals, MNCs are the second major economic player in the international conflict mineral trade. MNCs that manufacture electronic devices at the end of the supply chain especially rely on cheap and reliable sources of 3TG minerals. In particular,

major technology conglomerates such as Google, Apple, Intel, IBM, Microsoft, and Samsung often turn a blind eye and use “minerals sold to fund combatants in the [DRC]” in the manufacture of their products (Luckerson, 2014). MNCs are undoubtedly the most powerful actors in the conflict mineral trade market due to their financial strength. As the dominant players in the market, MNCs have the luxury of dictating the flow of minerals in accordance with their needs. In accordance with Wallerstein’s core-periphery model (which states that rich, “core countries” dictate the global flow of resources), MNCs based in rich countries control the amount of 3TG minerals suppliers in “periphery countries” (like the DRC) can sell (Lee, 2014). Suppliers in these countries solely rely on the demands of these MNCs. Coltan, the primary component in processor chips, only costs around $69 per pound, a relatively low cost when one considers the number of chips manufactured using a pound of coltan (each processor only uses a couple grams of coltan) (Metalary, n.d). While other areas like Afghanistan, Australia, and Canada also contain 3TG minerals, acquiring these minerals from the DRC is much cheaper and far less restrictive (Rockwood, 2012). Thanks to the emergence of economic globalization, the supply chains of MNCs engaging in the conflict mineral trade are extremely convoluted. “After minerals are mined, they are sold to a middleman and usually taken to the country’s capital,” where the metals are extracted and blended with other elements (Reuters, 2017). These blended compounds are then exported to

countries where they are further refined and prepped for use in end products (Reuters, 2017). As of 2017, Apple purchases 3TG minerals from smelting and refinery corporations in several — primarily east Asian — countries such as China, Indonesia, Japan, and South Korea (Apple, 2017). During this process, the minerals change hands several times. This divides the cost of processing minerals among multiple actors and reduces the overall price paid by MNCs (Reuters, 2017). As such, it is difficult for auditors — and even the MNCs themselves — to trace the minerals down the supply chain and determine if they originate from an illegitimate mining operation (Reuters, 2017). While militia groups and MNCs gain from the conflict mineral trade, it negatively impacts Congolese laborers and miners working for legitimate mining operations. In the DRC, around “8 to 10 million people rely on mining to earn a living (Wolfe, 2015). Particularly in the eastern Congo, mining is one of the only existing economic activities following the infrastructural destruction by the Congolese civil wars and militia violence (Reuters, 2009). Legal mining operations are costly to operate and cannot compete with militia groups, which can afford to sell their minerals at far lower prices. As a result, legal mining operations significantly lower their prices; in 2010, “miners were selling a kilogram of tin — about two pounds — for $7 [although] the world market price averaged $18 dollars a kilo” (Raghavan, 2014). Due to this competition, miners only earn one to five

dollars a day, which constitutes around fourteen hours of manual labor (Wolfe, 2015). Many of the miners are women, who support themselves and their children through their meager earnings (Wolfe, 2015). However, artisanal miners are the ones most prominently impacted by the conflict mineral trade market. They operate independently, neither under the jurisdiction of a mining corporation nor under the control of militia groups (Blanco, 2016). As a result, they earn the equivalent of less than one dollar per day and are at risk for attacks by militia groups looking to seize control of the mine (Blanco, 2016). These mines are also rife with smuggling. In 2013, around “$400 million in gold was smuggled out [from] artisanal mines” (Raghavan, 2014). The state of the “conflict-free” mineral industry in the DRC exemplifies dependency theory (which explores the cyclic relationship between developing countries that provide raw resources and developed countries that provide finished goods). The DRC, as a developing country, supplies raw goods to developed countries at very low prices, thus bolstering the economic growth of the developed countries. Meanwhile, the DRC’s own development stagnates, as it (an other such developing countries) often cannot afford to purchase the finished goods acquired from developed countries, which prevents the modernization of its own economy. The conflict mineral trade market has not gone unnoticed by governments. Currently, the most definitive reformatory

legislation implemented toward regulating the conflict mineral trade is Section 1502 of the United States’ Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, signed into law on July 21, 2010, Section 1502 “imposes additional reporting requirements on U.S. companies regarding their sources of certain ‘conflict minerals’” (Ayogu & Lewis, 2016). It attempts to cut off the flow of money, which aides conflict mineral suppliers and (by extension) “financ[es] conflict in the DRC region” (Davis, 2017). Becoming law in 2014, Section 1502 requires MNCs that participate in an industry where conflict minerals are “‘necessary to the functionality or production’” of their products to file paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and publish an annual conflict minerals report (Ayogu & Lewis, 2016). To properly complete this report, MNCs must thoroughly examine their supply chain, conduct “third-party verification” (hire a third party to audit their trade policies), and list whether the areas from which they acquire 3TG minerals are conflict-free (Ayogu & Lewis, 2016). The purpose of Section 1502 is to publicize their mineral supply chain, thereby exposing any connections to DRC militia suppliers. By forcing MNCs to publicly state whether their products contain DRC conflict minerals, Section 1502 uses the “name and shame” tactic — impacting the corporation’s “brand” and letting consumers determine whether to continue utilizing the offending MNC’s goods and services (Ayogu & Lewis, 2016). Furthermore, the compliance costs MNCs incur by having to adhere to

Section 1502 “fall between $9 billion and $16 billion,” attempt to incentivize MNCs in quickly finding conflict-free sources of 3TG minerals (Ayogu & Lewis, 2016). Section 1502 — and the Dodd-Frank Act in general — signifies a shift away from a liberal economic mindset. Instead, Section 1502 is a more realist economic policy, designed to introduce some amount of government regulation that directs how companies should interact in the economy. Nearly eight years after it passed into law — and four years after its full implementation — controversy surrounds Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act. One charge levied against Section 1502 is that it is far too lenient on MNC, as they simply do not face enough penalties for non-compliance (Paulas, 2017). An independent study that “analyzed every conflict minerals report submitted to the SEC in 2014, 2015, and 2016” categorized each MNC analyzed into one of three groups: “DRC conflict-free” (for MNCs that certified their minerals as 100% conflict free), “no reason to believe [use of conflict minerals]” (a lower standard which implies some level of uncertainty), and “DRC conflict undeterminable” (for MNCs that could not determine where their minerals were sourced from) (Davis, 2017). Only about 1% of the MNCs were classified as “DRC conflict free”, while 19% categorized as “no reason to believe,” and the remaining 80% fell in the “DRC conflict undeterminable” category (Davis, 2017). Most companies which fall under Section 1502 (like Apply, Google, and Samsung)

can absorb the compliance costs, due to their financial robustness. Furthermore, the “name and shame” tactic, which relied on the free market and consumer public to cut profits from MNCs utilizing DRC conflict minerals, was relatively ineffective (Paulas, 2017). The failure of Section 1502 to regulate the behavior of MNCs challenges the notion of whether it succeeds in promoting a realist economic policy. The second charge levied against Section 1502 is that rather than preventing militia groups from profiting off of conflict minerals, it hurts the Congolese miners working for legitimate mining operations. Although there was a correlation between “[militia] groups’ loss of control and [Section 1502’s] implementation,” many politicians and academics believe that this was due to the increase in “U.N. and Congolese army missions fighting rebel groups” (Wolfe, 2015). Since the act has not encouraged substantive efforts from MNCs to thoroughly audit and restructure their supply chains, militia groups are still able to sell their conflict minerals via smuggling, bribery, or the utilization of several intermediary traders (Paulas, 2017). The prices of conflict-free 3TG minerals have therefore dropped as smelters and refineries fear being labeled as users of conflict minerals (Raghavan, 2014). The price miners earn from conflict-free tin dropped from a price of $7 per kilo in 2010 to $4 per kilo in 2014, even though the global market price rose from $18 per kilo to $22 per kilo during that same period. Although MNCs fail to sufficiently comply with Section

1502, the Congolese government initially forced Congolese mining operations and traders to comply with Section 1502 and initiate a process which would certify their minerals as conflict-free. As a result, legitimately operated mines shut down for several months. Consequently, foreign smelting and refining companies avoided buying minerals from these mines, thus driving down the price of minerals (Raghavan, 2014). In the DRC, Section 1502 is known as “Loi Obama” (Obama’s Law) and viewed to be a well-intentioned but economically disastrous American law that influenced the Congolese government into enacting detrimental domestic mining policies (Raghavan, 2014). This phenomenon reflects the failure of both the American government and intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) such as the World Trade Organization (WTO) to account for side effects that negatively impact a benign party. Their failure reinforces the argument of critics who state that the WTO and other IGOs are ineffective in assisting developing countries and are only capable of supporting policies that favor developed countries. In February 2017, the Trump administration prepared an executive order that proposed a “two-year suspension of” the Section 1502 Dodd-Frank financial reforms (Pilkington, 2017). Although passed by the House of Representatives, it still requires confirmation from the Senate. The proposal agrees with the critics of Section 1502 and states that there is “‘mounting evidence’ that the obligation on US firms to prove to

regulators that they are not involved in blood minerals has ‘caused harm to some parties in the Democratic Republic of the Congo’” (Pilkington, 2017). The proposed suspension is extremely divisive, garnering support from critics of Section 1502 and receiving intense criticism from human rights groups who believe that Section 1502 is beginning to see some success (Pilkington, 2017). Additional criticism toward the suspension comes from critics who believe that such action would hold MNCs even less responsible and allow them to renege on the (previously agreed upon) supply chain transparency. Almost simultaneously (in May 2017), the European Union (EU) voted to adopt new import regulations on conflict minerals. The EU Conflict Minerals regulation targets “[3TG] minerals originating from conflict-affected or high-risk areas without being limited to specific geographical locations” (Deloitte, 2018). The act directly applies to corporations — only those which have headquarters in the EU — which import 3TG minerals into the EU, no matter where these metals originate from (Europa, 2017). With an application date of January 2021, the EU regulations are based on Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Act and impose similar conditions, such as supply chain inspection and publication of annual audits (Europa, 2017). Like Section 1502, the EU regulations currently have no mechanism in place for penalizing corporations that either refuse to comply with the act or utilize conflict minerals.

The future of the conflict mineral trade market is mired in uncertainty and indecision. Militias continue to wage war in the DRC, and MNCs still acquire cheap 3TG minerals for their products, with both parties engaging in indirect but mutually beneficial trade. Meanwhile, the United States and the European Union remain on the verge of implementing two opposing sets of laws, and it appears that governments are extremely conflicted on how to best stifle conflict mineral trade. As a result, legitimate Congolese mining operations and miners continue to feel the burden of low prices, are crowded out by the conflict mineral trade, and face low demand for their minerals as buyers from both the US and the EU wait for their governmentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; to ratify effective mineral trade policies. For a paradigm shift to occur, coordinated and homogenous action on the parts of both federal governments and IGOs is necessary to concretely enforce restrictions on conflict mineral trade. A successful end scenario would eliminate militia groups from the equation and involve mutually beneficial trade between MNCs and legitimate Congolese mining operations.

REFERENCES Apple. (2017). Apple Smelter and Refiner List [PDF file], https://images.apple.com/supplier-res ponsibility/pdf/Apple-Smelter-and-R efiner-List.pdf Ayogu, M., & Lewis, Z. (2016, July 28). Conflict Minerals: An Assessment of the Dodd-Frank Act. Retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/ conflict-minerals-an-assessment-of-t he-dodd-frank-act/ Blanco, A. R. (2016, January 19). Blood and minerals: Who profits from conflict in DRC? Retrieved from https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/f eatures/2016/01/blood-minerals-profi ts-conflict-drc-160118124123342.ht ml CIA. (2018, March 15). The World Factbook: CONGO, DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE. Retrieved from https://www.cia.gov/library/publicati ons/the-world-factbook/geos/cg.html Davis, Y. H. (2017, February 17). 80% of Companies Don't Know If Their Products Contain Conflict Minerals. Retrieved from https://hbr.org/2017/01/80-of-compa nies-dont-know-if-their-products-con tain-conflict-minerals Deloitte. (2018, January 22). New EU Conflict minerals regulation. Retrieved from https://www2.deloitte.com/be/en/pag es/tax/articles/New-EU-Conflict-min erals-regulation-implications-and-les

sons-learnt-from-the-Dodd-Frank-Act-in-the -US.html Europa. (2017, December 13). Conflict Minerals Regulation explained. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/in-fo cus/conflict-minerals-regulation/regu lation-explained/ Lee, D. (2014, May 30). 'Conflict minerals' deadline looms for technology firms. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/technolog y-27635301 Luckerson, V. (2014, June 03). Apple, Amazon, Intel Address the Conflict Minerals in Your Smartphone. Retrieved from http://time.com/2819594/conflict-mi nerals-apple-google-intel-amazon/ Metalary. (n.d.). Tantalum Price. Retrieved from https://www.metalary.com/tantalumprice/ Paulas, R. (2017, August 03). How the Conflict Minerals Rule Failed. Retrieved from https://psmag.com/economics/how-t he-conflict-minerals-rule-failed Pilkington, E. (2017, February 08). Proposed Trump executive order would allow US firms to sell 'conflict minerals'. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/us-ne ws/2017/feb/08/trump-administration -order-conflict-mineral-regulations Polgreen, L. (2008, January 23). Congo's Death Rate Unchanged Since War Ended. Retrieved from

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/23 /world/africa/23congo.html

how-dodd-frank-is-failing-congo-mi ning-conflict-minerals/

Raghavan, S. (2014, November 30). How a well-intentioned U.S. law ended up hurting poor Congolese miners. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/wo rld/africa/how-a-well-intentioned-uslaw-left-congolese-miners-jobless/20 14/11/30/14b5924e-69d3-11e4-9fb4a622dae742a2_story.html?utm_term =.180625f0c2e7 Reuters. (2009, April 08). Ban on 'conflict minerals' would hurt Congo's poor. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/idUS L8672067 Reuters. (2017, April 06). Tech firms must go beyond Congo's 'conflict minerals' to clean... . Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/us-c ongo-minerals-supply/tech-firms-mu st-go-beyond-congos-conflict-minera ls-to-clean-supply-chain-study-idUS KBN1781M1 Rockwood, K. (2012, July 30). How a Handful of Countries Control the Earth's Most Precious Materials. Retrieved from https://www.fastcompany.com/1694 164/how-handful-countries-control-e arths-most-precious-materials Schneider. (2011, May 04). Bibliography. Retrieved from https://conflictmineral.wordpress.co m/bibliography/ Wolfe, L. (2015, February 02). How Dodd-Frank Is Failing Congo. Retrieved from http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/02/02/

Gender and Memory: Depictions of Femininity in Irish Revolutionary Art Pearl Joslyn Senior, History and Global Studies The popular narrative of the 1916 Easter Rising, which marked the start of the Irish Revolution, reflected highly gendered views of masculine and feminine roles in armed rebellion. In the gendered environment of British-ruled Ireland at the end of the Victorian Era, women were frequently pushed out of active combat roles. Instead, women were expected to aid the young men of Ireland, who were frequently sent to their deaths, a trope not uncommon in the history of revolution and warfare. These gender roles were reflected in the Irish arts during the years surrounding the 1916 Easter Rising. Depictions of masculinity and femininity in Irish Nationalist art often portrayed women as helpless victims of British oppression, who needed young men to give their lives to protect their honor. The arts played a critical role in Irish nationalism and codified the common perception of the role women played in 1916 as passive and marginal. The adoption of this vision into the collective consciousness undermined the active role women played in the Easter Rising and subsequent war for independence, effectively rewriting the history of women who took up arms against the British and served as active combatants.

This paper compares depictions of the mythological personification of Ireland, 1 Kathleen ni Houlihan, with the true stories of female active combatants to investigate where collective memory of the Easter Rising diverged from the truth. By presenting these examples against the backdrop of traditional gender roles in the era of Irish state-building, this paper hopes to contribute to the study of gender in revolutionary Irish history. Additionally, this paper offers a critique of the over-reliance on romanticized versions of the past that derive from fiction in collective memory. This paper will shed light on the women of the revolution, whose vita role in Irish history is often overlooked. When Lady Augusta Gregory and William Butler Yeats wrote Cathleen ni Houlihan in 1901, they did not expect it to become a rallying cry for revolution. The play, however, became a sort of call to arms among young nationalists who saw a vision of renewal in the play’s conclusion. The play’s influence on society horrified Yeats and Gregory, who feared that the outcome of a violent revolution would not only be disastrous for Ireland, but also forthem as 2 members of the British aristocracy. For Yeats and Gregory, there was something romantic in their vision of Irish rebirth, but 1

A number of spellings of the name Kathleen ni Houlihan exist. For the purposes of this paper, the common spelling of Kathleen ni Houlihan is used. All other spellings are retained from the use of the authors. 2 William Butler Yeats and Lady Augusta Gregory, Cathleen ni Houlihan, in Collaborative One-Act Plays, 1901-1903, Ed. James Pethica (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006), XXXV-XXXVI.

both saw it as more of a symbolic and gradual rebirth than a sudden one brought on by revolution. In fact, Yeats saw the play in quite a different light, viewing the groom’s abandonment of his bride as symbolic of “the perpetual struggle of the cause of Ireland and every other ideal cause against private hopes and dreams, against all that we 3 mean when we say the world.” While Yeats and Gregory may not have intended to spur nationalists to action, their play helped awaken a movement. Cathleen ni Houlihan provided a highly gendered image of revolution, wherein young men had to give their lives to restore youth and beauty to the elderly and helpless Ireland. In fact, when the young protagonist, Michael Gillane, asks Cathleen ni Houlihan what she wants from his family she responds “If anyone would give me help he must give me himself, he must give me all.” After Cathleen ni Houlihan tells Michael that she wants him to give his life for her, he forgets everything from his old life, including his fiancé and 4 parents. The play ends with Michael’s brother, when asked if he had seen the “Old Woman” Cathleen ni Houlihan, responding “I did not; but I saw a young girl, and she 5 had the walk of a queen.” Despite the passive role she takes in sending men to their deaths, their martyrdom is shown as bringing renewal to Cathleen ni Houlihan, and thus to Ireland. This play depicts an extremely gendered and rigid power structure. Cathleen ni Houlihan exhibits little agency over her own life, while the

young men of Ireland are forced to take on violent roles to protect her youth, beauty, and purity. Cathleen ni Houlihan was based on Yeats’ earlier poem “Kathleen the Daughter of Hoolihan and Hanrahan the Red.” The poem, in contrast to the play, presents Kathleen ni Houlihan as the object of the protagonist’s desire, rather than the distraction from love that she is presented as 6 in the play. The evolution of the use of Kathleen ni Houlihan from the poem to the play is perhaps due to Lady Gregory’s influence, or the need for higher stakes and greater conflict in a stage play than in a short poem. Regardless of the motivation for the evolution, Kathleen ni Houlihan still serves the same purpose as the personification of Ireland, the object of love. As such, she is used in both works to disguise nationalist sympathies under the 7 guise of romance. Yeats was somewhat self-conscious of being overtly nationalistic, surely for personal reasons, but also for the sake of his writing. He worried that more frank allusions to nationalism weakened the structure of a work. This is evidenced in William Dall Hefernan’s poem about Kathleen ni Houlihan, which is much more 8 overtly political and less romantic. By presenting a highly romanticized version of this story, Yeats was able to avoid accusations of nationalism by instead

Phillip L. Marcus, Yeats and Artistic Power (New York: NYU, 1992), 56. 7 Marcus, Artistic Power, 56. 8 Marcus, Artistic Power, 56-57. 6

Yeats and Gregory, XXXVII. 4 Yeats and Gregory, Cathleen ni Houlihan, 92-95. 5 Yeats and Gregory, Cathleen ni Houlihan, 95.

presenting his work as carrying on the legacy of Irish myth through romanticism. A more overtly nationalist work, the poem “Roger Casement” by Eva Gore-Booth again presents a male martyr who gave his life “For the sake of God and 9 Kathleen ni Houlighaun.” This poem, written by Gore-Booth to her sister Constance Markievicz following the 1916 Easter Rising, presents a particularly interesting study because of the circumstances surrounding Roger Casement’s death. Casement was born to a Protestant family, but was raised Catholic. After trips to the Congo Free State and the Putumayo region of the Amazon to investigate atrocities being carried out under imperialism, Casement become strongly anti-imperialist. Following these experiences, Casement returned to Ireland where he worked to gain German support for the Rising. After being caught, he was executed for high treason by the British government. Casement’s trial and subsequent execution have remained a controversial subject because of the accusations of homosexuality brought against him in his trial. In the poem, Gore-Booth addresses and refutes these allegations, saying: I dream of the hatred of men, Their lies against him who knew nothing of lying,

Nor was there fear in his mind.

In the poem, Kathleen ni Houlihan again takes on a passive role, with no action by her being depicted while the central figure of the poem gives his life for her honor. Gore-Booth’s refutation of Casement’s sexuality is especially interesting, given her own queerness. Most viewed accusations against Casement as deliberate acts of character assassination aimed at destroying his legacy, and Gore-Booth was clearly no exception. The painting “Eire” by Beatrice Elvery, also known as Lady Glenavy, again depicts the figure of Kathleen ni Houlihan as the personification of Ireland. In the painting, Kathleen ni Houlihan sits in a traditional cloak in front of a Celtic cross. Holding the infant Ireland in her lap, with saints behind her and the bodies of martyrs at her feet, Kathleen ni Houlihan resembles 11 the Virgin Mary. The painting plays on the trope of the Virgin Mary as a bringer of renewal through the birth of Jesus, but again shows the figure of Kathleen ni Houlihan as a passive actor in the struggle for Irish independence. Like Yeats and Gregory’s Cathleen ni Houlihan, this painting also inspired feeling of martyrdom amongst young Irishmen, much to the shock of the artist. In fact, Lady Glenavy was inspired by Yeats and Lady Gregory’s writings to create 12 the painting. The painting was hung at St. 10

Gore-Booth, 130. Beatrice Elvery, Éire, 1907, Pearse Museum, Dublin. 12 Ann Matthews, Renegades: Irish Republican Women 1900-1922 (Cork, Ireland: Mercier Press, 2010), 26. 11

Eva Gore-Booth, “Roger Casement” in Prison Letters of Countess Markievicz, Ed. Esther Roper (New York: Krauss Reprint Company, 1970), 130. 9

Enda’s College, and upon meeting a student from the school, Lady Glenavy was horrified to learn that the painting had driven the young man to be willing to lay down his life for Ireland. Like Yeats and Gregory, Lady Glenavy had thought her work to be of little interest to Irish nationalists, and was surprised to learn of its 13 impact. These works showcase a depiction of gender roles and expectations that were in keeping with the era. In reality, women played a much more direct role in the revolution. Countess Constance Markievicz, the sister of Eva Gore-Booth, was an active combatant in the Rising, and was only spared from execution because of her 14 gender. This prevented Markievicz from being remembered as one of the martyrs of the Rising, which would help to explain her absence in the national memory of the Rising, if not for the popularity of Michael Collins and Éamon de Valera, who also avoided the firing squad. Like Collins and de Valera, Markievicz took an active role in early state formation in Ireland, even becoming the first woman elected to the 15 British Parliament. While Markievicz is, without a doubt, the most widely known woman of the Easter Rising, her memory has been overshadowed by the legacies of the men she fought beside, and by overly-critical analyses of her life and role in the Rising. One such work was Seán

O’Faoláin’s 1934 biography of the Countess, which Esther Roper published her Prison Letters of Countess Markievicz in response to. Roper’s book was an attempt to shed light on the deep personal sacrifices Markievicz made for the Rising, and to 16 prove her significance in the revolution. This book showcases what was a rare attempt at the time: Roper hoped to rewrite the popular narrative of Markievicz’s life by using primary sources to prove her involvement in the Rising. Like Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth, the women who dominated Irish politics were usually highly educated, especially compared withtheir rural counterparts. Many of the women leading the charge on issues of suffrage and independence were educated in the arts and humanities in Dublin, and as a result were very likely well-versed in Irish literature. In comparison, most Irish women were relegated to domestic roles and lived in 17 devoutly Catholic rural areas. Because of these factors, the views of the prominent Irish women of this time were not necessarily representative of the majority of Irish women. Instead, these were the views of a small class of elites who had the ability to dedicate their time to political causes. Regardless, these women fought for the rights of all Irish women and many joined in with the nationalist cause, often hoping that 16

Marcus, Artistic Power, 123-124. 14 Loredana Salis, “The Duty and Pleasure of Memory: Constance Markievicz”, Studi Irlandesi. A Journal of Irish Studies, No. 8 (June, 2018). 15 Salis. 13

Salis. Margaret Ward, "'Suffrage First-Above all Else!' an Account of the Irish Suffrage Movement". Feminist Review 0, no. 10 (Spring, 1982): 21. https://search-proquest-com.libproxy.temple.edu/doc view/1300471635?accountid=14270. 17

independence would afford more leeway for women’s rights issues. Women were active in the nationalist movement for decades before the Easter Rising, and played an important role in merging Irish literary movements with nationalism. Alice Milligan, an author, poet, and Gaeilgeoir (Irish speaker), became a prominent figure in the Irish literary world at the turn of the century. She befriended Yeats, along with other writers of the Irish literary revival. As editors of the nationalist literary publication The Northern Patriot, and later The Shan Van Vocht, she and writer Anna Johnson gave a voice to some of the rising figures in the nationalist movement, most notably James Connolly. Milligan and Johnson published Connolly’s early socialist writings under the Irish Socialist Republican Party. Milligan’s upper-middle class Methodist roots afforded her the opportunity to create The Shan Van Vocht and further the merging of Irish 18 artistic society with the nationalist cause. In these ways, the nationalist movement was more inclusive of women than traditional society, however, female participation was still greatly limited within some nationalist organizations and circles. The Inghean A na h-Eireann (meaning the Daughters of Ireland) was founded in 1900 by Maud Gonne and Helana Maloney, and was the predecessor to Cumann Na mBan. This occurred at the same time as the circulation of the Bean na h-Eireann, a pamphlet for women. Eight

years later, the Irish Women’s Franchise League was created, followed by Fianna Na 19 h-Eireann a year later. The organizations formed the early basis for the participation of women in the Easter Rising. As nationalist activity increased, James Connolly and James Larkin formed the Irish Citizen Army in 1913. The Irish Citizen Army offered full equality to women, and drew upon members, including women, from the Irish Transport and General 20 Workers’ Union. These early groups encouraged women to be politically engaged and work alongside men to further the cause of Irish independence. Additionally, the groups attracted women who had already been engaged in the suffrage movement. These women could bring powerful organizing skills to the nationalist movement. The results of women’s participation through separate organizations, however, were usually not so evenly balanced. It is worth further investigating Maud Gonne’s relationship with the revolution, and with nationalist works. Gonne, an heiress and member of the Irish aristocracy, seemingly developed deep nationalist sympathies, or was at least very good at pretending she had. It was observed that she used charm to gain the trust of nationalist men who were initially suspicious of the ethnically English heiress suddenly appearing in nationalist circles. As a result, Gonne was able to work her way into what had until then been male-only 19

Matthews, Renegades, 27-28.

Gore-Booth, 14. Gore-Booth, 14-15.

areas. Gonne’s sympathies were reflected in her participation in organizing the centenary events commemorating the 1798 rebellion. It was during this period of event planning that Gonne and Yeats grew close and began a 21 relationship. This close relationship between Yeats and Gonne is somewhat surprising, given Yeats’ hesitance toward radical nationalism and concerns over maintaining his position in society. Yeats’ relationship with Gonne lasted for several years, however, and it was ultimately Gonne who inspired Cathleen ni Houlihan, according to Yeats. Trying to avoid the play being viewed as a work of nationalist propaganda, Yeats let the public know that the idea for the play came to him in a dream. The connections between Kathleen ni Houlihan in the play and Gonne are obvious, and it was unsurprising that Gonne was cast 22 in the lead role. Gonne’s relationship with Yeats highlights the important ways in which these nationalist works were really thinly veiled depictions of real events, which in retrospect hinted at the looming Easter Rising. In the case of Cumann na mBan, the women’s branch of the armed independence movement, the highly gendered nature of Irish society in the early twentieth century was replicated within the independence movement. In the years leading up to the revolution, the women of Cumann na mBan Adrian Frazier, "Cathleen ni Houlihan, Yeats's Dream, and the Double Life of Maud Gonne", Sewanee Review 121, no. 2 (2013): 225-233, https://muse-jhu-edu.libproxy.temple.edu/article/506 240 (accessed December 7, 2018). 22 Frazier, “Yeats’ Dream”.

were relegated to the secondary role of collecting funds and excluded from decision-making processes, despite the centrality of equality to the movement. This was in part caused by the unwillingness of the leadership of the Irish Volunteers to risk alienating members by giving women a more active role in the organization. Because of these factors, despite being the Cumann na mBan President, Constance Markievicz focused much more effort on the Citizen Army, which allowed the 23 participation of women. Simultaneously, many of the women in the organization agreed that women should take on a subsidiary role. At a 1914 Cumann na mBan meeting, member Alice Stopford Green expressed a desire “that the women of Ireland would band themselves into a real body of volunteers,” but clarified this role, by explaining that she meant for women to take on the task of collecting money for the 24 Irish Volunteers. It was not until after the 1916 Easter Rising that Cumann Na mBan gained a more active role in the independence movement. Even then, the sentiment was in response to the need for more fighters during the war for 25 independence rather than a shift in values. These views on women’s participation were influenced by mainstream views of appropriate conduct by women, even though these views undermined the goals of the revolution.

Ward, “Irish Suffrage”. Cal McCarthy, Cumann na mBan and the Irish Revolution (Cork: The Collins Press, 2007), 23. 25 Ward, “Irish Suffrage”. 24

Even Markievicz grew tired of the constant uphill battle to be recognized as an equal in the revolution. Spared from execution because of her gender, Markievicz aired some of her frustrations in letters sent from prison to her sister. She recalled, “It is such years since we served on committees together: not since we went out to force a suffrage bill through Parliament. I have no ambition to vote for an English Parliament, and don’t suppose I would use it,” and then conjectured, “I think I am beginning to believe in anarchy. Laws work out as 26 injustice, legalized by red tape.” Markievicz seemed to have grown tired of the barriers she faced in her activism, enough that she at least ruminated on the benefits of anarchy. These feelings were no doubt inspired by the sexism she faced in the revolutionary movement, evidenced by her discussion of her work as a suffragette, and her difficulty asserting women’s rights in the republican movement. The literature of the period surrounding the Easter Rising reflects the general attitudes of the era toward women’s role in the nationalist movement. Yeats and Gregory’s Cathleen ni Houlihan presents femininity as being based in youth. Additionally, the play presents a feminized depiction of Ireland that has lost its purity. The male figures in the play are tasked with regaining Ireland’s purity, by giving their lives in an act of violence. As such, the figure of Kathleen ni Houlihan exhibits almost no agency over her own life, creating a highly unbalanced power structure. Yeats’ 26

earlier depiction of Kathleen ni Houlihan presents Ireland as a young, attractive woman, but still reinforces this lack of agency. In her painting, Éire, Lady Glenavy depicts Kathleen ni Houlihan as a maternal figure, but again her presence is secondary to the main, male figure. Finally, in her poem “Roger Casement”, Eva Gore-Booth constructs a rigid gender landscape, where a dominant male figure gives his life for the virtue of Kathleen ni Houlihan. When juxtaposed with the actual roles women played in the revolution and the trials they faced because of their gender, it is clear that these works were not an accurate reflection of the roles women took on during the revolutionary period. Constance Markievicz took an active enough role in the combat surrounding the Rising to warrant her imprisonment. While she was spared the same fate as her male counterparts, this wasonly because of societal standards of the era. When compared to the passive roles artists portrayed Kathleen ni Houlihan in, it is clear that the popularity of these works is more based in the popularity of romanticism and reflections of traditional gender roles than in historical accuracy. It is the unfortunate nature of these works, mostly created by women, that they are reflective of the ideals of the time and projecting a simplified narrative of national history. As a result, these works overshadow the stories of the real women of the Rising, and steer the national narrative toward the stories of male participants.

Markievicz, Prison Letters, 174.

The impacts of these artistic works have carried over into the popular narrative of the Easter Rising, which centers on the martyrs and male figures of the Rising while overlooking the stories of the women involved. These artistic works compose an important segment of Irish history by highlighting the importance of romantic art to the national narrative. At the same time, they need to exist alongside a greater awareness of the contributions real women made to the revolution. Unless these two stories can exist in the national consciousness simultaneously, an important aspect of the story of Irish revolution will continue to be overlooked.

REFERENCES Elvery, Beatrice. Éire, 1907. Pearse Museum, Dublin. http://pearsemuseum.ie/online-tour/tour-of-t he-house/ and http://www.askaboutireland.ie/learning-zone /secondary-students/art/art-in-ireland/theme s-in-irish-art/. Accessed December 3, 2018.

.edu/docview/1300471635?accountid=1427 0. Yeats, William Butler and Lady Augusta Gregory. Cathleen ni Houlihan in Collaborative One-Act Plays, 1901-1903. Ed. James Pethica. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006.

Frazier, Adrian. "Cathleen ni Houlihan, Yeats's Dream, and the Double Life of Maud Gonne". Sewanee Review 121, no. 2 (2013): 225-233. https://muse-jhu-edu.libproxy.temple.edu/art icle/506240 (accessed December 7, 2018). Gore-Booth, Eva. “Roger Casement” in Prison Letters of Countess Markievicz. Ed. Esther Roper. New York: Krauss Reprint Company, 1970. Marcus, Phillip L. Yeats and Artistic Power. New York: NYU, 1992. Matthews, Ann. Renegades: Irish Republican Women 1900-1922. Cork, Ireland: Mercier Press, 2010. McCarthy, Cal. Cumann na mBan and the Irish Revolution. Cork: The Collins Press, 2007. Salis, Loredana. “The Duty and Pleasure of Memory: Constance Markievicz”, Studi Irlandesi. A Journal of Irish Studies. No. 8 (June, 2018). https://doi.org/10.13128/SIJIS-2239-3978-2 3387 Ward, Margaret. "'Suffrage First-Above all Else!' an Account of the Irish Suffrage Movement". Feminist Review 0, no. 10 (Spring, 1982): 21. https://search-proquest-com.libproxy.temple

Gridlock in Global Ocean Governance: Diverging National Interests in the South China Sea Wesley Nappen Senior, Political Science I. Introduction One of the greatest challenges to global governance has been in the realm of the global commons. This term refers to aspects of the world that no particular nation controls, but every nation relies upon for its own political, economic, and security needs. One area that falls into this category is the oceans (Patrick 2014, 67). When 168 parties ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in 1994, it was intended to serve as an international agreement that gave the United Nations the mandate to enforce laws of the sea and facilitate resolutions over any maritime disputes through international cooperation. However, the United Nations is experiencing gridlock in its ability to fully enforce UNCLOS, particularly in the South China Sea. For centuries, the countries that surround the area have contested the many islands, atolls, and reefs that are situated throughout the South China Sea. Even with the acceptance of UNCLOS as universal law, the conflict over sovereignty rights to the South China Sea stills persists in contemporary global governance. In fact, the dispute over this territory has been more contentious than ever in recent years, revealing major faults in the UN’s ability to

govern the world’s oceans (Beckman 2013, 142-145). The purpose of this paper is to determine what solutions the UN can implement through the use of UNCLOS to resolve the dispute in the South China Sea. Since 1947, the Republic of China has been the driving force behind the South China Sea dispute, staking claim to the entirety of the South China Sea based on maps that make territorial claims dating back to the 2nd Century. The issue has escalated since then with Taiwan also making claims for the entirety of the South China Sea, the Philippines and Malaysia making territorial claims in the region in the 1970s, China forcefully removing Vietnamese soldiers from already occupied islands in 1974, and Brunei and Indonesia making small claims of ocean territory in the 1990s. Meanwhile, UNCLOS met on three separate occasions following World War II, drawing out laws on additional issues, such as continental shelf limits and exclusive economic zones (EEZs) for coastal states. Despite all six nations listed above being party to UNCLOS, they continue to challenge one another over sovereignty in the South China Sea. The reasons for this enduring struggle are threefold: UNCLOS does not address issues involving sovereignty, China is strategically delaying any diplomatic resolutions from occurring, and the discovery of natural resources in the region has made the dispute more economic in nature (Fravel 2011, 292-296). There are a variety of political theories that can explain the perpetuation of

the South China Sea dispute. One is that the rise of globalization and the growing interconnectedness of states has led to harder problems for global governance to solve (Hale, Held & Young 2014, 43-45). The dispute in the South China Sea is not simply a dispute over territory between regional actors, as the entire globe will be economically impacted by the results of this dispute. This is because 25 percent of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s trade passes through the South China Sea annually (Ba 2011, 270). Furthermore, the discovery of large quantities of oil beneath the sea floor and increased competition between international fishing industries has made the legal control of ocean territory even more consequential for actors involved in maritime conflicts, such as the South China Sea dispute (Anand 1981, 453). Therefore, this dispute has become economic on a regional and global scale. A second theory that explains this dispute is the dilemma of institutional inertia, in which the rules of global governance that were enacted decades ago are difficult to change in order to address modern conflicts (Held, Hale & Young 2014, 41-43). This is potentially relevant in the South China Sea dispute due to the lack of governance over ocean sovereignty in UNCLOS. Although UNCLOS successfully outlined how to address coastal boundaries, it failed to address what might be done if those boundaries were challenged. Furthermore, the theory of institutional inertia bears economic significance as well, as the territorial regulations laid out by UNCLOS have made the consolidation of

island features in disputed waters even more consequential. This paper concludes that the dispute in the South China Sea can be explained by theories that point to the nature of hard problems and institutional inertia as the reasons behind gridlock. This can be seen through the growth and variety of actors that have staked their interests in the South China Sea and the economic impacts the dispute could force upon the globe as a whole. Furthermore, the discovery of large quantities of natural resources in the region has made the dispute more economically consequential for the Asian actors involved. The difficulty in resolving this conflict is exacerbated by the fact that UNCLOS does not address issues of ocean sovereignty, though it does address natural resource extraction in the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s oceans. With the political will of the actors involved and the governing capabilities on UNCLOS, joint resource extraction (known as energy cooperation) could bring about economic benefits in the region that would outweigh the desire to compete for sovereign territory (Buszynski & Sazlan 2007, 157). This paper traces the history of the South China Sea dispute from the years following World War II to the issues of present day. The purpose is to understand the origins of the conflict and why it is such a seemingly endless and complex issue. Secondly, this paper analyzes the history of global ocean governance and origins of UNCLOS in order to determine what the UN had set out to accomplish in establishing its own sea laws and exactly which laws are

pertinent in discussing the South China Sea dispute. Lastly, this paper examines the current state of the South China Sea dispute, how the global governing institutions are trying to resolve the conflict, and what solutions can be applied to improve the nature of global ocean governance in the region.

II. Alternative Explanations

and Young assert that, “There are two ways in which problems have gotten harder. First, as argued above, different kinds of problems, issue areas that previously fell neatly into national boundaries, have become subject to the logic of interdependence. Moreover, old and new problems alike now penetrate deeper into societies, requiring larger policy adjustments…to achieve cooperation” (Held, Hale and Young 2014, 44).

The South China Sea dispute is an incredibly complex situation, with potential ramifications that could affect the global community as a whole. In short, the dispute involves six key actors: China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Brunei. Each of these actors have overlapping territorial claims to different parts of the South China Sea, which include the sea’s natural resources and land features. However, it has been demonstrated in recent years that these states lack the political will to resolve their differences in this matter (Smith 2010, 215). In a globalized world, where states must cooperate with one another in order to solve international disputes peacefully, this inability to solve problems is referred to as gridlock. In their pivotal work, Gridlock: Why Global Cooperation Is Failing When We Need It Most, Thomas Hale, David Held, and Kevin Young present multiple theoretical explanations for why international cooperation becomes gridlocked in modern society. One of these explanations is referred to as harder problems. In this explanation, Hale, Held

The logic of harder problems is potentially relevant in the case of the South China Sea dispute. States involved in the dispute are heavily interdependent on each other because of their shared geography, and the economic ramifications of this dispute have the potential to impact average citizens across different societies. Additionally, the blatant territorial disputes are accentuated by the economic value of retaining sovereign territory in the South China Sea. International legal studies scholar R.P. Anand affirms, “With the discovery of oil under the sea prior to the end of the Second World War, and coastal fishery resources increasingly threatened by larger and better equipped ships of distant-water fishing States, conflicts between the wider claims of coastal States to protect their economic interests, on the one hand, and attempts by major maritime Powers to maintain the status quo, on the other…” (1981, 453). Therefore, the complications over territorial interests in the South China Sea are made even harder due to the underlying economic interests of the actors involved. The first step in understanding how the gridlock in

the South China Sea is attributed to harder problems is by analyzing the interests of all the key actors. III. Ocean Governance and the South China Sea The South China Sea covers 3.5 million kilometers of sea area and is surrounded by China, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Brunei. The area is dotted with various islands, shoals, reefs, rocks, and cays. The most significant landmasses in the South China Sea are the Parcel Islands and the Spratly Islands. Furthermore, the South China Sea is rich in sea-life and oil reserves, and serves as a major shipping route that dates back centuries. (Gao and Jia 2013, 99). It is also necessary to understand the individual interests that each state listed above has in this region. When studying the dispute in the South China Sea, a common concept is the nine-dash line, which is the entire basis for China’s interest in the region. This line refers to a geographic line, split into nine dashes, that outlines the territorial claims made by China, which essentially encompasses the entirety of the South China Sea. The earliest documentation of this line can be found in copies of atlases dating back to 1947, which were circulated by the Chinese government. When questioned, the Chinese government often avoids discussion over the legality and legitimateness over this line, citing ancient historical sovereign rights to the area. However, many scholars agree that this line

likely came about due to China’s desire to reconstruct its sovereign claims in the postwar era (Goa and Jia 2013, 103). Since the 1940s, China has continuously promulgated its Declaration on the Territorial Sea, which asserts its claims to the territory within the nine-dash line. China has done this prior to the discussion of uniform maritime law, during the diplomatic collaborations over UNCLOS, and in anticipation to the establishment of UNCLOS (Goa and Jia 2013, 104). In fact, China has most recently publicized its vague claims to the South China Sea with a note verbale to the United Nations in 2011, which states “China has indisputable sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea and the adjacent waters, and enjoys sovereign rights and jurisdiction over the relevant waters as well as the seabed and subsoil thereof. China’s sovereignty and related rights and jurisdiction in the South China Sea are supported by abundant historical and legal evidence” (Chinese Foreign Ministry). Since the years following World War II, China’s assertions of its claims within the nine-dash line have become such fundamental aspects of the discussion about the South China Sea that the basis of the line itself has been lost in discussion. Therefore, China’s role in the dispute has become less about why the nine-dash line exists, and more about how to encourage China to engage in diplomatic discussion over its overarching sovereign claims. Vietnam also stakes its claims in the South China Sea based on historical

references, in which the Vietnamese government declares that they have sovereign rights to the Parcel Islands that date back to the 16th Century during the Nguyen Dynasty. In fact, South Vietnam occupied these islands until 1974, when the Chinese military took advantage of the chaos during the Vietnam War to forcefully remove South Vietnamese troops from the islands. Following the country’s reunification after the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese military felt it finally had the strength to reassert itself in the South China Sea. With the deliberations of UNCLOS underway in the late 20th Century, Vietnam formally declared the Parcel Islands, as well as the Spratly Islands, as a part of its territorial waters. Vietnam still asserts this claim today and has a military presence on many of the Parcel and Spratly Islands (Buszynski & Sazlan 2007, 146). The Philippines also has a historical basis for its claims, which can be traced back to more recent history. The Filipino government argues that they have sovereign rights over the Spratly Islands due to the discovery of the islands by Filipino Admiral Thomas Cloma. Allegedly, Cloma came across the islands in 1956 and found them to be uninhabited, claiming the landmasses for the Philippines. Cloma intended to formally declare his discovery to the United Nations, but was captured by the Taiwanese navy before he could do so. The Filipino government continues to assert its claims over these islands and maintains a naval and fishing presence in that area. Meanwhile, Malaysia is simply concerned with

maintaining its legal continental shelf limit and exclusive economic zone (EEZ), which is a maritime boundary that privatizes natural resources within 200-nautical-miles of a state’s coast. In the late 1970’s and early 80’s, Malaysia began consolidating the reefs and atolls that they believed lawfully fell into its sphere of influence. However, its immediate neighbor, the Philippines, has slightly overlapped its territorial claims with that of Malaysia’s. This has led to a contested dispute between Malaysia and the Philippines in a small pocket of ocean area, where Filipino fishermen are often arrested by Malaysian law enforcement (Buszynski & Sazlan 2007, 147). Meanwhile, Indonesia is simply trying to extend its EEZ in order to support its fishing industry. Indonesia claims an EEZ that extends well beyond its continental shelf, infringing on the sovereign waters of Malaysia and Vietnam as declared by UNCLOS. Therefore, Indonesia’s primary concern in this matter is reaching an agreement on EEZ limits with its immediate neighbors (Beckman 2013, 149). Brunei is another actor that does not have a significant role in the South China Sea dispute, but is being challenged nevertheless in its territorial claims. Brunei has merely one claim to a single reef that has been made part of Malaysia’s attempt to consolidate its territory. However, this reef, which lies within Brunei’s EEZ, can bear great significance for Brunei. Without possession of this reef, Brunei’s EEZ would recede drastically, limiting the ocean area in which they can fish and extract natural resources

(Beckman 2013, 144). Lastly, Taiwan plays a minimal role in the South China Sea dispute, mainly because each state in the region respects the one-China policy. Taiwan’s position in the dispute is made even less consequential since their claims are nearly identical to China’s. However, Taiwan is excluded from any diplomatic discussion on the South China Sea due to the one-China policy. Nevertheless, Taiwan’s attempts to claim many of the large archipelagos in the South China Sea may be a means of cooperation between the two Chinas (Beckman 2013, 162). Lastly, in addition to the individual territorial interests of each country involved, the South China Sea dispute has become an even harder problem due to the economic significance of the region. As noted earlier, one quarter of the world’s trade passes through the South China Sea. Furthermore, between 80 and 90 percent of oil exports from China and Japan pass through these waters. The South China Sea is also an important fishing source that each country in the region depends on in order to support their national economies. However, the most important economic factor in the South China Sea is the large quantities of hydrocarbon resources that have been discovered in the region (Ba 2011, 270). Prior to the development of a universal law of the sea, these economic factors might not have been as significant in the discussion of the South China Sea dispute. However, the introduction of EEZs by UNCLOS allowed for the privatization of 30 percent of the world’s oceans and 95 percent of its fishing

hubs (Mansfield 2004, 317). Therefore, having control over certain areas of the South China Sea holds significant economic ramifications for those involved. It comes as no surprise that there is strong backlash against China’s nine-dash line, in which their territorial claims would give them control over a valuable trade route that is abundant in fish, oil, and other natural resources. However, it is not only the states involved in the dispute that may be affected, as states around the globe may be impacted in their ability to trade in the region. Overall, the individual interests of the states involved and the economic significance of the region as a whole have made the South China Sea dispute a gridlocked issue, in which the complexity of the dispute has made it more challenging for the international community to solve. Although the theory of harder problems does an excellent job of explaining the perpetuation of gridlock in the South China Sea dispute, there are other theoretical explanations that are worth considering, one of which is institutional inertia. Held, Hale & Young summarize the dilemma of institutional inertia by stating that “institutions are created in foundational moments to deal with the needs of that time, and reflect the attendant constellations of power and interests. But these later shift, creating a mismatch between institutions and the conditions on which they depend” (Held, Hale & Young 2014, 42). In other words, international institutions are fundamental tools in solving global issues that transcend borders. However, many of

the international institutions we are familiar with today were established generations ago. Therefore, the global challenges being faced today were not necessarily considered during the formation of these institutions. The founders of UNCLOS could not have conceived of the complexity of the South China Sea dispute as it exists today. This complexity is perpetuated by the regulations of UNCLOS itself, as the significance of different territorial sea limits, such as EEZs, has made national interests in South China Sea dispute even more substantial for those involved. UNCLOS was established to create a uniform and global law of the sea in order to make the high seas safer to access and navigate, and in many ways UNCLOS was successful. However, as the South China Sea dispute has shown, UNCLOS has failed in its ability to resolve the conflict due to inconsistencies between old laws and modern issues. IV. Origins of UNCLOS Prior to UNCLOS, the world’s oceans were largely governed by the Freedom of the Seas Doctrine, which dates back to the 17th century. Under this doctrine, states only held sovereignty over waters that extended three nautical miles from its coastline, in which the rest of the world’s oceans were considered international waters. However, after World War II, many nations began to recognize the growing demand for natural resource extraction, an increasing number of entangled land claims, a rise of pollution in the world’s ocean, and strengthening demands to extend maritime territorial claims. This prompted the newly

formed United Nations to address the need to replace the Freedom of the Seas Doctrine with a modern law of the sea (United Nations Office of Legal Affairs 2012). The formation of UNCLOS began in 1956 when the United Nations held the first UNCLOS conference (UNCLOS I) in Geneva, Switzerland. This conference brought about four fundamental treaties that were all eventually entered into effect by 1966. One of these treaties is known as the Convention of the Continental Shelf, which gave states sovereign rights over its surrounding continental shelf. This allows states to legally control shallow ocean area around its landmass, which can extend up to 24 nautical miles from a state’s shore. Following UNCLOS I came the second conference on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS II), which was also held in Geneva in 1960. However, this conference only lasted a few weeks and failed to bring about any further laws or agreements (United Nations Office of Legal Affairs 2012). The pivotal moment in UNCLOS’ history occurred in 1967 when Maltese diplomat, Arvid Pardo, brought the issue of clashing maritime territorial claims to the floor of the United Nations. This led to the third and final conference on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS III) in 1973. This conference, which was held in New York City and did not conclude until 1982, was both monumental and highly productive; laying the groundwork for UNCLOS as the world knows it today. UNCLOS III established regulations over many pivotal topics, such as territorial waters, contiguous

zones, EEZs, and continental shelves. The laws over territorial waters ruled that states had complete sovereignty up to 12 nautical miles from its coast, which gave states the freedom to use and regulate these waters as they saw fit. This area essentially became a territorial extension of a state’s landmass. Furthermore, laws on contiguous zones gave states an additional extra 12-nautical-miles of water to enforce taxation and immigration laws. The laws on EEZs established that states had economic rights in ocean area up to 200-nautical-miles from its coast, giving them the ability to privatize natural resources, such as fish. Lastly, states were given rights to a larger continental shelf limit, which could extend up to 350 nautical miles. This gave states the rights to any non-living resources, such as oil, gas, and minerals submerged in the shelf soil. These new regulations, and UNCLOS as a whole, were officially ratified and put into effect on November 16, 1994. The convention was ratified by 168 parties, including China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, and the Philippines. (United Nations Office of Legal Affairs 2012). Traditionally, since the establishment of UNCLOS, maritime disputes were to be settled under the Optional Protocol of Signature Concerning the Compulsory Settlement of Disputes. Under this protocol, any party to UNCLOS could bring a dispute within the jurisdiction of UNCLOS to an International Court of Justice (Jessup 1959, 262-263). Normally, these same rules would apply to the South China Sea dispute. However, UNCLOS does not address issues

involving sovereignty, as the regulations over coastal waters laid out in UNCLOS III already established what territory legally falls within a state’s sphere of influence. Therefore, UNCLOS technically has no legal precedent in dealing with states challenging each other’s ocean claims based upon sovereign land disputes (Smith 2010, 220). However, it is important to note that although UNCLOS has no jurisdiction over sovereignty matters, the dispute over sovereignty in the region is deeply rooted in the laws laid out by UNCLOS. According to UNCLOS, every island that falls within the legal territory of a country has its own EEZ. Therefore, if an island claimed by a particular state lies 50 nautical miles off its coast, then the state’s true EEZ begins at the coast of that particular island. This is what makes certain geographic features, such as the Spratly Islands and the Parcel Islands, a fundamental aspect of the South China Sea dispute as a whole. However, UNCLOS’ definition of an island must meet specific parameters, including natural formation, ability to sustain human life, and land features that stand above sea level at high tide. Less than 40 features in the Spratly Islands alone meet the criteria of an island under UNCLOS (Beckman 2013, 149-151). Because of this, particular land features in the South China Sea have been more contested than others. The actors involved in the South China Sea dispute are staking their claims based on the rationale that their ability to control certain islands in the region would give them the legal ability to exploit

the region for their economies as they please. However, as noted above, UNCLOS does not have the legal capacity to address the sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea, as the founders of UNCLOS anticipated that the laws themselves would put any sovereignty disputes to rest. It is this institutional inertia by UNCLOS that is preventing cooperation and perpetuating gridlock in the South China Sea. V. Gridlock in the South China Sea The gridlock in the South China Sea dispute is mainly driven by the historical claims made by the large, and militarily advanced actors in the region such as China. These historical claims outweigh the territorial regulations laid out by UNCLOS. However, UNCLOS does address the concept of historic waters in some respects. States are considered to have historic rights to waters where it has exercised its sovereign rights for a significant period of time, regardless of the territorial regulations laid out by UNCLOS. In other words, a state may be able to claim legal historic rights to waters based on length of time and degree of activity in the area. However, these regulations are extremely vague, which makes it difficult to gauge which actor truly has historic claim to specific areas of the South China Sea. It is dubious that any of the actors in the South China Sea actually have a logical basis for their historical claims. These actors have been extremely volatile in recent history, and some did not even become independent nations until the 20th century (Keyoun 1999, 40-44). Therefore, it seems extremely unlikely that

the concept of historical waters offers logical support to the interests of each actor in the dispute. The only actor that has retained relative internal stability and a longstanding existence in the region is China. Nevertheless, many of these actors, China in particular, are pushing hard to ensure they retain their perceived sovereign rights. However, it can be argued that the debates over historical claims in the South China Sea are merely a façade for the real interests in the area. As noted earlier, the South China Sea has incredible economic value for whichever state dominates its waters. If the debate was truly over historic rights, it is likely China would be willing to cooperate and present evidence that justifies its nine-dash line. However, this has not been the case in recent years. China’s strategy in the South China Sea throughout the past few decades has been one of strategic delay. Political scientist M. Taylor Fravel summarizes, “Since the mid-1990s, China has pursued a strategy of delaying the resolution of the dispute. The goal of this strategy is to consolidate China’s claims, especially to maritime rights or jurisdiction over these waters, and to deter other states from strengthening their own claims at China’s expense, including resource development projects that exclude China” (Fravel 2011, 293). China has achieved this strategy of delay in a variety of ways. First, China is diplomatically delaying a resolution in the South China Sea by only being open to cooperation on a bilateral level. The other actors in the dispute who wish to resolve the

conflict multilaterally staunchly oppose this (Fravel 2011, 300). Secondly, China is delaying cooperation by taking a more active role in maritime administration in the South China Sea. It has expanded its jurisdiction in the South China Sea by policing the waters and preventing illegal fishing and hydrocarbon extraction from occurring. This increased level of Chinese maritime law enforcement has stifled other state actors’ willingness for cooperation (Fravel 2011, 303). Lastly, China has achieved its strategy of delay through military means. With a strong and modernized navy at its disposal, China has been able to retain its claims in the South China Sea by using intimidation tactics and forcefully expelling foreign actors from territory that China claims as its own. China’s overbearing military capabilities has limited other nation’s bargaining power to resolve the conflict, thus limiting future cooperation (Fravel 2011, 307). It is evident based on China’s current strategy in the South China Sea that it does not intend on appealing its historical claims to UNCLOS and the international justice system. Rather, China is using coercive methods to enhance its economic status in the South China Sea. As noted earlier, the dispute can be explained by the theories of harder problems and institutional inertia because of the underlying economic interests of the states seeking sovereignty rights in the region. However, despite China’s aggressive attempts to consolidate the South China Sea for itself, it continues to be challenged by its neighbors, which have

the ability to jointly move against China in unison. Furthermore, the ongoing challenges by China’s neighbors limit China’s and other states’ abilities to efficiently use the economic resources in the region. Therefore, it is possible that economic incentives may be the key to multilateral cooperation in the South China Sea. It is well known that the South China Sea is a hotbed of natural resources, such as oil and fish, making it a valuable economic asset for the state actors in the region. It is established that the claims of sovereignty in the region are largely based upon the economic benefits the region can provide. However, while the sovereignty disputes continue to persist, state actors in the region are not maximizing the present economic benefits. Therefore, joint resource development, also referred to as energy cooperation, may be a form of cooperation that can resolve the South China Sea dispute. In fact, this seems the most likely course of cooperation because China has openly discussed its willingness for joint resource extraction, even while asserting that its sovereignty claims are nonnegotiable (Joyner 1998, 215). Although China’s stubbornness on this matter is unsettling, the economic incentives of energy cooperation might be enough to bring the other state actors to the negotiating table. After all, the core reason these other states assert their claims is because they need the resources in the region to support their economies. If every actor in the region is reaping the benefits the South China Sea has to offer, the debate over sovereignty becomes

somewhat obsolete. UNCLOS could play an important role in establishing this joint resource development, as it already has laid out ground rules for activities, such as deep seabed mining. Therefore, UNCLOS could help in guiding this potential energy cooperation in a legally efficient direction, giving the institution more authority in resolving the dispute (Joyner 1998, 216). However, the state actors involved need to harness the political will to bring this cooperation about. This requires trust, communication, and persistence. Only time will tell if this energy cooperation will occur. VI. Conclusion The South China Sea dispute is a complex and multifaceted issue, involving many actors with diverging interests. The dispute has arisen from the clash over territorial claims in the South China Sea between the neighboring countries of China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, and the Philippines, leading to gridlock in the ability of global governing institutions to resolve the conflict. The source of this gridlock can be explained by the theories of harder problems and institutional inertia. According to the former, the growing interconnectedness of statesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; interests have made global issues more difficult to solve due to the overarching impacts that state and institutional actions can have on the global community. This theory is extremely prevalent for the state actors involved in the South China Sea dispute because their shared geography requires sincere

cooperation in order for them to efficiently utilize the regionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s natural resources to support their economies. According to the latter, the guidelines laid out by international institutions can hinder modern global governance issues because old laws are limited in their ability to solve current issues. This is also prevalent when discussing the South China Sea dispute because UNCLOS does not have the authority to intervene in sovereignty conflicts, and its own territorial laws have further exacerbated the conflict. Overall, the claims made by the countries in the South China Sea dispute are based on historical rights, territorial rights, or some combination of the two. Whatever the reason, it is argued that the underlying cause of these claims and of the dispute as a whole is the economic significance of the South China Sea. This is because the South China Sea is abundant with resources that regional actors rely on for the stability and prosperity of their economies. Furthermore, the development of UNCLOS in the late 20â&#x20AC;&#x2039;th century increased the importance of acquiring land rights in order to enhance economic dominance on the seas. This has become evident through the establishment of EEZs, which give states a 200-nautical-mile extension from their coasts to use the area as they see fit. However, recently, China has been actively preventing a resolution in the South China Sea through diplomatic, administrative, and military means, as it has been attempting to consolidate nearly all of the South China Sea for itself. Nevertheless, China has been open to the concept of

energy cooperation, which could satisfy the economic needs of all the state actors involved, thus quelling the debate over territorial claims in the South China Sea. With the political will of all the neighboring countries in the region and legal support from UNCLOS, a multilateral resource development effort might be the key to resolving the South China Sea dispute.

REFERENCES Anand, R. P. 1981. “Maritime Practice in South-East Asia until 1600 A.D. and The Modern Law of the Sea.” International and Comparative Law Quarterly30(02): 440–54. Ba, Alice D. 2011. “Staking Claims and Making Waves in the South China Sea: How Troubled Are the Waters?” Contemporary Southeast Asia33(3): 269–91. Beckman, Robert. 2013. “The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea and the Maritime Disputes in the South China Sea.” American Journal of International Law107(1): 142–63. Buszynski, Leszek, and Iskandar Sazlan. 2007. “Maritime Claims and Energy Cooperation in the South China Sea.” Contemporary Southeast Asia29(1): 143–71. Chinese Foreign Ministry. 2014. Note Verbale from the Permanent Mission of the People's Republic of China to the UN Secretary-General Note Verbale from the Permanent Mission of the People's Republic of China to the UN Secretary-General. New York City, NY: United Nations. Fravel, M Taylor. 2011. “China's Strategy in the South China Sea.” Contemporary Southeast Asia3 3(3): 292–319. Gao, Zhiguo, and Bing Bing Jia. 2013. “The Nine-Dash Line in the South China Sea: History, Status, and Implications.” American Journal of International Law107(1): 98–123.

Cooperation Is Failing When We Need It Most. Cambridge: Polity. Jessup, Phillip C. 1959. “The United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea.” Columbia Law Review59(2): 234–68. Joyner, Christopher C. 1998. “The Spratly Islands Dispute: Rethinking the Interplay of Law, Diplomacy, and Geo-Politics in the South China Sea.” The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law13(2): 193–236. Keyuan, Zou. 1999. “The Chinese Traditional Maritime Boundary Line in the South China Sea and Its Legal I Consequences for the Resolution of the Dispute over the Spratly Islands.” The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law14(1): 27–55. Mansfield, Becky. 2004. “Neoliberalism in the Oceans: ‘Rationalization,’ Property Rights, and the Commons Question.” Geoforum35(3): 313–26. Patrick, Stewart. 2014. “The Unruled World: The Case for Good Enough Global Governance.” Foreign Affairs93(1): 58–73. Smith, Robert W. 2010. “Maritime Delimitation in the South China Sea: Potentiality and Challenges.” Ocean Development & International Law41(3): 214–36. United Nations Office of Legal Affairs. 2012. “Overview - Convention &

Hale, Thomas, David Held, and Kevin Young. 2014. Gridlock: Why Global

Related Agreements.” United Nations.

The Gender Correctional Machine: Institutional Mechanisms that Reinforce a Patriarchal Gender Order in Correctional Facilities Micaela Robalino Recent Graduate, Gender, Sexuality, Women's Studies & Political Science

Introduction Mass incarceration is a feminist struggle. The growth and maintenance of a system defined in The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander as a collection of institutions and practices that locks people up on the basis of racial stigmatization and permanent marginalization (12), shapes the lives of 2.3 million criminalized people in the United States (Prison Policy Initiative). Not only does the criminal justice system disproportionately incarcerate people of color (Butler 36), but increasingly incarcerates women (Prison Policy Initiative). The gender divide in rates of incarceration continues to spike; women's state prison populations have grown 834% over the past 40 years across the United States, double the rate of men's prison population growth (Prison Policy Initiative). Nevertheless, research that addresses the particular needs of incarcerated or detained women falls short in reflecting the urgency of the matter. Michelle Alexander admits that her book ─considered today a progressive primer─ does not pay enough attention to "the unique experience of women, Latinos and immigrants in the criminal justice system, though these groups

are particularly vulnerable to the worst abuses and suffer in ways that are important and distinct" (15). As an attempt to continue to fill the gap in the literature regarding 1 women , this study aims to uncover the gender correctional machine that reinforces a patriarchal gender order within correctional facilities. By gender correctional machine, I refer to the multiple mechanisms within correctional facilities that aim to "correct" women into their traditional roles. It comes to no surprise that women who enter the criminal justice system are subtly forced to "realign" with a patriarchal gender order because "women who commit crimes have historically been characterized as those who have departed from their sex, or have otherwise crossed gender divides establishing 'appropriate' gendered behavior" (Davis 264). Correctional facilities, more commonly known as jails and prisons, follow their self-fulfilling prophecy: to correct. Beyond this, correctional facilities aim to impose a particular way of behavior -one that aligns with the traditional code of conduct that women ought to follow. The criminal justice system in the United States owns a badge that reads: "gender outlaws will be corrected back into the status quo." The status quo is one that places value on whiteness over colored-ness (race), compulsory femininity over gender nonconformity (gender), and male ascribing job skills over female ascribing ones (class). 1

The intersection between immigration and criminality, also known as crimmigration, stretches beyond the scope of this study. This phenomenon is the topic of a future study.

Previous literature that examines gender in prisons shows that correctional services try to bridge the gap between traditional femininity and criminality through the implementation of low-paying skills training, such as food, laundry, or clerical services (Davis 265), and parenting education (Kennon et. al). Nevertheless, the gender correctional machine is much more nuanced, complex, and pervasive than previous studies have shown. This study 2 takes an intersectional approach to uncover how the gender correctional machine works through two main institutional mechanisms: (1) correctional industries, and (2) exposure to patriarchal information through correctional libraries. Taking the Philadelphia Department of Prisons and the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections as a case study, I explore the complexities of these regulatory mechanisms as they play out within their contexts. In doing so, I attempt to challenge the notion that correctional industries and libraries are innocent environments for incarcerated 3 women. Situated knowledge epistemology as theoretical premise It would be misguided to assume that those who navigate the world outside of correctional systems are the true agents of 2

Intersectionality encompasses many more identity markers beyond class, gender, and race. However, only these three identity markers, and their interactions are explored in this study. 3 I am not suggesting that engaging in labor and reading have de jure negative implications for women but that the underlying mechanisms that shape such environments do.

change in a troubled criminal justice system; it would be best to call them allies who have better access to non-criminalized resources. Following Fernando Garcia's exploration of the partnership between feminist standpoint theory and critical social theory, this study sets as departure point situated knowledge epistemology. This intellectual tool ─first conceptualized by feminist scholar Donna Haraway─ complicates the feminist standpoint premise of treating agents of knowledge as spokespersons of marginalized communities and proposes "privileged and problematic knowledge situations for critical social theory" (Garcia 302). This implies that multidimensionality and fragmentation are required to understand how connected, opposing, and interacting social meanings and positionalities formulate and articulate knowledge. In this vein, Adrienne Rich's politics of location shed light on the importance of understanding positionality. She asserts that "to locate myself in my body means more than understanding what it has meant to me to have a vulva and clitoris and uterus and breasts. It means recognizing this white skin, the places it has taken me, the places it has not let me go" (Rich 372). Rich is pointing here to the privilege and marginalization that the social meaning of people's identities have over their social position. It would be naive to assume, then, that someone who has not had encounters with the criminal justice system could make an epistemological contribution to women's realities in correctional facilities.

However, as Fernando Garcia explains, "moving to a different standpoint than the one we are socialized in requires changing our own standpoint ─linked to our own identity─ which both hurts and entails a critical attitude" (302). This painful self-transformation that Garcia is referring to is possible through situated knowledge epistemology; understanding distance from and proximity to a social reality allows this study to explore the limitations and possibilities of doing research from the outside of correctional facilities, and to expose the limitations and possibilities of building resistance from the inside of correctional facilities. In this way, this study treats those who navigate the regulatory culture within correctional facilities as true agents of knowledge and change, "who are embodied, social and meaning positions, nonisomorphic and moving among diverse narrative territories" (Garcia 304). A personal story is in case here. While having a conversation with a formerly incarcerated person, I learned that the term "jailhouse 4 lawyering," or inmate-led litigation, is often perceived as a derogatory term by those who have faced incarceration. Understanding that the literature that refers to pro se defense as "jailhouse lawyering" might be perpetuating marginalization allowed me to make the decision of using non-alienating knowledge as one of the ways in which I aim to follow situated knowledge epistemology while parting with traditional methodology. The next section explains this process in detail, 4

"Jailhouse lawyering" was originally the main focus of this study. It is now presented as pro se litigation and a strategic solution to mass incarceration.

and the ways in which it plays out in the exploration of the gender machine in correctional industries and the importation of patriarchal information into prison libraries. Interpolating feminist methodology into the sociology of law Approaching the gender correctional machine is deceiving. I started the research process knowing that accessing information regarding the criminal justice system in Philadelphia would be challenging. In an effort to decipher the way the system is set up, I needed to reach out to experts beyond official government websites, such as that of the Philadelphia Department of Prisons. After talking to Professor Tricia Way ─Inside/Out Exchange Program facilitator at Temple University─, it came to my attention that the so-called Department of Prisons is actually a jail (and not prison) system. This differentiation is important because prisons hold convicted people serving long-term sentences while jails hold pretrial detainees and short-term inmates. Nevertheless, the name of Philadelphia's jail system might confuse the average person who does not study or work for the system itself. A simple distraction like this one is only the tip of the iceberg. In delving deeper into government websites, I realized how time-consuming it can be to access the limited information that the system provides. It seems like the hermetic walls that surround correctional facilities permeate into the hermetic websites that provide the public with enough information to give the appearance of justice, protection, and safety. Given that the

regulatory mechanisms at play within industries and libraries are different, I attempt to use different methods and feminist methodologies. These are described in separate sections for each branch that 5 makes the gender correctional machine. Correctional industries and the prison-industrial complex The state, a patriarchal and capitalist one, has a vested interest in maintaining the prison-industrial complex in place because it profits from it. In "Prison as a Border: A Conversation on Gender, Globalization, and Punishment," Angela Davis defines the prison industry as following: as a matter of fact, the term â&#x20AC;&#x2039;prison industryâ&#x20AC;&#x2039; can refer precisely to the production of prisoners even as the industry produces profits for increasing numbers of corporations and, by siphoning social wealth away from such institutions as schools and hospitals, child care and housing, plays a pivotal role in producing the conditions of poverty that create a perceived need for more prisons (1238).

This production of prisoners through intentional systems such as the school-to-prison pipeline benefits from racialized and gendered stigmas that 'justify' the need to control marginalized communities in the eyes of the public. For example, correctional officials use stigmas such as "mammies, matriarchs, welfare 5

This does not imply that correctional industries and libraries are the only contributors to the machine but that these are the present focus of this analysis.

recipients, and hot mommas" (Collins 69) to inform assessments of therapeutic treatment (Haney 56). The techniques that psychological services employ to intervene at women's correctional facilities deploy stereotypes that cut along race, class, and gender lines (McCorkel). Beyond the creation of a racialized, low-class, and gendered profile, the prison-industrial complex operates through a normalized assumption that prisons are natural institutions that protect society from the "deviant" further assuming that every incarcerated or detained person is a criminal. According to Andrea Smith, "uncompensated prison labor is a multimillion-dollar industry and undercuts unionized labor, forcing more people out of jobs and into poverty and thus making them more vulnerable to committing crimes of poverty" (155). The Philadelphia Prison System is not the exception. The Philadelphia Jail Inmate Handbookâ&#x20AC;&#x2039;, handed out to inmates during orientation, stipulates the following: "A number of work opportunities are available for inmates in all the PPS facilities. All assigned workers are paid a small daily wage ($1.50 per day for most workers); this pay is deposited directly into your Inmate Account. Work assignments are intended: to provide you with positive work habits and marketable skills; to keep you productively occupied; to prepare you for work opportunities after release; and to allow inmates to earn income to use in the Commissary, etc" (43).

Unashamed, the handbook reveals the extremely low wages that inmates receive. This regulatory mechanism ensures a vicious cycle of recidivism; ensuring that inmates do not make enough money while serving time is the perfect formula to have them back soon after they are released (Van Cleve 174). Perpetuating cycles of poverty and homelessness after re-entry provides the prison-industrial complex with a constant influx of new workers, also known as cheap labor. Nevertheless, a system that seems to impact class status only, also feeds the gender correctional machine. In order to explore the regulatory mechanisms at play within the industries, data on their classification and jurisdiction was extracted from the official government websites (Pennsylvania Department of Corrections and Philadelphia Department of Prisons). Then, the data was organized by the type of program they refer to; vocational, apprenticeship, or community work.

synthesize and compare data, the information below follows the format of categorization that the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections establishes.

Table 1 shows the multiple programs that make the correctional industry work in the three existing female correctional facilities in Pennsylvania, namely State Correctional Institution (SCI) Muncy and SCI Cambridge Springs, which are under the jurisdiction of the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, and Riverside Correctional Facility (RCF), which is under the jurisdiction of the Philadelphia Department of Prisons. For the two SCIs, the information was clearly categorized in the website, while for RCF the categories were broken down differently. Therefore, in an attempt to

Sources: http://www.phila.gov/prisons/programs; http://www.cor.pa.gov/Facilities/StatePrisons

Table 1. Programs offered by correctional facility.

As the table shows, the vocational programs appear to match the apprenticeship programs, or as they should be more fairly called correctional industries. It is no coincidence that women are trained, or vocationally guided ( as the system refers to it), in the same industries from which the prison-industrial complex benefit. For example, the nicely termed "technology vocational program" is the pipeline to the electronics tester industry; the optical vocational program to the

optical lab industry; or the environmental maintenance program to the laundry and dry cleaning industries. In this way, so-called vocational training is actually feeding into the industry itself, and not supporting the future of women upon release. Furthermore, these are all low-paying vocational programs and industries. It is worthy of mention that all the 'plants' under the apprenticeship program section for Riverside Correctional Facility are run by PhilaCor, a private contractor that manages the industries. Most notably, the Office of the Controller in the City of Philadelphia found that PhilaCor needs significant improvement in 2016, particularly in the design and implementation of procedures across all industries (Philadelphia Controller Office). This means that the state is aware of procedural issues in the correctional industries in Philadelphia but there is no mention of the regulatory nature of the vocational pipeline and narrow work opportunities being offered. From a Marxist-feminist perspective, the mixture of unrewarding labor and low-skill job options that incarcerated women have while serving time has a particular kind of regulatory framework in which patriarchal and capitalist values are praised. The material base of patriarchal relations in capitalist societies, like the United States, create an interdependent dynamic between capitalist values and patriarchal values (Hartman 180). Since women contribute with their labor to the prison-industrial complex, their

forced labor perpetuates male dominance and capitalist production simultaneously. For this reason, seemingly innocent vocational programs and correctional industries are actually necessary mechanisms that reinforce the gender correctional machine. Given that the correctional industries fall into either traditionally masculine jobs such as plumbing, painting, and maintenance or traditionally feminine ones such as cosmetology, customer service, and textiles, there seems to be an intention to maintain the line between gendered industries. There is an observable effort to offer seemingly gender-blind or race-blind jobs that are also low-paying ones, and therefore the opposite of gender-blind or race-blind. Thus the correctional machine reinforces racialized and gendered stigmas that keep women in low-paying industries inside correctional facilities, and prepares them to stay in them upon release. By discouraging any type of activity that does not align with the status quo in which "deviant" women inhabit, industries aim to correct women back into their limited allowable labor roles. However pervasive they are, correctional industries only make up one of the branches that holds the gender correctional machine together. The next section uncovers the ideological attempt to correct women within the facilities. Patriarchal rules in information inflow and the male gaze in facilities' libraries Much attention has been given to the importance of access to books and literature

within correctional settings (Wright 2001, McCook 2004, Billington 2011). Yet access without quality is not good enough. The content to which women are exposed to in correctional libraries matters not only for its potential in inmate-led litigation but for the creation of subjectivity within oppressive environments (McCook 2004). The acknowledgement and development of subjectivity, as an essential characteristic of agency and personhood, allows for a politicized understanding of the self and its community (Wright 35). For this reason, it is important to review the type of books that are permitted or banned from correctional facilities. The original task I set out to do when I found a datasheet of the publications that are denied and permitted in the 6 Pennsylvania Department of Corrections was to categorize each publication by subject. Nevertheless, I soon recognized the need to approach the categorization with a feminist lens not only because of the content of the publications, but because of the patterns that contribute to the maintenance of the gender correctional machine, namely the ways in which women are represented in those publications. It is paramount to examine both the 96 denied publications and the 258 permitted ones to provide a comprehensive reading of what information the correctional facility considers 6

The list is reviewed and put together by the Secretary Office in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. It is important to note that the listing is not particular to women's correctional facilities; the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections stipulates that the list applies to all facilities under their jurisdiction. SCI Muncy and SCI Cambridge Springs fall under this jurisdiction but is it not unique to them.

permissible for inmates to be exposed to. In order to analyze the contents of the publication list, I used Laura Mulvey's notion of the male gaze. Even though her analysis is grounded on the cinematic manifestations of patriarchy, her articulation of erotic objects (women) and the subjects who look at them (men) applies to the listing of denied and permitted publications because of the visual nature that most of the book covers present. In her iconic work "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema," Mulvey describes the mechanisms through which patriarchy is perpetuated in the cinematic form, as following: "The scopophilic instinct (pleasure in looking at another person as an erotic object), and, in contradistinction, ego libido (forming identification processes) act as formations, mechanisms, which this cinema has played on. The image of woman as (passive) raw material for the (active) gaze of man takes the argument a step further into the structure of representation, adding a further layer demanded by the ideology of the patriarchal order" (17).

In an attempt to make sense of the evidently patriarchal publications that I kept finding, I started by using the first part of Mulvey's conceptualization: the pleasure in looking at someone as an erotic object. In order to do this, I categorized the datasheet into three main sections: (I) those that fall under the male gaze (the objectification of women), (II) those that provide helpful information to inmates, such as emotional support or legal knowledge (referred from now on as support-based publications), and

(III) those that do not fall within the first two categories. In order to make a sensible categorization of the covers, I use 6 analytical subcategories (sexual objectification, passivity, heteronormativity, racialized fetishism, compulsory femininity 7 and toxic masculinity) to categorize the male gaze (section I). It is important to separate these categories to determine which is the most prevalent pattern through which the male gaze operates in book covers. Furthermore, I use 5 main subcategories for publications that fall under support-based publications: activism, self-help, skills, legal aid, and erotica (section II). The categories for section II are self-explanatory, yet it is relevant to note that erotica is distinct from categories that fall under the male gaze section because it portrays sexuality as an empowering, and not denigrating, realm. Erotica is treated as a positive exposure to information because the sexual content in these publications tend to challenge the traditional gender correctional machine. Finally, a category for book covers that do not fall into the two previously defined

categories (male gaze or support) is necessary to isolate those that are of interest to the study (section III). Examples of this category are books that deal with disciplines (such as history, religion, and politics) that do not necessarily provide a normative worldview (as opposed to section I and II). Table 2 and Table 3 below show the frequencies and comparative percentages of section I - male gaze (in orange), section II support (in blue), and section III disciplines (in white, labeled as N/A) for the 8 denied and permitted publications listings.

It is important to define what I mean by each category that makes up the male gaze. Sexual objectification refers to the act of treating women as sexual objects. Passivity refers to the assumption that women do not have agency in their own lives, and are therefore always available for men. Heteronormativity refers to the assumption that heterosexual relations are the norm, and that opposite sexes are complementary to one another. Racialized fetishism refers to the attribution of superior attractiveness to a particular racial or ethnic group. Compulsory femininity refers to the social expectation that women ought to behave in particularly feminine ways, such as the stereotypical interest in pink. Toxic masculinity refers to the androcentric tendency of enacting traditionally masculine traits, such as being violent or strong.

The full coding of both denied and permitted publications listing can be found in Sections A and B of Appendix 1.

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Table 2. Denied publications breakdown. Denied Publications Listing Category

Frequency

% (N/A excluded)

Activism Self-help Skills Legal aid Erotica Heteronorma tivity Passivity Sexual objectificatio n Racialized fetishism Compulsory femininity Toxic masculinity N/A Total

7 2 3 1 2

7.20 2.08 3.12 1.04 2.08

10.76 3.07 9.23 1.53 3.07

% within group 46.66 13.33 20.00 6.66 13.33

5 4

5.20 4.16

7.69 6.15

10.00 8.00

20.83

30.76

40.00

15.62

23.07

30.00

4.16

6.15

8.00

2 31 96

2.08 32.29 100

3.07 100.00

4.00 -

% per group

23.07

76.92

100

Table 3. Permitted publications breakdown. Permitted Publications Listing Category

Frequency

% (N/A excluded)

Activism Self-help Skills Legal aid Erotica Heteronorma tivity Passivity Sexual objectificatio n

28 17 25 9 7

10.82 6.58 9.68 3.48 2.71

16.8 10.05 14.79 5.32 4.14

% within group 32.55 19.76 29.06 10.46 8.13

5 5

1.93 1.93

2.95 2.95

5.61 5.61

% per group

50.88

49.11 47

18.21

27.81

52.8

101

Racialized fetishism Compulsory femininity Toxic masculinity N/A Total

5.03

7.69

14.6

1.93

2.95

5.61

8 89 258

3.1 34.49 100

4.73 100

8.98 -

The breakdown of denied publications shows a significant disparity between publications in the male gaze group (23.07%) versus the support-based group (76.92%). This finding matches the expectation that the correctional facility should prohibit the entrance of what they term "obscene material" (Department of Corrections Policy Statement DC-ADM 803). Nevertheless, the percentage of male gaze publications (49.11%) that are allowed into the facility almost equals the percentage of section II publications that are allowed (50.88%). Even though the percentage of permitted male gaze publications is lower than the percentage of denied ones, it is still relevant to note that there is equal permissibility for male gaze publications as support-based ones. Notably, the most prevalent subcategory within both the denied and permitted male gaze publications is sexual objectification. The publications that were coded within this subcategory had explicitly obscene images, which are seemingly prohibited by correctional policies. Nevertheless, findings show that the policy is being partially enforced given that more sexual objectification appears in permitted male gaze publications (52.8%) than in denied ones (40%). These findings

100

show how the gender correctional machine not only functions through denied publications but mainly through those that are permitted inside. An institutionalized reinforcement of what the pleasure in looking at someone as an erotic object falls on the shoulders of the women portrayed in the publications under the male gaze section. Given that the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections stipulates that the two listings apply to all correctional facilities under its jurisdiction, it is fair to assume that publications that women get exposed to are the same as men. Regardless of who reads the publications, the message is the same: the male gaze is permitted and patriarchy is the norm you ought to follow. Not only is the machine portraying heteronormativity, toxic masculinity, compulsory femininity, sexual objectification, and racialized fetishism as normal and acceptable traits, but it is also setting a seemingly positive structure in which processes of identification can flourish. This means that the library presents publication covers that can potentially have an impact beyond themselves; the possibility of internalization of male gaze traits becomes a given. For this reason, it is paramount to examine a visual sample of what the gender correctional

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machine is dictating. The next section explores the intricacies of the second mechanism of the machine. Seeing tradition as process of identification Simple Google searches on the content of each publication shed immense light on the second part of Mulvey's conceptualization of the male gaze, namely the processes that women go through to navigate their identity. One way to operationalize this is by looking at the content that women are exposed to in correctional libraries. It would be naive to assume my perception of the content is equivalent to that of people who are incarcerated. Instead, I analyzed the publications through an academic lense; interpreting the potential effect of this content on women who face incarceration. After looking at publication covers, the visual representations I kept coming across showed deep patriarchal patterns in the admitted publications. It would be expected to find that images in denied publications are significantly different from those in permitted publications. The Department of Corrections establishes the parameters/rules between permissible and denied publications, as following: "a request for and receipt of any publication or photograph may be disapproved when the publication or photograph contains content considered to pose a potential threat to security, contains nudity, explicit sexual materials, or obscene material” (Department of Corrections Policy Statement DC-ADM 803). However, a critical intersectional analysis of the covers of such publications show the opposite; the

six male gaze traits that were classified before (sexual objectification, passivity, heteronormativity, racialized fetishism, compulsory femininity, and toxic masculinity) are equally pervasive in both denied and permitted publications. Collage 1 below shows a sample of denied publications' covers and Collage 2 displays a sample of permitted publications' covers. Collage 1. Denied Publications' Covers

Collage 2. Permitted Publications' Covers

It is useful to evoke Audre Lorde's iconic analysis expressing that "the master's

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tools will never dismantle the master's house" (335). In an applied version of this quote to the gender correctional machine, the master is the gender correctional machine, its tools the 6 mechanisms of the male gaze, and its house the correctional facilities' libraries. If the denied publications are the baseline criteria determining what contents should and should not be allowed in correctional facilities, the department of corrections is evidently not following its own protocol and policies. And when it does, it still shows a patriarchal male gaze. For example, the images under the compulsory femininity subcategory have similar traditionally feminine ascribed colors, such as red and pink, and a woman with a flirtatious pose in the middle of the picture. Similarly, the pictures under toxic masculinity explicitly claim how a 'real man' behaves and looks; he is a womanizer and looks bulky. It follows this logic that the images under the heteronormativity subcategory reinforce ideas of property associated with traditional heterosexual marriages, such as possessive body language or possessive names that tie women to a particular man (the dope man's wife, in Collage 2). Furthermore, the images under the passivity subcategory highlight a woman's breasts and use a submissive gaze to imply docility and availability. Moreover, the pictures under the racialized fetishism subcategory shows a woman of color (or multiple) revealing their backs in black lingerie. Finally, the images under the sexual objectification subcategory eroticize women by portraying them as abnormal, animal, and dangerous. Thus permitted and denied

publications are not significantly different. The gender correctional machine allows similar content into the facility as it leaves out. In doing so, the machine proves that its mechanisms of selection will not dismantle the patriarchal order that exists as pillars of the libraries but only reinforce it. Therefore, it is fair to argue that the patriarchal meanings of the six mechanisms can shape inmates' processes of identification. Inmates who view these images inevitably encounter a pre-established status quo: heterosexuality is the norm, women are sexual and passive objects, and men should be macho. In this way, the gender correctional machine sets the parameters for what inmates ought to identify with as appropriate behavior and norms. As long as the inmate can see herself in the publication cover as she would in a mirror, the machine has fulfilled its goal. Bridging the three mechanisms together to bring the machine down The gender correctional machine has authority over a web of power that oversees, controls, and ultimately shapes the construction of gender norms in correctional facilities. The two main branches of the web of power, namely correctional industries, and exposure to patriarchal information through libraries, function as a moderator of who women are and can be. However, this does not imply that the machine is always successful; doing so would mean taking away women's agency and denying their capacity to think critically. Returning to situated knowledge epistemology, it is important to recall that women's experiences within the walls of correctional facilities are

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different from those that I have in seeing the system from the outside. For that reason, a further study requires that voices of incarcerated women be the driving force in order to have a holistic view of the gender correctional machine. For now, a proposed two-fold intervention to start dismantling the machine is offered below. This entails moving away from monolithic traditions, and having better access to legal tools in radical resistance. Moving away from monolithic traditions Assuming that all incarcerated women are a monolithic entity is epistemologically false. The intersections of race, class, gender, and all the identity markers that make up subjectivity determine difference and commonality amongst women in correctional facilities. However, correctional industries seem to assume and reinforce that all women fall into a single category of identity. Forcing women to devote their time to sewing, cooking, and, in the best case, doing clerical work presumes that all incarcerated and detained women held that type of job before entering the criminal justice system or will do it when re-entering society. Moreover, by exposing women to a particular vision of who they ought to be, the machine attempts to box them into static categories. However, the material conditions that define the lives of incarcerated or detained women before their incarceration are much more diverse and complex than what the gender correctional machine attempts to tie them to. The fact that "nearly two-thirds of women under probation are white, while two-thirds of

those confined in local jails and state and federal prisons are minorities" (Womenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Health USA) is not taken into account in this system. The current programs to address women's needs in jails and prisons are outdated, race-specific, and class-specific. The diverse experiences of detained women of color are therefore erased once more by a seemingly innocent attempt to provide them with gender-responsive (a.k.a. responsive to traditional gender roles and monolithic notions) services, which put forth monolithic creations of selfhood (or lack thereof). Given that there are intentionally patriarchal mechanisms in place, building resistance from women's situated knowledges would be potentially beneficial in building a sense of selfhood and independence. Since criminalized women are experts in the conditions that led to their incarceration and their legal case itself, this situated knowledge brings a critical lens deriving from their standpoint to the ways in which they interact with the criminal justice system. Since the multiplicity of standpoints of detained women are depoliticized by traditional gender expectations when entering the jail system, it would be beneficial to construct spaces in which those standpoints can be politicized through active resistance. As an outsider to the system, I can only work to provide resources that would make this easier but the resistance should be articulated and led by women within correctional facilities. Making the walls of facilities more porous would build a more restorative system because women would be meeting justice "with their eyes

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wide open" (Wright 2001). This means that the veil of traditional gender roles, which is held in midair for a second when detained women are first described as deviant to later be imposed on them through multiple mechanisms, would be counteracted by a critical engagement with their own and shared standpoints. The next section explores how better access to legal tools could potentially evoke pro se litigation and agency for women in correctional facilities. The fallout of traditional gender roles as a radical space of critical resistance within correctional facilities The criminalized woman is already perceived as deviant. However, such presumed deviancy could be matched with a radical approach to such a label. By dismantling the negative meaning attached to gender-specific deviance, such deviancy could potentially be met by an explosion (meaning full embrace) of the label. If society renders criminalized women deviant, then using, expanding, and honing on that deviancy would challenge traditional gender expectations and programs. Women in jails not only need mental health support ─which is also strictly paramount to the well being of incarcerated and detained women (Billington 2011)─ but a critical engagement with legal knowledge. One of the biggest changes from the old paradigm of justice (retributive) to the new one (restorative) is that restorative justice reduces the dependence of defendants on legal professionals and allows for the direct involvement of participants in the legal process (Wright 37). However, the practice

of such direct involvement should be studied more closely in regards to gender roles. According to the listing of permitted publications, only 5.32% are legal aid materials, which is clearly insufficient and disproportionately low (compared for example with sexual objectification or activism). If preconceived notions of gender define the attitudes of jail authorities towards inmate agency, an essentialized perception of women's needs seems inevitable (Davis 265); assuming that all women ascribe to traditional gender roles demarcates the gendered response women get regarding their agency. Therefore, if this trend is systematically dismantled ─by empowering women to engage in pro se defense rather than pushing them away from selfhood─ the differences and complex identities of detained women would actually impact the services they receive at correctional facilities. Possibilities of implementation and the power of pro se defense New approaches to vocational training is not a new idea in criminal justice reform. A radical feminist methodology to develop and implement such programs by building on situated knowledges and standpoints is more recent in its theorizing. This type of radical resistance can draw from efforts such as the Canadian Task Force on Federally Sentenced Women's, which works towards reshaping women's agency in regional correctional facilities. In 1990, the Force created the "Creating Choices" document, which describes the new rapport that would be implemented in

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five regional facilities. This rapport has four main principles: "empowerment; meaningful and responsible choices; respect and dignity; a supportive environment and a shared responsibility for offenders" (104-112). If these principles would be translated from a prison setting to a jail setting, they would still hold their revolutionary impact. According to Randall L. Wright, "Creating Choices" is a postmodern critique of hierarchical, bureaucratic, and traditional correctional systems because it listens to the voices of incarcerated women. A translation of this model into jail settings would be more powerful because a jail focus takes power and makes power simultaneously (as Andrea Smith deems necessary to do) through meeting the specific needs of detained women. Since restorative opportunities and services are fewer in jails than prisons, the push toward women's pro se litigation might need to start from non-profit organizations like Books Through Bars. This organization sends free books to incarcerated people upon request. Programs such as Address This! ─a Books Through Bars initiative─ aim to address the education and empowerment gap within correctional facilities by providing “innovative correspondence courses” (Books Through Bars website), which could assist women in building resistance within facilities.

collective ways of creating justice within jails. Pro se defense materials and workshops could bring women together as a group that fights against the non-adversarial judicial model that mass incarceration has created. Women who politicize their standpoints together, by bridging differences and solidarity, are more powerful than women who are institutionally forced to follow traditional gender norms. Thus, critical legal knowledge-based resistance within women's jails could destabilize punitive systems of justice, promote solidarity amongst different women, and challenge the traditional ways of providing services to incarcerated and detained women.

Since the gender correctional machine feeds off of the "divide and conquer" mentality, just like capitalism does, a radical detachment from that mentality would inevitably bring about more

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REFERENCES Alexander, Michelle., and West, Cornel. The New Jim Crow. The New Press, 2012.

Department of Corrections. "Policy Statement DC-ADM 803." 2016. Web.

Billington, Josie. “'Reading for Life': Prison Reading Groups in Practice and Theory.” Vol. 23, no. 3, 2011, pp. 67–85, 131.

Dream Corps Unlimited. "Dignity for Incarcerated Women." 2018. Web. https://www.cut50.org /our_mission.

Butler, Paul, et al. Let's Get Free : a Hip-Hop Theory of Justice. New Press : Distributed by Perseus Distribution, 2009

Fine, Michelle. Just Research in Contentious Times : Widening the Methodological Imagination. Teachers College Press, 2018.

Center for Constitutional Rights and the National Lawyers Guild. "Jailhouse Lawyer Handbook." 2010. Web. https://ccrjustice.org/sites/default/file s/assets/Report_JailHouseLawyersH andbook.pdf

Haney, Lynne. 2010. Offending Women: Power, Punishment, and the Regulation of Desire. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Collins, Patricia Hill, et al. Black Feminist Thought Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment. Rev. 10th anniversary ed., Routledge, 2000. Davis, Amanda. “On Teaching Women's Prison Writing: A Feminist Approach to Women, Crime, and Incarceration.” Women's Studies Quarterly, vol. 32, no. 3/4, 2004, pp. 261–279. Davis, Angela, and Gina Dent. “Prison as a Border: A Conversation on Gender, Globalization, and Punishment.” Signs, vol. 26, no. 4, 2001, pp. 1235–1241. Davis, Angela. “Are Prisons Obsolete?” Radical Philosophy Review, vol. 8, no. 1, 2005, pp. 83– 96.

Hartman, Heidi. "The Unhappy Marriage of Marxism and Feminism: Towards a More Progressive Union." Capital and Class 0.8 (1979): 1. Web. Kennon, Suzanne S., et al. “Parenting Education for Incarcerated Mothers.” Journal of Correctional Education, vol. 60, no. 1, 2009, pp. 10–30. McCook, Kathleen de la Peña. “Public Libraries and People in Jail," 2004. McCorkel, Jill. 2004. "Criminally dependent? Gender, punishment, and the rhetoric of welfare reform." Social Politics 11: 386–410. Misra, Tanvi. "The Rise of 'Crimmigration." September 2016. Web. https://www.citylab.com/ equity/2016/09/the-rise-of-crimmigat ion/499712/

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Mulvey, Laura. "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema." Screen Xvi.3 (1975): 6-18. Web. Prison Policy Initiative. "The Gender Divide: Tracking women’s state prison growth." 2018. Web. https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports /women_overtime.html#localjails

Wright, Randall L. “Justice With Her Eyes Wide Open: Situated Knowledges, Diversity and Correctional Education in the Postmodern Era (Part II).” Journal of Correctional Education, vol. 52, no. 1, 2001, pp. 33–38.

Schlanger, Margo. “Inmate Litigation.” Harvard Law Review, vol. 116, no. 6, 2003, pp. 1557–1706. Sjoberg, Laura, and Caron E. Gentry. Mothers, Monsters, Whores : Women's Violence in Global Politics. Zed Books ; Distributed in the USA by Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Tosh, Jemma. Psychology and Gender Dysphoria Feminist and Transgender Perspectives. London; New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2016. Web. Van Cleve, Nicole Gonzalez, and Ebook Central. Crook County: Racism and Injustice in America's Largest Criminal Court. Stanford Law Books, an Imprint of Stanford University Press, 2016. Wagner, Pete and Bernadette Rabuy. "Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2017." March 2017. Web. https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports /pie2017.html Women's Health USA. "Population Characteristics: Incarcerated Women." December 2011. Web. https://mchb.hrsa.gov/whusa12/pc/pa ges/iw.html

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The Greek Voyage Panagiotis Tzumakaris Recent Graduate, History & Secondary Education Introduction Returning from a pleasant encounter with local Greeks on the island of Zante, Thomas Dallam recorded, “When our marchantes saw us, they began to be verrie angrie saying that they had soughte alaboute and thoughte that we had…com to som evell fortune; but I bid them hould ther peace, and 1 lett me tell them my adventures.” Throughout the late 16th and 17th centuries, English travel writers were beginning to rediscover Greece which, at the time, was under Ottoman and Venetian rule. While most well-educated English travel writers began to form certain unflattering opinions about Greece, Thomas Dallam, an English organ-builder, experienced an opposing perspective. Coming from an artisan background, Dallam, unlike most classically-educated English travel writers, had few expectations for this small Mediterranean nation. Because of Dallam’s upbringing and his curious nature, Dallam’s perceptions of Greece differ significantly from other early English travel writers.

J. Theodore Bent, Thomas Dallam, and John Covel. Early Voyages and Travels in the Levant. I. The Diary of Master Thomas Dallam, 1599-1600. II. Extracts from the Diaries of Dr. John Covel, 1670-1679. With Some Account of the Levant Company of Turkey Merchants, Works Issued by the Hakluyt Society ; No. 87. New York: B. Franklin, 1964, 25.

For England, the ability to travel into the Mediterranean predominantly stemmed from the Battle of Lepanto. Due to this naval battle, a new economic and political balance was established in the Mediterranean and the Levant Company was founded. As a result, there were higher rates of travel to the Near East from England. Thomas Dallam traveled with the merchants of the Levant Company like many of the British elites in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, but his accounts on Greece provide a fresh and different perspective. The interactions with the peoples of Greece that the early English travel writers experienced not only allow for an interesting first-hand insight of Greek life but provide reflections of the authors and their culture. The stereotypes held by the English toward Greece affected travel writers’ works while abroad in those lands. The political climate of England, religious differences, and classical education are three prominent factors that shaped the perspective that English travel writers had on Greece. English travel writers tended to focus on common themes in their depictions of Greece: ancient glory versus present decline and civilization versus barbarism. While the English elites emphasized flaws in Greek society, Dallam focused purely on his experiences with the locals. The Battle of Lepanto and the Formation of the Levant Company The Ottoman Empire was a major power through the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The Ottomans

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dominated and maintained control of the Eastern Mediterranean for centuries after the siege and sack of Constantinople in 1204. The majority of Greece, Bulgaria and the Balkans were under Ottoman rule at that time. However, several prized Greek islands were controlled by the Republic of Venice. These contested borders led to animosity between the Turks and the Venetians. In 1570, the Ottoman Empire set its sights on the island of Cyprus, which at the time was under Venetian rule. The Sultan had demanded that Venice surrender the island to his control. The Venetians refused, and with the aid of the papacy and Spain, the fourth Ottoman-Venetian War began. The Battle of Lepanto marked a pivotal victory for the Republic of Venice and her allies. Peter Marshall suggests that the naval battle, which took place in 1571 off the western coast of modern-day Greece, deeply changed the mindset of Christian Europe. Marshall writes in his article, “Lepanto’s importance as an iconic moment of respite and revival for Christian Europe, after decades of apparently inexorable Turkish advance, was to stand the test of 2 time.” Marshall expands by explaining how publications of prayers and thanksgivings were bought at English churches regarding 3 the Turkish defeat. Although the Ottoman Empire was able to rebuild its fleet and capture Cyprus

Peter Marshall, "“Rather with Papists than with Turks”: The Battle of Lepanto and the Contours of Elizabethan Christendom," Reformation 17, no. 1 (2012): 136. 3 Ibid, 141.

within the same year, the battle of Lepanto had instilled a strong sense of morale in Christian Europe. As Cayetano Rosell argues in his article: The victory of Lepanto was neither for Venice nor Spain a decisive triumph over the perpetual enemy…It did not give liberty to Greece, it did not plant the cross beneath the walls of Constantinople; but it arrested the usurping march of the Ottoman empire; it prepared for the glorious catastrophe of Navarino. We should see in it not the beginning but the end of an heroic era… The victory of Lepanto over the Turks is the last page in the epic of their 4 greatness. After decades of decline in commerce between England and the Ottoman Empire, shifting waters had led to expanding trade negotiations. By the end of the 16th century, the Levant Company had been established, allowing English merchants and travelers to visit the Ottoman Empire and more specifically, Greece more freely and frequently. In the late sixteenth century, Queen Elizabeth, the reigning monarch of England, began to establish a fiscal relationship with the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. England’s trade revolved around mercantilism. England relied on exporting as many goods as possible in order to

Cayetano Rosell, "The Battle of Lepanto: 1570-71," Rosseeuw St Bilaire, The Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature (1844-1898) 1, no. 3 (1865): 357.

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maximize profit. The Ottoman Empire, however, endorsed imports in favor of maximizing the supply of goods available in 5 their vast and diverse markets. Commercial wealth was not the only advantage of this newly chartered trade agreement for England. According to James Theodore Bent, the Levant Company aided in England’s development of art, research, 6 geography and travel. Traveler writers such as Thomas Dallam, Fynes Moryson, John Covel, and George Wheler were able to visit lands previously considered restricted allowing for the rediscovery of Greece. The Anti-Greek Bias Through the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, an English education signified a classically trained individual focused on Roman literature. Efterpi Mitsi, an English literary scholar, clarifies that “Late sixteenth-century England viewed itself as a second Troy and understood the Greco-Roman world from the Roman point of view, following Virgil’s and other Roman 7 authors’ anti-Greek bias.” Naturally, Romans portrayed themselves as superior while regarding Greece as decadent, servile, and weak. The English travel writers’ privileged and educated background shaped

a distasteful opinion about Greece and its people. An English travel writer by the name of George Wheler inherited a small fortune which supported his studies at Lincoln College, Oxford where he became fascinated 8 in antiquity. He was the son of two royalist parents who were sentenced to exile and as a result was born in the Netherlands in 1651. A year later, after the death of a relative, Wheler’s family moved back to England. Starting in 1673, Wheler began touring Europe, and in 1675 in the city of Rome, met Jacob Spon. Spon would be Wheler’s travelling companion on his journey to 9 Greece and the Levant. One of Wheler’s earlier stops in Greece was on the island of Mykonos. A prominent observation he made on this island pertained to women. Wheler described the women he encountered as “deservedly [having] a greater reputation for 10 Beauty then Chastity.” Greek women have largely been considered exotic and erotic since 1585 when the French traveler Nicolay’s travelogue was translated to English.11 He compared the Greek women of the island of Chios to nymphs which not only sexualized them, but connected them to their classical past. Mitsi writes, “[Nicolay’s] depiction of the women reflect

Murat Çizakça, “The Ottoman Government and Economic Life,” in The Cambridge History of Turkey, edited by Suraiya N. Faroqhi and Kate Fleet, 2:. Cambridge History of Turkey, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. 260. 6 Bent, Dallam, and Covel, Early Voyages and Travels, ii. 7 Efterpi Mitsi, Greece in Early English Travel Writing, 1596–1682. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 59.

Ibid, 156. Ibid, 154-155. 10 George Wheler, and Jacob Spon,. A Journey into Greece by George Wheler, Esq., in Company of Dr. Spon of Lyons: In Six Books...: With Variety of Sculptures, Early English Books Online, London: Printed for William Cademan, Robert Kettlewell, and Awnsham Churchill, 1682, 63. 11 Mitsi, Greece, 71. 9

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the ambiguous position and significance of Greece in the late sixteenth century, simultaneously idealized and condemned for 12 its fall and decadence.” The stereotype of the decadent Greek, in particular the indulgent woman, is reflected by Wheler. Conversely to his remark on the lustfulness of Greek women, he continued by revealing that his captain had purchased a young woman to take with him on his travels from her father. Wheler witnessed the young woman “who with weeping and great seeming unwillingness, suffered her self to 13 be carried to the Boat.” Unsurprisingly, being educated in the classics, Wheler related this scene to the rape of Helen. He writes, “The History of the taking her I will not let pass without relating it, because I was by accident at the Rape of this fair Helena.” 14 This connection to the ancient past draws on Wheler’s English education and alludes to his bias, for the portrayal of the “rape” of this young woman does not quite fit Wheler’s previous accusation of the willing and promiscuous Greek women. Wheler then proceeds to narrate that the mother of this young woman, filled with rage and bringing the rest of the women in the town to an “uproar,” followed the captain to the shore. Wheler writes, “Above a hundred girls, from ten or elven, to fourteen or fifteen years old, stood with their Coats as high as their middle (I guess to signifie they were ready to accompany her, 15 so soon as occasion offered).” Although Mitsi, Greece, 72. Wheler and Spon, A Journey into Greece, 63. 14 Ibid. 15 Ibid. 12 13

Wheler had just explained that the women were enraged that one of their own was being essentially abducted, he made the assumption that they followed her to the shore largely because, they too, wanted to be taken. This bold conclusion was made due to the predetermined belief of Greek decadence and further perpetuated negative Greek stereotypes. Another English travel writer, Fynes Moryson, also correlated Greece with its ancient past and labeled them in an unfavorable way. The son of an affluent government official, Fynes Moryson, born in 1566, obtained his education at Cambridge University. After acquiring his M.A., Moryson believed that remaining in England rendered him unproductive and as a 16 result, desired to travel abroad. His University had provided him a license to travel “partly ‘for the ornament’ of his intended profession, partly because of his ‘innated desire to gain experience by 17 traveling into foreign parts.’” On May 1st 1591, Moryson began his travels, and in the span of four years, had visited Germany, Switzerland, the United Provinces, 18 Denmark, Poland, Italy, and France. Fynes Moryson clearly acquired an exceptional education, and as such, developed negative bias towards the Greeks 16

"Shakespeare's Europe: Unpublished Chapters of Fynes Moryson's Itinerary. Being a Survey of the Condition of Europe at the End of the Sixteenth Century; with an Introduction and an Account of Fynes Moryson's Career by Charles Hughes. London: Sherratt and Hughes. 1903." The Edinburgh Review 197, no. 404 (1903): 378. 17 Ibid, 379. 18 Ibid, 380.

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from the Roman literature he studied. Often, the descriptions of the Greek regions that Moryson visited were congested with Greece’s glorified history and deplorable present state. One example of this is when Moryson is travelling on the island of Crete. He writes, “There was a monument of the cave of Minos, which the Candians call the sepulcher of Jupiter… [We] lodged that night… upon straw… [and] we could not buy no better meate, nor get any provender 19 for our beasts.” Moryson wrote about the Greek poets that once lived in the lands he crossed, or the statues he recognized that depicted mythological heroes and combined it with his complaints about the unpleasant foods he was “forced to eate,” or the 20 “ridiculous customes” of the Greeks. Similarly to Wheler and Moryson, John Covel’s education prompted an anti-Greek bias. John Covel wrote a great deal on his travels in his many diaries. Covel was educated at Bury St. Edmunds and later Christ’s College in Cambridge where he was 21 elected to a Fellowship. In 1669, Covel was funded by Charles the II and the Levant Company to travel to Constantinople and act 22 as chaplain to the ambassador upon arrival. Along the way, Covel was able to travel to numerous countries and regions including Moryson, An Itinerary Containing His Ten Yeeres Travell through the Twelve Dominions of Germany, Bohmerland, Sweitzerland, Netherland, Denmarke, Poland, Italy, Turky, France, England, Scotland & Ireland. Glasgow : New York: J. MacLehose and Sons; The Macmillan Company, 1907, vol. II, 80. 20 Ibid, 84-87. 21 Bent, Dallam, and Covel. Early Voyages and Travels, xxviii. 22 Ibid, xxix. 19

Greece, where he wrote extensively in his diary on the land, people, and religion. In August of 1670, when Covel traveled to Adrianople, a city in modern-day Turkey but historically Greek, he emphasized the “curious” Greek religious customs and superstitions. Covel expressed, “You cannot imagine the strange superstition that is generally amongst the 23 people of this country.” Both Moryson and Covel criticized the superstitious Greeks. Yet during the same time period, England was passing statutes based on superstition. England’s witchcraft statute was revived in 1563, which extended well into the mid-seventeenth century until a sharp decline in the 1670’s when “relatively few 24 alleged witches were executed.” Because of their anti-Greek bias, these early English travel writers almost effortlessly recorded their disapproval of the Greeks while ignoring similar flaws that existed in their nation. Civilization versus Barbarism A common theme amongst the writings of early English travel writers to Greece is civilization versus barbarism. In his writing, Moryson makes an assumption that the people of Greece are inherently violent which alludes to this common theme. Moryson’s second journey began in December of 1595, this time with the accompaniment of his brother Henry. Their 23

Ibid, 255. Julia M Garrett, "Witchcraft and Sexual Knowledge in Early Modern England." Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies 13, no. 1 (2013): 32-72. 24

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ultimate goal was to travel to Constantinople 25 and the Holy Land. Finishing their first voyage to Jerusalem and upon returning to the Venetian controlled shores, Moryson and his brother set foot on the Greek island of Cephalonia to refresh themselves on May 26 8th, 1596. Evidently, from Moryson’s writings in his Itinerary, it is noticeable at this brief stop that he has predetermined perceptions on Greece. Having washed their bodies on the Greek shore, Moryson writes, “Wee durst not goe farre from our Marriners, lest the inhabitants of the woodie 27 Mountaines should offer us violence.” The civilized, in Moryson’s viewpoint, are himself and his counterparts. Meanwhile, the barbaric are the Greeks. Moryson’s assumption that the people of Greece are inherently violent not only categorizes the Greeks as barbaric, but also emphasizes Moryson’s anti-Greek bias. In November of 1669 John Covel traveled to Peloponnese, a part of the mainland of Greece and wrote about the barbarity of the Maniotes (the Greeks native to this region). Because of the rocky terrain and mountains, the Maniotes were able to resist Ottoman occupation. Covel described them as “lawless people” that the Ottomans 28 were unable to convert to “good order.” The theme of civilization versus barbarism arose again. Instead of perceiving these Greeks as champions against their oppressors, or simply free men, they were 25

"Shakespeare's Europe”, 383. Moryson, An Itinerary, vol. I, 455-56. 27 Ibid, 456. 28 Bent, Dallam, and Covel. Early Voyages and Travels, 133.

considered barbaric. Oddly enough, the civilized party the Greeks were being compared to in this instance is not the British, but instead the Turks. According to Covel, the subjugation of the Maniotes by the Ottoman Turks would have brought unto them laws and good order. Afraid of the lawless Greeks, the captain of the Covel’s ship warned the passengers not to stray far from the Peloponnesian shore. He disclosed to them an incident that he witnessed six years prior. As stated by the captain, there was a Greek “varlet” who had approached several “Gentlemen” and had been able to deceive them into surrendering all of their 29 belongings. While the varlet likely considered himself clever rather than devious and deemed the British as fools rather than gentlemen, Covel had formulated an opposing opinion. Covel writes in his Diary, “These miscreant wretches lye constantly watching upon the Rocks and the Mountains, not to secure themselves from the injuries of Pirates as themselves to 30 Thieve and rob whom they can catch.” Not heeding the captain’s warnings, several British men began climbing up the mountains. Soon after their ascension, shots were heard. Covel witnessed that the men running back towards the shore were being chased away by Maniotes. He recounts that 31 four men were killed by this event. Covel had formulated a perception of the Greeks from this altercation and his

Ibid. Ibid. 31 Ibid, 134-137. 30

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knowledge of Roman literature. He remarks, “I could not but call to mind old Sinon in Virgil … Greeks are Greeks still; for falseness and treachery … Trust them and hang them, or rather hang them first for 32 sureness.” It is apparent that years of study have perpetuated negative Greek stereotypes in Covel’s consciousness. Had Covel not been familiar with Roman writing, he may have analyzed the situation more critically and neutrally. The majority of Greeks had been oppressed by foreign rule for over two centuries when Covel arrived. The Maniotes, a small pocket of resistance often assaulted by the Ottomans and invading pirates, had remained free by taking advantage of the terrain and defending their mountains. Under Ottoman rule, the Greeks would have to pay devshirme, also known as a blood tax. This tax was only administered to Christian families. Military officers would rip early adolescent boys from their families, forcibly convert them to Islam, and train them to fight in the military or become civil servants. Mitsi adds, “There oppression is such that they do not even own their 33 children.” The Maniotes, under constant attack, would not endanger their liberty or surrender their children to a possible foreign threat. Because of Roman texts, Covel perceives the intention of the Maniotes’ attack to be false-hearted and barbaric, when in fact they were being true to themselves and defending their freedom.

In George Wheler’s account, the theme of civilization versus barbarism is found a bit differently but exists nonetheless. When Wheler arrived in Athens, he was pleased to see that the Acropolis still existed. Mitsi explains that previous English travel writers passing by the city had little to say about it. She writes, “In [their] accounts, the deformity of the ‘once worthy realm’ is not even worthy of 34 description.” Wheler, however, writes extensively on the Parthenon and the antiquities surrounding it. He even went as far as to identify Athens “[as] a more 35 civilized Country, than we had yet passed.” This is quite the complement to the Athenians from the perspective of an educated English travel writer. Although Wheler described Greece in his dedication to the King, which precedes the preface, as a “Lamentable Example of the Instability of humane things,” he gives Athens the honor of being the most civilized part of this 36 deplorable nation. It cannot be ignored that throughout his travels in Greece, Wheler mentions the kindness, hospitality, and humanity he received from the Greek peoples. However, Wheler concluded his work by praising God for raising him as an Englishman by stating: That he had placed the Lot of mine Inheritance in a Land that he had blessed, and hedged about for himself: where nothing is wanting to supply the defects of frail nature; but 34

Ibid, 133. 33 Mitsi, Greece, 59.

Ibid, 170. Wheler and Spon, A Journey into Greece, 335. 36 Ibid, The Epistle Dedicatory. 35

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where Peace and Plenty for this many Years have seem’d to embrace each other; where every Mans Right, from the Prince to the Peasant, is secured to him by the protection of good and wholesome Laws; And more, by a King who is the Indulgent Father of his Country, and not a Tyrant: and lastly, rendered me into the Bosom of a Church, that I had often heard, but now knew, to be the most refined, pure and Orthodox Church in the World; freed from Slavery, Errour and Superstiton, and without Novelty or Confusion, established in Purity of Doctrine, 37 Decency and Order. In his conclusion Wheler mentions the laws that are provided for English citizens and the faultlessness of his church, which is void of superstition. Wheler bolsters the civility of England with his praise, and in turn, implies Greece’s barbarity. Hospitality Overlooked For the Greeks, their hospitality has withstood the test of time; this was apparent in English travel writers’ accounts, even if it was largely unappreciated. The first example of unappreciated hospitality comes from the writings of Fynes Moryson. On July 4th, 1596, en route to Scanderoon from Aleppo, Moryson’s brother Henry died from an illness. Efterpi Mitsi analyzes Moryson’s reaction to this tragic event in her book, Greece in Early English Travel Writing, 1596–1682. She writes, “Moryson’s

reference to illness in his travelogue mark his isolation, as his physical and emotional health affects not only his perception of the foreign place but also his contact with 38 others.” Mitsi argues that from this moment forward, Moryson’s accounts of the regions he visits were heavily influenced by his brother’s death. Circumstances did little to alter Moryson’s negative impression of Greece. Following his brother’s death, Moryson’s next Greek destination was the Venetian-ruled island of Candia, now modern-day Crete. While on the ship to the island’s capital, harsh and unfavorable winds had convinced the French sailors piloting the ship that Moryson and his entourage were heretics and had to be 39 abandoned immediately. Moryson was dumped on the opposite side of the island. He illustrates this scene in his Itinerary dramatically. Moryson described how ill and weak he was upon landing on the island and how, in order to advance along the beach, he was driven to fashion two swords into 40 crutches. He had arrived on the island early in the morning and by noon was found by two Greek monks who took him to their monastery. At the monastery, Moryson acknowledged the Greek monks’ kindness, yet at the same time, managed to criticize them. Moryson noted, “The Caloiri or Monkes received us courteously, and gave us such victuals as they had, namely, Mitsi, Greece, 51. Moryson, An Itinerary, vol. II, 72. 40 Ibid, 73. 38 39

Ibid, 482.

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Pomegranates, Olives, Bread, and sharp Wine, which were no good meats for sicke 41 men.” Moryson depicted himself as a dying man in his writing and when the Greek monks demonstrated their hospitality, he promptly insulted the meal he was given. In another instance in his Itinerary, Moryson wrote to the Consul of Candia so that he may be transported out of his current lodgings in the monastery to the Capital because, “[his] solitary living here… and many other things in this place, are irksome 42 unto [him].” It is clear that Moryson did not genuinely appreciate the accommodations he received from the Greeks. John Covel is the second example of largely overlooked and unappreciated Greek hospitality. Nicomedia, another historically Greek city, now situated in modern day Turkey was visited by Covel on February 22nd, 1670. He intentionally used the word “hovel” instead of house when describing the peoples’ residences and labeled the city “intolerably bad, little, pittyfull, low, [and] 43 dirty…” At the same time, Covel mentioned that he was “nobly lodged at the 44 monastery by Greeks.” Greek hospitality is briefly commented upon and then muted in comparison to the verbal disapproval of the city as a whole. A Fresh Perspective: Thomas Dallam’s Diary

An exceptional organ-builder from London, Thomas Dallam had an exceedingly different perception of Greece when he traveled there on his voyage to Constantinople in 1599. Dallam was born in the village of Lancashire and eventually moved to London, where he apprenticed at a 45 blacksmiths’ company. Constructing the most principle organs of his time, Dallam was chosen by Queen Elizabeth to construct an ornate organ that would be given as a gift to the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 46 England. The Levant Company played a large role in financing Dallam’s project and voyage because they were desperate to compete with their European rivals in the 47 Mediterranean. Throughout his voyage to Constantinople, Dallam kept a detailed diary noting his experiences. His artisan background, which excluded a formal and upscale English education, determined his curious, excited, and open-minded perspective on his journey. Dallam’s first encounter with Greeks occurred on the island of Zante, today named Zakynthos. When the ship landed on the island, he had convinced two men travelling with him to climb the nearest 48 mountain for a better view of the island. While climbing, they came across a shepherd, and one of the men accompanying Dallam up the mountain warned him to go no further “tellinge [him] that surly those that did inhahite thare weare savidge men,

Ibid, 74. Ibid, 78. 43 Bent, Dallam, and Covel. Early Voyages and Travels, 281. 44 Ibid, 280.

Ibid, xvi. Ibid, xvii. 47 Mitsi, Greece, 61. 48 Bent, Dallam, and Covel. Early Voyages and Travels, 20.

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and myghte easalye wronge us.” At this point, Dallam refused to believe such an assumption and continued on with now only one other companion. A bit later, they came across another Greek man lying on the 50 ground with a smile on his face. Being thirsty, Dallam had asked him for a drink. The man lifted a carpet and revealed six bottles of wine, one of which he poured into a silver cup and handed to Dallam. Upon finishing the glass of red wine, the man poured him a glass of white wine which Dallam exclaimed to be the best wine he 51 ever drank. Dallam’s companion refused to accept wine from a Greek man to which Dallam replied, “He was a foule to refuse 52 suche a cup of wyne.” In order to properly thank this Greek man, Dallam tried to pay him. The Greek man refused to accept 53 payment. The hospitality of the Greeks is exemplified in this account of Dallam’s Diary. Dallam, unaware of the Greek stereotypes that educated Englishmen were taught, ignored the unfounded warnings of his companions. As a result of his open-minded and curious nature, Dallam confides, “I was so well pleased with this 54 entertaynmente.” Unlike the previously mentioned travel writers, Dallam appreciated the Greek man’s hospitality and was not hunting for something to scrutinize.

Ibid. Ibid, 21. 51 Ibid, 22. 52 Ibid. 53 Ibid. 54 Ibid. 49 50

Because of Dallam’s sincerity, the Greek man had grabbed his hand and escorted him to a nearby chapel where mass was being held. Dallam described that within the chapel, the women sat on a lower 55 level separately from the men. His companion, having lost sight of Dallam, entered the chapel and sat by the women, two of whom began to laugh at him. “He behaved him selfe verrie foolishly,” Dallam 56 writes. Dallam attempted to immerse himself in the foreign situation. Instead of criticizing the Greek Church and customs, he commented on the foolishness of his companion. After the service had ended, Dallam and his companion exited the chapel. A Greek man had approached them and brought them to a house where they were offered food and drink. Dallam again tried to pay for the meal but the man refused to take the money. He then tried to offer the money to the young women at the house who also refused to accept it. Finally he offered a knife he was carrying to the Greek “Jentlewoman” present who “was unwilling 57 to take, but at laste she tooke it.” Once again, Dallam depicts the generosity of the Greek people. Dallam uses the term “Jentlewoman” to describe his host. Marcus Collins explains the significance of the word “gentleman”in his article. Collins demonstrates that “the gentleman once embodied a national ideal as idiomatic and irreplaceable as the American 55

Ibid, 23. Ibid. 57 Ibid, 24. 56

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Dream. Its existence was once thought to be 58 what most made the English English.” This remained true until the late 1960’s when the works of the state-of-the-nation unanimously endorsed that the gentleman 59 would no longer represent English virtue. By referring to this Greek woman as a “Jentlewoman,” Dallam is essentially suggesting that her status is on par to that of an English woman’s. This is something no other English travel writer would do during the late 16th and 17th centuries. Conclusion

She states, “Both Danson and MacLean have defined Dallam’s writing as unusually secular in tone, thus differing from the Christian and moral perspective of other 60 travelers…” Moryson, Covel, and Wheler all express the civility of England while illustrating the barbarity of Greece, largely due to preconceived notions. Greece, to the educated English travel writer, represented decay, subjugation, and decadence. Greece, in Dallam’s perception, represented generosity, hospitality, and phenomenal wine.

The voyages of English travel writers to Greece through the late 16th and 17th centuries stemmed from the establishment of the Levant Company. The Battle of Lepanto was a significant turning point in the 16th century that helped facilitate the foundation of the Levant Company, which directly and indirectly funded many of the English travel writers and was the reason safe passage to Greece and the Mediterranean was possible. While many formally educated English travel writers were influenced greatly by the negative biases ancient Roman literature contained, Thomas Dallam’s lack of classical knowledge allowed him to experience Greece with a radically different perspective. In her book, Mitsi discusses an interpretation of two authors who have analyzed Dallam’s work. 58

Marcus Collins, "The Fall of the English Gentleman: The National Character in Decline, C. 1918-1970." Historical Research 75, no. 187 (2002): 92. 59 Ibid, 109.

Mitsi, Greece, 64.

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REFERENCES Bent, J. Theodore, Thomas Dallam, and John Covel. Early Voyages and Travels in the Levant. I. The Diary of Master Thomas Dallam, 1599-1600. II. Extracts from the Diaries of Dr. John Covel, 1670-1679. With Some Account of the Levant Company of Turkey Merchants. Works Issued by the Hakluyt Society ; No. 87. New York: B. Franklin, 1964. Çizakça, Murat. “The Ottoman Government and Economic Life.” in The Cambridge History of Turkey, edited by Suraiya N. Faroqhi and Kate Fleet, 2:. Cambridge History of Turkey, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012. Collins, Marcus. "The Fall of the English Gentleman: The National Character in Decline, C. 1918-1970." Historical Research 75, no. 187 (2002): 92. Garrett, Julia M. "Witchcraft and Sexual Knowledge in Early Modern England." Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies 13, no. 1 (2013): 32-72. Marshall, Peter. "“Rather with Papists than with Turks”: The Battle of Lepanto and the Contours of Elizabethan Christendom." Reformation 17, no. 1 (2012): 136.

Moryson. An Itinerary Containing His Ten Yeeres Travell through the Twelve Dominions of Germany, Bohmerland, Sweitzerland, Netherland, Denmarke, Poland, Italy, Turky, France, England, Scotland & Ireland. Glasgow : New York: J. MacLehose and Sons; The Macmillan Company, 1907. Rosell, Cayetano. "The Battle of Lepanto: 1570-71." Rosseeuw St Bilaire, The Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature (1844-1898) 1, no. 3 (1865): 357. "Shakespeare's Europe: Unpublished Chapters of Fynes Moryson's Itinerary. Being a Survey of the Condition of Europe at the End of the Sixteenth Century; with an Introduction and an Account of Fynes Moryson's Career by Charles Hughes. London: Sherratt and Hughes. 1903." The Edinburgh Review 197, no. 404 (1903): 378. Wheler, George and Jacob Spon. A Journey into Greece by George Wheler, Esq., in Company of Dr. Spon of Lyons: In Six Books...: With Variety of Sculptures. Early English Books Online, London: Printed for William Cademan, Robert Kettlewell, and Awnsham Churchill, 1682.

Mitsi, Efterpi. Greece in Early English Travel Writing, 1596–1682. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.

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Love is Historically, Institutionally, and Societally Constructed: Using Intersectionality to Examine Racial Issues of Power and Privilege in Queer Relationships Sarah Tahir Senior, History “Morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless.” When Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. stated these words, he was referring to anti-lynching laws which would help protect his and his community members’ lives. Now, Dr. King’s words can more expansively relate to resistance—to racial, gender, and sexual inequalities. Queer people of color have displayed resistance long before 2016, when it became the key term of a movement against a president who uses his platform to scapegoat minorities, before A Tribe Called Quest raised Black power fists at the Grammys, and before thousands of women took to the streets to reassert their voices post-inauguration day. In 1989, Kimberle Crenshaw wrote “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex” to coin intersectionality, Ellen Nadler initiated the legal fight for same-sex couples to remain parents in 1967, and James Baldwin taught us that love is a battle starting in the 1950’s. Activists have been resisting systemic infringements on their right to autonomous identity for decades. Their resistance is visible in the 1960s Civil Rights and feminist movements as well as the 1970s introduction of intersectionality

and women and gender studies. Because of these activists, we can articulate how privilege and power manifest themselves in all aspects of life. Intersections of experiences are specifically affected by historically, institutionally, and societally constructed norms about love, relationships, and representation. Understanding those intersections is key to progression. To unpack the power dynamics within white and person of color LGBTQ relationships, there must be an examination of the desires for privilege, cisheteronormativity, and assimilation inherent in them due to hegemonic systems of oppression. I will use American court cases from the 1940’s onwards to demonstrate institutional infringements on queerness. I will also use scholarly articles to support my point that white privilege infiltrates every aspect of life including relationships and the dynamics which form them, with a specific focus on visibility. The LGBTQ equality movement is situated within a larger struggle for minority rights in the United States. The summer of 1969 is a microcosm for queer peoples’ larger struggles to be heard. Queer people were involved in the protests by anti-Vietnam War advocates, African Americans, Native Americans, and feminists 1 without a specific cause of their own. They had to find a way to incorporate their social justice needs quietly—yet, the sexual identities they were born with were enough Clendinen, Dudley and Adam Nagourney. Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2016), 1. 1

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to challenge the norms of society. The queer community did not stand idle as their fellow minority communities engaged in protests; they themselves were starting to ignite their own movements in San Francisco, 2 Washington, Los Angeles, and New York. The context in which the fight for queer liberation arose was one where the national census, surveys, and political parties deemed queer people invisible by not including them. LGBTQ people could not exist as a 3 unified group with legal recognition. The only way they were acknowledged as a group was as a group of sinners by alt-right conservatives and the American public in general. The demand for visibility climaxed during a Friday night in June of 1969, when New York police officers raided an iconic gay bar, the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village. This time, after numerous raids, the queer people of New York violently resisted, breaking windows, throwing stones, and giving fuel to flames that were 4 once figurative. They made a loud statement to the American public: â&#x20AC;&#x153;We exist and we are here to stay.â&#x20AC;? That Friday night in Greenwich Village commenced the modern gay rights 5 movement. Since then LGBTQ visibility and rights have expanded. The first annual gay pride parade happened on the anniversary of the raid on June 28th, 1970, the first federal gay rights bill was introduced to address discrimination based on sexual orientation five years later, and the 2

Ibid. Ibid, 2. 4 Clendinen and Nagourney, 2. 5 Ibid. 3

first legal same-sex marriage took place in 6 Massachusetts in 2004. The concepts of visibility and rights interlock with privilege, which will be explored in my argument that queer interraciality is burdened by whiteness. However far the LGBTQ movement came leading up to the monumental milestone of the Supreme Court of The United States guaranteeing same-sex couples across America the right to marry, queer activists evidently still have a long struggle ahead, considering the election of Donald Trump, a white supremacist to the Oval Office and one of the most homophobic governors in modern U.S. history, Mike Pence, as his accomplice. Queer people, with all of their intersecting identities, have resisted before, currently resist, and will continue to resist. Institutional Enablement of Privilege Intersectionality is the framework which is most useful for discussing and learning about intersecting identities and struggles; it countervails decades of cisgender white men and women being at the forefront of non-inclusive social movements, state homophobia, and racism. The need for research on intersectional identities and struggles is high, yet most LGBTQ academic research and corresponding education is one-dimensional and fails to include people who belong in racial, economic and religious minorities as

â&#x20AC;&#x2039;"LGBT Rights Milestones Fast Facts." CNN, November 09, 2017, Accessed November 29, 2017, http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/19/us/lgbt-rights-milest ones-fast-facts/index.html. 6

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well as a sexual minority. Hence, awareness of intersecting struggles is not widespread, fueling a plethora of different issues such as cis-heterohomophobia and strikingly low visibility for many young queer people of color. LGBT Youth in America’s Schools gives readers examples of what researchers need to include in their studies to serve educational institutions better: “How do LGBT youth of color integrate their racial and ethnic identities? What interventions can be used or altered to better facilitate this process?” and “Are immigrants, particularly undocumented immigrants, less likely to report anti-LGBT harassment and violence due to a desire to minimize their interactions with governmental authorities?” are questions we should be taught to grapple 8 with as early as possible. Libraries, grade schools, and universities are institutions which have the power to gate-keep social norms by choosing to represent or dangerously misrepresent different groups. When transgender youth of color and immigrant LGBT youth are left out of conversations about identity, mental health, and body health, they feel ostracized, 7

For example, the first article that comes up with a search for “gay teen suicide” on JSTOR, “Young, Gay, and Suicidal: Dynamic Nominalism and the Process of Defining a Social Problem with Statistics,” by Tom Waidzunas at Northwestern University, makes no mention of race, gender, ethnicity, class, or location as factors which affect the mental health of LGBT youth. The wide audience the article is able to reach learn about sexuality as it relates to suicide in a way that completely disregards intersecting struggles and coinciding oppression. 8 Cianciotto, Jason and Sean Cahill. "The Need for Research on Understudied LGBT Populations," In LGBT Youth in America's Schools, 155-172: University of Michigan Press, 2012, 155.

causing them to remain silent about issues that are unique to their experiences. Thus, the cycle of institutionally, inflicted ignorance, and lack of visibility continues. At that, transgender youth of color, immigrant LGBT folks, and other people of intersecting identities should not be expected to explain themselves or be outspoken about their experiences because awareness should be a societal effort—a step towards creating more environments in which the aforementioned people thrive and feel comfortable stepping forward. Accordingly, it is crucial for the discrepancies in treatment of LGBT youth across different environments and geographic spaces be acknowledged in research. Only “24 percent of rural students reported that LGBT resources were available in their school libraries, compared with 45 percent of suburban students and 32 9 percent of urban students.” These stark differences need to be addressed and further investigated to see if they correlate with differences in reported rates of depression and suicidal thoughts. Research, education, and awareness all factor into which type of queer person is visible and prioritized and which types get further marginalized in a shallow attempt to be inclusive. Ever since women’s studies emerged as a new discipline at Cornell in 1969, intersectionality has been an educational tool used to navigate a context where opportunities for women of all backgrounds are not equally dispersed. Particularly, intersectionality and subsequent women’s 9

Ibid, 157.

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studies education emerged from the call for black-on-black love by lesbian Black feminists, who were left out of the first wave of feminism and the Civil Rights Movement. “The Combahee River Collective Statement [which Kimberle Crenshaw expanded on in 1989 to coin intersectionality as a term] noted that its proto-intersectional politics “evolve[s] from a healthy love for ourselves, our sisters, and our community which allows us to continue our struggle and work.” The statement’s impact extends beyond the second wave of feminism into modern day 10 movements. A person who is a Black, Muslim lesbian, for example, will face more prejudice and institutionally-inflicted oppression than one who is a white, Christian lesbian—although both are part of sexual minorities, one is racially privileged and does not experience racial and religious minoritization. These advantages and disadvantages stack to create completely different experiences for both. Conclusively, education and educational resources function on an institutional level to contribute to the visibility of white, middle class queer people over queer people of color, concurrently contributing to disparities in privilege among the groups. Intersectionality is necessary to dissect how such privilege affects people based on their social identifiers; it facilitates women’s studies’ inquiry into power dynamics which exist within society and which naturalize 10

Nash, Jennifer C. "Practicing Love: Black Feminism, Love-Politics, and Post-Intersectionality," Meridians 11, no. 2 (2011): 1-24, doi:10.2979/meridians.11.2.1, 2.

inequality and perpetuate oppression. Inequality within larger societal dynamics and in individual ones is extremely multi-dimensional, hence why intersectionality was conceptualized. Legislation and Policy as Infringing Upon LGBTQ Agency: The Case of Earnestine Blue Historical and legislative impediments on queerness and interraciality contribute to power dynamics and privilege which manifest themselves on individual levels. For example, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act is still being enforced in Indiana, allowing businesses and individuals to refuse queer people services for supposedly religious purposes. This act results from a long history of homophobic laws and groups and should not surprise the American public. The Southern Poverty Law Center outlines what they call a “Timeline of the radical right’s thirty-year crusade against homosexuality,” starting with 1977 and the formation of the first anti-gay group, Save Our Children, motivating queer 11 activists to fight hate groups. During the 1980’s, nearly 17,000 queer soldiers were discharged as a result of the U.S. Department of Defense asserting that homosexuality was incompatible with 12 service in 1982. In 1986, the Supreme Court imposed normative sex practices and criminalized same-sex sex practices with the 11

"History of the Anti-Gay Movement Since 1977." Southern Poverty Law Center, Accessed December 02, 2017, https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-r eport/2005/history-anti-gay-movement-1977. 12 Ibid.

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Bowers v. Hardwick decision, holding that all states’ anti-sodomy laws are 13 constitutional. The 2000’s started with another homophobic Supreme Court decision, America et al. v. Dale, which allowed the Boy Scouts to continue banning gay scoutmasters, refusing gay men an opportunity to serve their communities and furthering the stereotype that queer men are 14 innately pedophilic. Moving forward, the 2000’s continued to see legalized attacks on queerness. In the context of examining queer interraciality, when people are refused a huge part of their identity based on their race or sexuality, those who refused them their rights to basic humanity become ubiquitous and superior. Parallels can be drawn between restrictions on gay marriages and interracial marriages. Bans on interracial marriages were initially enforced as a conscious tactic to embed and entrench white supremacy, while the rules referring to marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman grew out of a context of cisheteronormativity and raging 15 homophobia. Marriage has always functioned as a state institution; the laws which regulate it also regulate sexual practices and gendered expectations. Although Perez v. Sharp in 1948 and Loving v. Virginia in 1967 overruled the ban on interracial marriages and invalidated all anti-interracial marriage laws respectively, according to Julie Novkov, “The more

abstract, egalitarian approach of neutrally extending access to marriage to same-sex couples would simply let same-sex couples into a largely untransformed [colorblind] 16 institution.”

Ibid. Ibid. 15 Novkov, Julie. "The Miscegenation/Same-Sex Marriage Analogy: What can we Learn from Legal History?" Law & Social Inquiry 33, no. 2 (2008): 345-386, 346.

Another major obstacle to queer relationships and particularly, queer relationships of color, is the denial of the right to parent. Again, those who refused queer folks their right to be parents and adopt children gain a powerful edge and set norms for families that align with heteronormative, institutionally, and societally enforced prejudices. According to Daniel Rivers, “Institutional anti-gay and lesbian prejudice constructed same-sex sexuality as antithetical to parenting, actively stripped many lesbian and gay men of their parental rights, and kept a whole generation of lesbian and gay parents in fear 17 of being estranged from their children.” Rivers’ statement exemplifies how anti-LGBT adoption policies extend beyond the denial of parenting rights to LGBT folks to construct widespread homophobic views which deem them incapable of cultivating life and “likely to be pedophiles [and] emotionally irresponsible,” simply due to 18 their sexualities, which are “deviant.” The legal fight for parenting equality began in 1967 when Ellen Nadler lost custody of her five-year-old daughter to her ex-husband and Justice Babich cited her Ibid, 347. Rivers, Daniel. “"In the Best Interests of the Child:" Lesbian and Gay Parenting Custody Cases, 1967-1985," Journal of Social History 43, no. 4 (2010): 917-943, 917. 18 Ibid, 918.

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sexuality as the reason she was unfit to 19 parent. Using the framework of intersectionality is imperative to understanding how racism, misogyny, and homophobia stack to vehemently stigmatize queer women of color who are also parents fighting for not only custody rights but human rights—the right to be seen as a caring, responsible adult just as anyone else is. While the legal fights of queer white women gained public attention by virtue of their racial privilege, the struggles of queer 20 mothers of color were left invisible. Earnestine Blue is an example of a woman who had every societal odd stacked against her and resorted to every parent’s worst nightmare: The intense vulnerability of being a lesbian mother of color was so great that in some cases it drove women to go underground with their children to keep custody of them. Earnestine Blue, an African-American lesbian mother who fled California for Utah in 1974, rather than lose custody of her children to their father, described the way that racism and anti-lesbian bias worked together in the courtroom: "I think that homophobia plays into it, I think the racism plays into it. I think that the judge did not care because both of us were African-Americans. I think that they felt like I was way worse because I was a lesbian." Blue recalled that her lack of financial resources made her

especially vulnerable and said, "I'm a black lesbian female, and my husband... he had a lot more money than I did, and I couldn't afford an 21 attorney. Blue’s story exemplifies how race, sexuality, gender, class, and geographic location, factored into her difficult decision to hide her children. The judge and the lawyer who are part of a patriarchal judicial system, which is supposed to protect the life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness of all people, failed her. Also, in many cases during the 70s and especially in the South, queer interraciality was cited as a reason for custody denial and an indicator of unfit parents, furthering racial and sexual stereotypes while villainizing people who simply want to keep their children. In Nadler’s case, anti-sodomy laws were stretched to not only deny her custody and but also force her to say the names of all the lesbian lovers she had had since 1966, at the request of a D.A. agent, all “in the best interests of the child,” a “smokescreen” used to judge homosexuals 22 and impose heteronormativity. The difference between Nadler’s legal fight and Earnestine Blue’s was that Nadler’s case was given a second chance by the California Court of Appeals, which used Justice Babich’s lack of broad discretion as 23 a reason for reassessing his decision. Although Nadler still lost custody of her 21

Ibid, 917. 20 Ibid, 923.

Rivers, 923. Ibid, 920, 924. 23 Ibid. 22

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children to her ex-husband and her sexuality continued to be tried, unlike Blue’s, her race was not. Nadler had the privilege of not being forced to hide her children, resources to re-try her case, and the benefit of her case emerging as the symbol for the larger fight for queer parenting rights. However, the custody fights of Nadler, Blue, and countless others from the years 1967 to 1985 contributed to eventual ideological shifts in society and culture which the courts finally began to acknowledge and rule accordingly. 24 Overcoming racism in addition to homophobia would still have a long way to go, but the bravery of all the people who fought for their human rights during those 20 years is not to be understated. As Dr. King said, morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. So far, the racial and intersectional issue of privilege is presented using historical and institutional evidence, which helps us to understand how racism and homophobia operate on a larger scale—the same evidence can inform us about power dynamics which infiltrate every individual queer interracial relationship. In accordance with Frantz Fanon’s theories about racism, interracial relationships expose colonizer/colonized and oppressor/oppressed power dynamics which are rooted in a 25 history of colonialism. When queer people of color get stigmatized to a point where they feel they are incapable of being loved for who they are, they can very well resort to

striving for whiteness in their life. It would be easy to say that “society” has rejected them. The harder truth to grasp is that white people, who benefit from institutional racism, infringe upon queer people of color’s ability to be loved, because they have become the default half of any healthy relationship and the norm to aspire to. Yet, those with white privilege continually otherize and objectify queer women of color for their own titillation and fail to accept them into the fabric of society which has always hailed them on the basis that they stay white as gatekeepers of culture. Fanon coins the term “lactification,” to describe efforts to whiten minority races to save them, not in terms of preserving their pre-colonial cultural values, but in terms of ensuring that they will not stand out. With this view, queer people of color will not cause an uproar over their rights and their 26 lives—instead, they will be whitewashed. Symbolic Oppression: Media and Representation of LGBTQ Otherness and Marginality On a societal level, stigmatizing queer people of color takes the form of symbolic oppression via misrepresentations and, at that, lack of representation—all of which additionally factor into power dynamics within interracial queer relationships and privilege. According to GLAAD, whereas 94.9 percent of television hours are taken up by heterosexual characters, only 3.6 percent includes gay

Rivers, 936. Frantz, Fanon. Black Skin, White Masks, Translated by Markmann, Charles Lam. London: Pluto Press, 1986, 33. 25

Fanon, 33.

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males, and 0.6 percent lesbian females. Shows that do portray LGBTQ characters tend to fall short when it comes to normalizing queerness and being a queer person of color, projecting images which become synonymous with queer identity in a negative way. For example, Orange is the New Black is a popular show that has received immense praise for portraying lesbians of color as main characters, but the manner in which they get portrayed and the way their storylines pan out can provide examples of common patterns within the larger context of media representation. The show encourages a critique of the prison industrial complex, racism, sexism, and homophobia while also displaying unrealistically sexualized iconography for the entertainment of the viewers. In her article, Anne Schwan argues that the show utilizes post-feminist and neoliberal strategies to capitalize on common stereotypes found in the women’s prison genre while inconsistently celebrating its 28 minority characters. The main character, Piper Chapman’s white, upper-class privilege allows her to navigate the prison world with resources, family, and business experience at her disposal; hence, Orange is the New Black both builds on and problematizes the exploitation fantasies that

Kidd, Dustin. "Not that there's Anything Wrong with that: Sexuality Perspectives," Chap. 5, In Pop Culture Freaks: Identity, Mass Media, and Society, 129-163, 2014. 28 Schwan, Anne. “Postfeminism Meets the Women in Prison Genre: Privilege and Spectatorship in Orange Is the New Black,” Television & New Media, vol. 17, no. 6, 11 May 2016, SAGE Journals Online, doi:10.1177/1527476416647497, pp. 473-490.

come with the women’s prison genre. Her privilege also allows her to hold the viewer’s perspective and let them see through her eyes—especially in the first season where the point of view shots blur out minority characters and focus on Chapman’s view of the world, a symbolic reference to real-life racial hegemony. Additionally, the only transgender woman of color on the show, Sophia Burset, is incorporated into the show with use of dialogue and flashbacks, yet, ends up disappearing for many episodes at a time because of solitary confinement. Although this is unfortunately realistic for transgender victims of mass incarceration, the show, and media in general, does not make enough effort to flip the script for people of intersecting identities, leaving LGBT youth of color with reflections of themselves which are depressing and indicate an inevitable path dictated for them by society and oppressive institutions. Coincidingly, the main two characters, Chapman and her on-and-off white girlfriend Alex Vause, are the only lesbians on the show to get a developed relationship story-line, they eventually get engaged, while Poussey Washington, a Black lesbian who was just starting to get serious with her Asian-American girlfriend, is choked to death by a security guard, raising awareness about police brutality while also adhering to the pattern of lesbians of color having tragic storylines and being incapable of maintaining a romantic relationship. Symbolic oppression does not outwardly 29

Ibid, 474.

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relay to its viewers that they are inferior, it continuously imposes on them reflections, which gradually embed the ideas that they do not exist as people but as marginalized identities, inevitably doomed to a particular fate. Hence, the discrepancies in portrayals of white queer people and queer people of color also signify immense discrepancies in visibility and representation, which lend themselves to how comfortable people of color feel about expressing their true identities, how they navigate a society which has so many preconceived notions of who they are supposed to be, and how they function in interracial relationships which are skewed in terms of privilege. In Allan Bérubé’s experiences, “Gay men of color, working against the stereotype, have engaged in long, difficult struggles to gain some public recognition of their cultural heritages, political activism, 30 and everyday existence.” The word “existence” is key here; to have to fight for the right to keep your child or order a wedding cake is one thing, but having to disrupt the heteronormative, racist fabric of society to merely ask people to acknowledge you is completely different. As Bérubé states, “To educate gay white men, they’ve [gay men of color] had to get our attention by interrupting our business as usual, then convince us that we don’t speak for them or represent them or know enough about either their realities or our own racial assumptions

and privileges.” It is extremely difficult to convince people of a minority that is already stigmatized and marginalized that there are still people who have it worse, because their memberships in multiple oppressed minorities stack to profoundly disadvantage them. This dilemma should not be characterized as a contest to see who is the most disadvantaged. Rather, it is a call for examining how whiteness is the norm of which everything else is built around, how the assumptions and privileges it creates form “a powerful camouflage woven from a web of unquestioned beliefs—that gay whiteness is unmarked and unremarkable, universal and representative, powerful and 32 protective, a cohesive bond.” Such a camouflage has the purpose of veiling activists with neutrality in order to accommodate white fragility. From an intersectional standpoint, gay white men have the privilege of retreating to narrow definitions of activism when the fight for liberation for all people gets too frustrating and long-winded. Gay men and women of color of course, do not have anywhere near the same privilege. This reality, coupled with historically and institutionally formed prejudices, fuels power dynamics within interracial relationships which are incredibly poignant. Afterall, “As James Baldwin’s words remind [us], acting on gay desires is about not being afraid to love and therefore about having to confront this white society’s

Bérubé, Allan. "How Gay Stays White and what Kind of White it Stays," In My Desire for History, 202-230: University of North Carolina Press, 2011, doi:10.5149/9780807877982_berube.15, 205.

31 32

Ibid. Bérubé, 206.

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terror of love—a terror that lashes out with 33 racist and anti-gay violence.” In accordance with Amy Steinbugler, differences in power arise in the most ordinary moments of everyday life. In the U.S., only “Two percent of interracial gay couples and 1.7 percent of lesbian couples 34 are Black/white pairs.” Two gay lovers, one who is Black and one who is white, “are unequally positioned in a social context that privileges whiteness and marginalizes Blackness within other categories, such as 35 gender, sexuality, and social class.” Queer people experience race and racial lines as they intersect with their experiences of being in a sexual minority. Interracial queer partners have to negotiate “each other’s differential access to status and power” and “navigate racially divided social environments” to find comfort within each other, steps that intraracial couples do not 36 even have to think about. Eduardo Bonilla-Silva’s concept of “abstract liberalism,” a key part of colorblind racism, is evident in many accounts of interracial queer relationships where the white partner will diminish the role race plays in shaping his/her partner’s life and whose Black partner will internalize such diminishment to be able to say that his/her partnership “just happens to be” comprised of people from 37 two different races; this is not true. If a 33

Ibid, 225. Ibid. 35 Steinbugler, Amy C. Beyond Loving: Intimate Racework in Lesbian, Gay, and Straight Interracial Relationships, New York City: Oxford University, 2012, xii. 36 Ibid, xiv. 37 Steinbugler, xv. 34

queer person of color is so intimidated by the history of their people, the institutions which stigmatize them, and the symbolic oppression they see on a daily basis, they may not be visible to other queer people as a result of being too afraid to out themselves. Examining queer interraciality is about examining how systemic racism and color blind-racism operate to infringe on queerness and create power dynamics right from the outset of being born into a life of multiple intersecting identities which makes it nearly impossible for one to be accepted for who they are. How can a queer interracial relationship “just happen to be” if one half of that union has experienced a lifetime of discrimination coming from all different angles and the other half only has to tackle one of those angles? How can the white half of that union have negotiated their differences yet diminish the role that race has played in their partner’s life? Is that diminishment not a testament to their power and privilege? According to Steinbugler, a social context where interracial relationships are viewed as “ill-fated, based purely on sexual attraction, [and] simply immoral,” necessitates racework which includes visibility management, or modifying both 38 identities and public behaviors. Darius Hockaday, a young adult born out of an interracial Black/white marriage, can attest to feeling the impacts of historically and institutionally stigmatized interracial 39 relationships. Within his own Black 38

Ibid, xviii. Hockaday, Darius. "The Experience of Being an Interracial Child," Interview by author, November 2, 2017. 39

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community, he has been deemed “a light-skin” and “not Black enough” even though he feels the daily impacts of his skin color because of what he believes is a persistence of the One Drop rule. “I’ve been called a n*gger before, I’ve been harassed, I’ve been pulled over by cops, I know what 40 it feels like.” In terms of his parents’ interraciality, he speaks about how upset his great-grandparents on his white mother’s side were when they found out she was dating a Black man, and how that experience stuck with his mom to the point where she was infuriated with the fact that he identified himself as Black and not mixed. Hockaday mentions that although his mother will never fully understand his struggles, she should understand that she has a Black child and that she is married to a Black man—both have profound implications for how they have to carry themselves in a racist society. Her colorblindness is a signifier of her privilege and her child feels the consequences daily. Historical, institutional, and societal forces combine to construct love. From being denied basic humanity to rarely being included in important conversations about LGBT issues to only seeing yourself portrayed in depressing ways, queer interraciality is defined by power dynamics constructed from inequality. Using intersectionality to examine queer interraciality is crucial because race intersects with all dimensions of inequality including cisheterosexism and homophobia, having profound implications in terms of 40

Ibid.

privilege and visibility. Heightened awareness and eventual progression lie in acknowledging the powers that be while also fighting them for the sake of all people, not just one type of people. In the words of President Barack Obama, “Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the 41 change that we seek.” Kimberle Crenshaw, Earnestine Blue, and James Baldwin all sought change in the way their humanity was viewed and treated, and they could not afford to wait for anyone else; when their oppressors went low, they went high.

“Barack Obama’s Feb. 5 Speech.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 4 Feb. 2008, www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/us/politics/05text-oba ma.html. 41

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REFERENCES “Barack Obama’s Feb. 5 Speech.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 4 Feb. 2008, www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/us/po litics/05text-obama.html. Bérubé, Allan. "How Gay Stays White and what Kind of White it Stays." In My Desire for History, 202-230: University of North Carolina Press, 2011. doi:10.5149/9780807877982_berube .15. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/10.5149/9780807877982 _berube.15. Cianciotto, Jason and Sean Cahill. "The Need for Research on Understudied LGBT Populations." In LGBT Youth in America's Schools, 155-172: University of Michigan Press, 2012. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/10.3998/mpub.4656286.1 2. Clendinen, Dudley and Adam Nagourney, Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America New York: Simon & Schuster, 2016. Frantz, Fanon. Black Skin, White Masks. Translated by Markmann, Charles Lam. London: Pluto Press, 1986. Gomez, Jewelle and Barbara Smith. "Talking about it: Homophobia in the Black Community." Feminist Review no. 34 (1990): 47-55. doi:10.2307/1395304. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/1395304. "History of the Anti-Gay Movement Since 1977." Southern Poverty Law

Center. Accessed December 02, 2017. https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-h ate/intelligence-report/2005/history-a nti-gay-movement-1977. Hockaday, Darius. "The Experience of Being an Interracial Child." Interview by author. November 2, 2017. Keating, Christine (Cricket). "Conclusion: on the Interplay of State Homophobia and Homoprotectionism." In Global Homophobia, 246-254: University of Illinois Press, 2013. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/10.5406/j.ctt3fh5hk.14. Kessler, Kelly. "They should Suffer Like the Rest of Us: Queer Equality in Narrative Mediocrity." Cinema Journal 50, no. 2 (2011): 139-144. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/41240700. Kidd, Dustin. "Leave Brittany Alone: Sexuality Perspectives on Social Media." Chap. 3, In Social Media Freaks: Digital Identity in the Network Society, 69-95, 2017. "Not that there's Anything Wrong with that: Sexuality Perspectives." Chap. 5, In Pop Culture Freaks: Identity, Mass Media, and Society, 129-163, 2014. "LGBT Rights Milestones Fast Facts." CNN. November 09, 2017. Accessed November 29, 2017. http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/19/us/l gbt-rights-milestones-fast-facts/index .html.

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Nash, Jennifer C. "Practicing Love: Black Feminism, Love-Politics, and Post-Intersectionality." Meridians 11, no. 2 (2011): 1-24. doi:10.2979/meridians.11.2.1. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/10.2979/meridians.11.2.1 . Novkov, Julie. "The Miscegenation/Same-Sex Marriage Analogy: What can we Learn from Legal History?" Law & Social Inquiry 33, no. 2 (2008): 345-386. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/20108764. Rivers, Daniel. “"In the Best Interests of the Child:" Lesbian and Gay Parenting Custody Cases, 1967-1985." Journal of Social History 43, no. 4 (2010): 917-943. http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.temple .edu/stable/40802011. Schwan, Anne. “Postfeminism Meets the Women in Prison Genre: Privilege and Spectatorship in Orange Is the New Black.” Television & New Media, vol. 17, no. 6, 11 May 2016, SAGE Journals Online, doi:10.1177/1527476416647497, pp. 473-490. Steinbugler, Amy C. Beyond Loving: Intimate Racework in Lesbian, Gay, and Straight Interracial Relationships. New York City: Oxford University, 2012.

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Loss of Balance: Destructive Legal Mechanisms Within USA Gymnastics Policy and their Contributions to a Toxic and Abusive Environment Katherine Weaver Junior, Political Science & Global Studies Less than a month after the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, in which the USA women’s gymnastics team took home a total of nine medals, news broke that an anonymous Olympian had filed a sexual assault lawsuit against former team physician Larry Nassar. In the months that followed, hundreds of other gymnasts, including all but one member of the 2016 team, came forwards as victims of Nassar’s systemic assault. Almost all of these gymnasts confessed to a culture of fear and organizational silencing that characterized governing body USA Gymnastics (USAG) and prevented them from coming forward about their abuse and maltreatment, but what exactly about these policies were so harmful? Lack of awareness as to this matter could potentially provoke future instances of abuse, or even allow for the continuation of such mistreatment that could still be going on today. The policies put in place by USA Gymnastics were designed in a way that discriminated against athletes by making it difficult or unworthwhile for them to come forward about abuse, and those same policies governed the culture that made USA Gymnastics a breeding ground for abuse in the first place.

Larry Nassar’s systemic abuse on gymnasts and other athletes dates back to the 1990’s, when he was first reported to have assaulted a twelve year old gymnast in Michigan. Nassar was working on obtaining his medical education from Michigan State University’s College of Osteopathic Medicine at the time. In addition, he was working both on the USA Gymnastics medical staff and at several gyms in the greater Michigan area- thus, his access to patients and potential victims of abuse at this time was unknowable (“Why does abuse continue to plague USA Gymnastics?”). Many women have come forward to say that they were abused during this time, and some even made reports to law enforcement during that time, which they claimed were ignored or mishandled and dismissed as a result. In 2016, however, two events launched Nassar’s abuses into the spotlight: former Michigan club gymnast Rachael Denhollander came forward about her experiences being abused by Nassar in an Indianapolis Star article, and 2000 Olympic gymnast Jamie Dantzscher filed a civil lawsuit in California court alleging that Nassar had inflicted the same abuse on her while she was a gymnast (Armour & Axon 2018). These athletes would be the first in a long line of accusers, and their testimonies would launch a sort of reckoning in the sport of gymnastics and, most importantly, the USAG organization as a whole. Since the 1980s, USA Gymnastics has been the national governing body for the sport of gymnastics in the United States. . In the wake of the Nassar scandal and the

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impending amount of damning testimonies, more and more gymnasts began to come forward about their experiences of abuse. In late 2016, USAG hired legal consultant and former federal prosecutor Deborah Daniels to create a report that outlined any changes she felt should be made for the betterment of the organization. Daniels did so through a thorough analysis of USAG policies and bylaws, as well as other relevant documents, and by conducting over 160 interviews with various coaches, athletes, staff members, and other individuals involved in the sport of gymnastics in the United States (Daniels 2018). The report, known as the Daniels report, outlined instances in which USAG policies had directly or indirectly influenced gymnasts wishing to come forward about any instance of abuse, and showed that the policies in place were discriminatory in that they were clearly ineffective at preventing abuse, or at ensuring that those actors who were the most abusive were removed from any gymnastics-related work. The discrimination against gymnasts is a form of organizational discrimination. These gymnasts were discriminated against based on their place in the power structure of the USA Gymnastics hierarchy. Anti-abuse and other organizational policies did not specifically target gymnasts in a negative manner, but the consequences of their implementation were wholly malicious in nature. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, such indirect discrimination can be just as harmful: “In some cases, a discriminator will adopt a policy that, on its face, makes no explicit

reference to the group that he or she aims to disadvantage. Instead, the policy employs some facially-neutral surrogate that, when applied, accomplishes the discriminator’s hidden aim” (Altman 2015). In the case of USA Gymnastics, its hierarchy, though not explicitly placing gymnasts at the bottom, was designed and supported by policies that were in favor of the organization and not those gymnasts who did its greatest bidding. Though the gymnasts were essentially the basis of the USA Gymnastics organization, without whom it would have no purpose, they were consistently held to have less value and were often taken less seriously. Subsequently, though gymnasts competed for the organization and represented the United States at its bidding on the international stage, the policies put in place by the organization were wholly stacked against them, particularly in instances of abuse and other mistreatment. Though the gymnasts were carrying out important athletic work, they were still treated in a way that held them above their years. “The athletes, who were mostly under the age of 18...were treated like adults when it came to competing and children without agency when it came to virtually every other aspect of their lives. They bore all the responsibility, and enjoyed none of the freedom” (“Faehn’s Olympic Experience”). One must question how a gymnast would have felt confident in reporting abuse knowing that this was the way they were treated on a regular basis within the organization.

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The environment within USA Gymnastics, though productive of incredible success on many levels, was incredibly destructive mentally to gymnasts and wholly conducive to abuse on widespread levels. A sobering exhibit of just how low gymnasts ranked among the priorities of USAG officials can be seen in a 2000 issue of the now defunct USA Gymnastics magazine. In his magazine-opening letter, former USAG president Bob Colarossi informed readers that the organization had undergone a sort of policy shift: We have worked hard to ensure that all of our resources and programs have been better aligned to achieve our three major objectives: medals, growth, and visibility. This means that, when our teams don’t perform in the manner which we expect, they are held to a higher standard and changes are made to ensure that standard will be met in the future. (5) This damning statement establishes a culture in which medals and success on the international stage were prioritized over the well-being of the athletes themselves, and this mentality, alongside the destructive policies put in place by USAG, were the ingredients needed for a toxic and abusive environment in which abuse by actors like Nassar could easily thrive. Throughout the history of the organization, USA Gymnastics consistently advocated its reporting system for sexual abuse, which they felt was adequate for reporting and preventing abuse. Though this

reporting system existed, however, there was almost no incentive to take advantage of it, and that showed during the Nassar investigations. Moreover, the reporting systems put in place by USA Gymnastics were ineffective and a form of discrimination in that they were designed knowing that people would be afraid to use them. If anyone wished to report an allegation of abuse, their report had to fall in line with general misconduct guidelines; there was no separate reporting procedure for something as serious as sexual abuse. The complaint had to be “submitted in writing to the President [of USAG] at the Corporation’s principal place of business” and “be signed by the complainant” (Daniels 2018). This process had the potential to cause undue stress; it is hard to imagine an athlete wanting to come forward in such a way, and that the only acceptable complaint was in such a strict and rigid format. This process was also highly problematic, as can be seen in the instance that resulted in the first official report to a USAG official. In June of 2015, Sarah Jantzi, coach of national team member Maggie Nichols, reported to Rhonda Faehn, senior vice president of the women’s program at the time, that she (Jantzi) had overheard Nichols having a conversation with two other gymnasts regarding Nichols’s discomfort with treatment techniques being used on her by Nassar. After Jantzi reported her athlete’s comments to Faehn, USAG did not immediately contact law enforcement. Rather, they opted to hire an investigator (who had no

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affiliation with law enforcement, instead representing a private practice) to interview the athlete and the two others Jantzi reported as having made similar comments about Nassar’s treatment. USAG reported that the purpose of this was to determine if it “would be appropriate to notify law enforcement.” As a result, five weeks passed between Jantzi’s call to Faehn and any contact with law enforcement regarding Nassar (“Why Does Abuse Continue”). Steve Penny’s discussion of such an investigator, here taken from an email to Faehn, is a clear display of how he wanted her investigations to go. Both athletes are adults and we are going to need you to reach out to them and find out how we can arrange for them to have a conversation. Our preference is for them to meet privately with the interviewer and not involve their coach or their parents. If they had to involve someone, the preference would be the parents (personal communication, July 13, 2015). From this sort of language, it is clear that Penny wished to keep the matter of Nassar’s abuse within the confines of the USAG hierarchy for as long as possible. Clearly, he and other upper-level officials sought to circumvent any issues of complaints where they could, rather than address it head on. In addition, there is further evidence that complaints like this were not even taken seriously by upper-level officials. Emails submitted to the Senate by Faehn show that,

of the fifteen upper-level members of the USA Gymnastics hierarchy who were seemingly aware of Nassar’s misconduct, not a single one (Faehn included) submitted any sort of independent report to law enforcement regarding Nassar. This is in part due to the minimum requirement of gymnastics staff being to report to their supervisor when they came across any knowledge of sexual assault. Such was not only the legal policy of USAG, but it also had grounding in Indiana’s family and juvenile law. According to Title 31 of Indiana code, “an individual who has reason to believe that a child is a victim of child abuse or neglect shall make a report as required by this article” (31 U.S.C. § 35-5-1). USAG placed emphasis on the term individual and argued in court that, though the organization as a whole had not taken steps to report Nassar, the fact that individuals within it had done so should have been seen as substantial in the eyes of the law, and should absolve USAG from any related punishment (“Why does abuse continue to plague USA Gymnastics?”). Faehn, too, argued in the Senate that she stayed silent and did not take any of Jantzi’s comments to law enforcement since she believed Penny was doing the right thing by hiring an “investigator,” and thus didn’t feel it was her place to be involved any further (Meyers 2018b). The fact that she did not know her responsibilities as an upper level administrator within USAG is more evidence to the lack of seriousness the organization applied to abuse prevention

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awareness, and to the discriminatory policies against athletes that ensued as a result. In addition, though the protocol in instances of abuse was for whoever heard of the abuse to report it to the person hierarchically above him or her, there was also a tendency for upper-level officials to take those claims less seriously depending on what they deemed to be an athlete’s credibility, which they often held in less regard than that of their coaches. Steve Penny himself gave a concrete reason for his wariness, and the wariness of his staff, to look into claims of abuse too closely: the fact that doing so could put the coach in question in jeopardy if the rumors turned out to be false. In interviews with Penny that were part of a 2014 lawsuit against USA Gymnastics, “...the potential for...a witch hunt, becomes very real. And so it’s possible that someone may make a claim like this because they don’t like someone or because they heard a rumor…” (Kwiatkowski, Alesia, & Evans 2016). This directly aligns with the Daniels report, which found that these reporting procedures unfairly favored the rights of the accused in comparison to the rights of the accuser. In her report, Daniels also purported that there could be “an unnecessary and disproportionate concern that reports of abuse might be filed by representatives of one club in order to disadvantage a very capable coach at another club. This may or may not have led to undue caution on the part of USA Gymnastics in reviewing reports of abuse” (Daniels 2016). This “undue caution” was discriminatory in that it

almost always favored the coaches over the gymnasts who did the reporting. This, again, has both legal and discreet origins. Gymnastics, in general, is a very coach-driven sport; none of the incredibly difficult skills could be learned without some sort of training, and it so happens that much of that training is done on a highly individual basis as the athletes advance further in the sport, since there are so few competing at that level in the first place. Thus, gymnasts grow to rely on their coaches for everything, especially at the elite level when it often seems that coach is the only one who is able to help a gymnast achieve her dreams. This can be justification for maltreatment in that gymnasts (and even parents) could have thought it was all for a greater goal- namely, reaching the highest levels of success in the sport. If the aforementioned policies were in place on their own, there is a chance that much of the abuse propagated by Nassar and other coaches could have been stopped earlier due to a higher likelihood of reporting and better outcomes of doing so. However, this does not take into account the characteristics of the culture that USA Gymnastics and gymnastics as an entire sport, created over time. In addition to the sexual abuse that has been found to be so common at the elite levels of gymnastics, abuse of power in sports has long been a pervasive issue. Thus, in addition to the legal mechanisms put in place to silence the gymnasts, more covert methods embedded within the culture of the sport worked in tandem to create a toxic environment for

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gymnasts. It was an environment in which gymnasts would not have felt comfortable coming forward about any abuse or even recognizing that such behavior could be classified as such. Gymnasts testifying against Nassar during the victim impact statement portion of his trial told stories in which the people around them in the gymnastics world were incredibly toxic and demoralizing, and that they trusted Nassar because his behavior seemed kind and friendly; in short, exactly the opposite of all those around them. Because of the environment of the highest levels of USAG being so discriminatory against athletes and their well-being, they had no choice but to confide into those who showed any inkling of kindness; in this case, even someone with even more malicious intentions. The abusive behavior on the part of coaches and administrators within USA Gymnastics is even more unfair and oppressive when considering the lack of autonomy that gymnasts have in trying to advocate for themselves. Gymnasts competing at the various levels of the USAG hierarchy are most often not professional athletes, earning no compensation for their performance (usually in hopes of obtaining an athletic scholarship to compete in the sport at the college level). Often, gymnasts have no need for an agent since the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) eligibility requirements prevent them from taking advantage of any financial sponsorship benefits. Thus, the majority of gymnasts are often left to defend themselves in any instance of mistreatment or

unfairness. Combined with ideals pushed by the organization that medals were the most important outcome of a gymnastâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s career, and that gymnasts could be ostracized without chance of those medals if they spoke up, this made for a highly negative combination. In spite of such malicious treatment, gymnasts were consistently instructed to hold their coaches and national team staff in the highest regard, since they were theoretically the only individuals who the gymnast could possibly expect to lead them to their Olympic dream of glory, or to similarly high levels. This, too, led to discriminatory policies and practices. Deborah Daniels remarked on this in the first few paragraphs of the Daniels report: Because of the subjectivity of the scoring in gymnastics and the even more subjective method of team selection, the coaches and national team staff have an unusual amount of control over whether a young athlete will be permitted to participate in a competition. And in a sport such as gymnastics, in which falls and injuries are common, the athletes are taught at an early age to â&#x20AC;&#x153;tough it outâ&#x20AC;? and not to complain or demonstrate weakness... only the athletes who are perceived to be able to withstand the physical and emotional strain of competition will rise to the top of their craft and be selected for inclusion on a team

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competing with the top athletes from other jurisdictions (11). Any gymnast who demonstrated being unable to handle the intensity of the sport is often placed under scrutiny; in the case of Nassar’s abuse, that includes reporting that a coach is being abusive. This was a process that came under the microscope when it came to selecting teams for important competitions. Daniels found issue with the fact that one of the members of the selection committee, as designated by USAG policy, was to be the athlete representative; i.e., the individual (usually a former gymnast) within USAG who was designated to check up on athletes and ensure their well-being during national team training events. This made for a conflict of interest in that the athlete representative could potentially take issue with a gymnast’s complaints of abuse and leave her off a team because of it; Daniels wrote in the report that, through interviews, she had reason to believe that this had happened on multiple occasions. Thus, the structure of the USAG selection committee was also constructed in a discriminatory way against athletes who reported abuse because they allowed for potentially biased actors to take part in selecting teams (Daniels 2018). Since there were no rules prohibiting “unbiased” actors from taking part on selection committees, USA Gymnastics opened the door for selection bias that could be stacked against those who brought forward claims of misconduct or abuse. The gymnasts who were arguably impacted the most by policies like this were those who competed at the very top of the

USAG hierarchy, the national team members from whom World Championship and Olympic team members were chosen. Until this year, those gymnasts trained at the Karolyi ranch, the US National Team Training Center located near Huntsville, Texas that also served as one of the locations in which Nassar was able to carry out the most instances of his abuse. The rules and regulations regarding the Ranch were designed in a way that athletes who went there could focus only on the gymnastics they’d be performing there, and they also created a toxic environment where abuse could go completely unnoticed. In this way, the rules of the ranch were equally discriminatory towards athletes and were especially constructed to prevent athletes from coming forward about abuse, or even allow them to know that what was happening to them could be classified as such. According to rules governing the national team, top gymnasts attending monthly camps at the ranch (while training at their club gyms at home at all other times) were not allowed to attend with anyone other than their coach- no other parent or chaperone was allowed to join them for the duration of the camp (usually a few days in length). In addition, the Karolyi ranch (now serving only as the home of former women’s program coordinators Bela and Marta Karolyi) was located in a very isolated stretch of forest in Texas, miles away from any city. There is no hospital within reasonable driving distance; a gymnast would have to be airlifted in the case of any

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serious injury (LeBlanc 2018). In addition, there was minimal cell service and no payphones on site, so gymnasts had little means of contacting their parents, guardians, or anyone from the outside world in case something went wrong. In this instance, the isolation worked as a discriminatory practice against gymnasts by putting them in a different sort of mentality in which they had no choice but to focus on anything other than their gymnastics. There was also minimal food available for the athletes, and many testified that that which was available was of a low quality that would discourage them from eating it; this can be tied to the idea that body weight and performance are highly correlated in gymnastics, which led many coaches to strictly monitor their athletes’ diets (LeBlanc 2018). Many gymnasts stated that Nassar would bring them food during these camps, giving it to them in secret so their coaches wouldn’t see, creating a grooming relationship that facilitated his abuse.

2018).” In this sort of demeaning environment, it must be questioned whether the training policies and regimens instituted by USA Gymnastics were even conducive to showing them what did and what did not constitute as abuse. According to Deborah Daniels, gymnasts’ “all-encompassing training regimen can isolate an athlete from the rest of society, and limit his or her exposure to and comprehension of the normal boundaries of adult and child interaction; so it can be hard for a young athlete to recognize what constitutes acceptable conduct and what does not.” (Daniels 2018). Thus, gymnasts not only might have been afraid to inform their coaches of any abuse, but likely would not have been able to identify such abuse in the first place. Policies against abuse that can’t even be understood by gymnasts in certain circumstances must be discriminatory in some sort of way, as were policies like those governing the Ranch that ensured gymnasts were still kept in the dark.

Institutional policies related to national team camps, and the resulting culture they created at camps, were structured in a way that athletes were placed at the very bottom of the hierarchy. “[Administrators]...would search the girls’ rooms, looking for snacks that might be stashed away, according to the lawsuit and interviews with former gymnasts. The Karolyis, their coaching staff and sometimes other visiting coaches would publicly ridicule girls about their weight or bodies and force the gymnasts to work through devastating injuries” (Weiss & Mohr

Another informal yet discriminatory barrier that could have prevented gymnasts from coming forward about their abuse was the ensuing backlash they might have faced for doing so. In a sport that emphasized perfection, gymnasts already had to pay the consequences at any sort of misstep. Mattie Larson was a Nassar victim and national team gymnast who fell on the floor exercise at the 2010 World Championships, resulting in the United States slipping from gold to silver medal position. Rather than supporting Larson, the coaches, national team staff, and even her teammates

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(conditioned by fear of the adults around them) ignored Larson for the rest of the competition; Larson alleged that they refused to acknowledge her presence, let alone her performance (Meyers, 2018c). It would be her last competition on the elite stage- years later, Larson would come forward as a Nassar victim. It is difficult to imagine how a gymnast who might have been abused would want to come forward in a system where consequences like these were the norm. Thus, gymnasts were as victimized by the discriminatory policies of USAG as they were by the coaches who upheld them and manipulated them for their own benefit. Even when gymnasts who had long been retired faced scrutiny if they dared say anything negative regarding the sport. For example, when Dominique Moceanu, 1996 US Olympian and gold medalist, was interviewed by journalist Bryant Gumbel regarding her new book, national team coach John Geddert reached out to her via email to convey his negative thoughts (Meyers, 2018a). “[Your] initial quotes and coverage...have me wondering how you could stab this sport in the back. The system (sic) that you malign is the same system that “petitioned” you onto the 96 team. The coaches that you malign are the very coaches responsible for your fame and notoriety (sic)” (personal communication, July 22, 2008). In spite of the mistreatment going on around them, gymnasts were still bullied into silence for fear of retribution, or public shame and rebuke for any sort of step out of line.

All of these coaching-related problems relate to the need for a serious culture change within the sport. The indiscreet nature of such a culture change made it somewhat difficult to write this paper, since many of the policies only became problematic in the presence of such a negative culture. In addition, since the Nassar atrocities only became exposed to the public on a large scale in 2016, little formal writing has been done on the subject. Much of the knowledge on how USA Gymnastics conducted itself on a discrete level comes not from the organization itself, but from testimonies of the gymnasts who suffered its abuse. Though these testimonies were certainly helpful, it would have been even more beneficial to have more academic or professional writing on the subject to use as sources. Paradoxically, however, more and more information comes out on the case on an almost daily basis which can render previous notions or judgements irrelevant. For example, while this paper was being written, USA Gymnastics announced its decision to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, which could potentially put a stop to any new depositions or discoveries on the case due to the legal “timeouts” that bankruptcy would entail (Davis O’Brien & Ferek 2018). New developments are consistently emerging regarding the case, and those could quickly impact future research. Another limitation is the sheer scope of agencies involved in propagating both Nassar’s abuse and that of other coaches. In addition to USA Gymnastics, the US Olympic Committee and Michigan State

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University, as well as countless other groups and organizations that can’t be known, played a role in covering up abuse. While researching for this paper, it was difficult enough to pinpoint all the legal and structural ways USAG sought to conceal abuse, as was it to disentangle them from the twin efforts of the aforementioned other bodies, whose efforts were very similar. Thus, to write an entire paper that fully details all of these agencies and the roles they played would be extremely difficult to do, though it would be interesting to study the joint results of their efforts. There were many factors contributing to the way in which Larry Nassar’s abuse continued through the years. As often happens in cases of abuse of power, these policies were nothing more than a sort of figurehead that works only theoretically; when put into practice, the policies put in place by USA Gymnastics were discriminatory against athletes or anyone who wished to report sexual abuse because they were not conducive to the culture of fear that was already prevalent within the organization. Many critics of the organization have advocated for a “culture change” within not just the organization, but within the sport of gymnastics itself. Gymnastics, like other sports, was designed with good intentions in mind, and the benefits it can bring to competitors are often unmatched. However, it has been tainted by evil actors to the point that these accolades pale in comparison. Regarding the medals his daughter Madison (2016 Olympian and Nassar victim) garnered over her career,

father Thomas Kocian, stated that "You always want to protect your child and do what you can for them, and to me, at this point, no it was not worth it. There are still people at the top that I feel have overseen this issue for a long time” (as cited in Caplan 2018). Those “people” must work tirelessly to correct their wrongdoing. While this will be a Herculean task (coaches learn their ways and pass them down; programs adopt “traditions” and never really change; gymnasts fall in line with problematic behavior and learn to accept it), it will be necessary if any legal mechanisms further developed or changed by USA Gymnastics can ever expect to be effective at preventing abuse.

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REFERENCES Altman, Andrew (2015). Discrimination. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Retrieved from <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/ win2016/entries/discrimination/>. Armour, N. and Axon, R. (2018). USA Gymnastics makes puzzling decision to keep sexual abuse case. USA Today. Retrieved from https://www.usatoday.com Caplan, Callie (2018). Parents of Dallas gymnast Madison Kocian after abuse revealed: Daughter's Olympic medals weren't worth it. Dallas Morning News. Retrieved from https://sportsday.dallasnews.com/oth er-sports/olympics/2018/08/16/paren ts-dallas-gymnast-madison-kocian-af ter-abuse-revealed-daughters-olympi c-medals-werent-worth. Colarossi, B. (2000). “1999 in Review.” USA Gymnastics Magazine, 29(1), 5. Davis O’Brien, R. and Ferek, K. USA Gymnastics files for bankruptcy. (2018). Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from https://www.wsj.com/articles/ Daniels, Deborah (2016). Report to USA Gymnastics on proposed policy and procedural changes for the protection of young athletes. Retrieved from https://usagym.org/pages/aboutus/pa ges/recommendations.html. Editorial: Why does abuse continue to plague USA Gymnastics? (2017). FloGymnastics. Retrieved from https://www.flogymnastics.com/artic les

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Weiss, M. and Mohr, H. (2018). U.S. gymnasts say sport rife with verbal and emotional abuse. â&#x20AC;&#x2039;Chicago Tribuneâ&#x20AC;&#x2039;. Retrieved from https://www.chicagotribune.com/spo rts/international

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