Publication Type: Invited Paper
Abstract: “The Fight is On: Juanita Jewel Craft and the Dallas NAACP Youth Council,” will analyze the activities and contributions of Juanita Jewel Craft to the civil rights struggle in Dallas, Texas by focusing on her work as Youth Council Advisor for the Dallas NAACP. Specifically, the paper will address Mrs. Craft’s leadership, mentorship and organizing activities in the desegregation of North Texas State College, desegregation of the State Fair of Texas and attack on fraudulent trade-school practices in black communities in Dallas. Craft’s work with the youth unit of Dallas’ NAACP branch became a prototype for other NAACP youth groups throughout the state and country. Her persistent activities against Jim Crow practices in Dallas also led to desegregation litigation and passages of legislation establishing rules for trade school operations within the community.

Publication Type: Proceeding

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: This study of gay enclaves seeks to answer two questions: First, can neighborhoods in the southern United States city of Dallas constitute an urban gay ghetto according to the previous models of enclaves? Second, is this paradigm of urban enclave existence useful in understanding the current LGBT communities that exist within urban spaces? This project uses 2000 Census data of same-sex unmarried partner households, document analysis of gay and lesbian newspapers, and field study as evidence to support the existence of a gay ghetto (or enclave) in Dallas, Texas. Although the paradigm of an urban gay ghetto as used by Levine (1979) is useful for sociologists to understand whether or not a gay community exists, the model has a number of shortfalls that are addressed in the paper, including the presentation of "gay" as a unified quasi-ethnic identity that is mainstreamed to deny differences amongst LGBT people based upon race, class, and gender.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The format dubbed “guy talk” dominates sports talk radio. Dallas-Ft. Worth station The Ticket pioneered this model and earned unprecedented audience loyalty… among men. This paper examines station promotion, events and publications to demonstrate how The Ticket manufactures a visual corollary to balance the disconnected voices of talk radio. In doing so, the station gathers an audience, scattered by a decentralized metroplex, into a collected identity. However, this inclusion operates through exclusion, as both visual and audio privilege a strong heterosexual masculinity. Unlike most critics, though, I will allow for resistant readings by an audience that actively engages with the station’s heavily ironic attitudes.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper presents preliminary findings from our ongoing research on the Dallas walkouts in March of 2006. Drawing on journalistic accounts of the events of March 27-28 and data from in depth interviews with students involved in the protests, we outline four major themes highlighted by the student walkouts protesting legislation to criminalize undocumented immigrants and their supporters: the role of rapid communication mediated by social networking software, the spontaneity of the events, and the stirring emotions that attended the walkouts and lingered long after the events. These themes recall insights from the collective behavior tradition and support more recent calls by social movement scholars to attend to the role of emotions, ambiguity, and mystery in protest mobilizations.